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Close your eyes and think about the one thing you love more than anything else in the world.
You don’t have to tell anyone what it is. You can keep it to yourself if you must. It’s your passion, the special something that drives you out of bed everyday and makes life worth living.
If you love it enough, you don’t have to tell people about it. They will already know.
Right now there are a bunch of teenagers running around campus, sometimes dressed up better than I’ve ever been, carrying instruments in their arms and music in their hearts.
Do not fault them for their passion.
Do you like when someone complains that you watch too much football or play Halo 3 too much? Maybe someone thinks you spend more time with your car than you do with other people.
Perhaps you had a chemistry set when you were 10 and your mom wondered why you never went out to play with the neighborhood kids.
It’s the same thing with Jazz Fest kids. They are doing something they love, something many other kids aren’t doing. Some of them are even good at it.
If you were thinking that there isn’t anything you still love from when you were a kid, I’d say a trip down memory lane might be in store for you. Especially if you feel lost or like you are just floating by.
Those cheap chemistry sets are probably responsible for 80 percent of the science majors here today.
This week’s festival could keep these kids involved in music for their entire lives. Try telling me that’s a bad thing.
If you can’t find your own passion, close your eyes again and think of the reasons you are here. Ask yourself the “Office Space” question: If you had $1 million, what would you do?
Buy a bigger chemistry set? Learn to play the drums? Write a novel?
Even if you’d give the money to charity, that’s still something. In terms of the million dollar question, it means you want to help people.
All I want, really, is for my fellow students not to begrudge our annual visitors. One time a year, you can give up your parking space, deal with some overexcited teens, wait a little longer for your cheeseburger and remember what it’s like to love something.
Not very many of us are old enough to be so jaded about high school that we can’t stand the sight of a 15-year-old in a bowtie and vest.
None of us are old enough to have lost the passion for living.
Go ahead and fill your beakers with colored water and baking soda or spend a few hours trying to write blank verse poetry in a coffee shop. Do whatever it is that makes you happy and do not be bitter about anyone else’s happiness.
And let the kids have their fun. Some of them only get a trip like this once in a lifetime.
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