Above, from left: Riley Gardner, Maggie Law, Brenna Liponis, Peyton Wilson, and Ziwe Fumudoh Center: Alex Farrell Left: Ramya Prathuri
Top: “Vivat academia! Vivant professores!” Kyle Franco and Charlie Walters join their voices to the chorus of the traditional 13th-century academic hymn “Gaudeamus.” Above, from left: Annie Rau, Taylor Smith, Caroline Kaufman, and Helen Lord
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of the StoryCorps booths around the country, and sitting at a small bare table across from one another with microphones in front of them, they begin to talk. Everyday details, along with feelings never before revealed, begin to emerge.
You might ask questions from your earliest history like:
Inspired by StoryCorps, I once taped an interview with my 90-year-old mother about her childhood in small-town Pennsylvania during the Great Depression. She told me how she had cajoled her mother into letting her deliver newspapers after school to earn extra money, how the canvas bag holding the afternoon edition of the Harrisburg Telegraph hung heavy on her shoulder, how excited she felt to be given an extra nickel for landing the paper smack in the middle of a neighbor’s porch, every day for a week. I learned a lot about my mother that day and a lot about myself.
• What was your favorite children’s book to read to me?
So, a suggestion, Seniors: take the time soon to interview, or at least to have a long conversation with, your mother, father, or another close family member. Ask them about their lives and your life so far. And listen, really listen, to their answers. Andover | Commencement 2010
• What is your first memory of me? • Tell me about my very first day of school.
And ask questions about your more recent history: • How did you feel on the day you dropped me off at Andover? • How have you seen me grow and change? • What do you hope for my future? In these conversations you will discover from your past life clues about whom you have become, and also insights into the soul of someone you care for. As the title of the StoryCorps book puts it: Listening Is an Act of Love. It was not just family members who helped make you who you were when you came here. The teachers who taught you shaped you as well. This came home to me with shining clarity on that grand day of the spring Andover-Exeter games. My husband