Simon’s Rock: Now & Then

After graduation, move-out, and commencement, I was grateful for the chance to return to Simon’s Rock and attend the ceremony.

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The ceremony itself was rather uninteresting, but watching former new students graduate felt both familiar and strange; familiar in how their names unlocked frozen memories; yet strange and haunting in how much time had passed. Friends scattered by time. I was left standing there alone, in a place that's no longer my campus, surrounded by a crowd that no longer felt like my peers. I no longer belong here.

Then came the tirade from the provost, on how they "acquired" our school, only to kill it by their own hands. Bullshit. Total bullshit. They may still call it "early college" and slap the name "Simon's Rock", but everything is gone: the students, the faculty, the curriculum, and the spirit.

My mind kept drifting back to my AA commencement, the cheers, the laughter, the sunlight. But here we are, standing on a damp, muddy field beside an old seminary building (which itself went out of business a decade ago) that now forced to serve as classrooms, labs, library, and dorms. Looking at the meager list of graduates, it's painfully obvious how Bard is slowly swallowing what remains.

Amidst the ruins, we caught up with a few old professors. There truly wasn’t much left of the faculty we knew: David retired, Eric left, and the math department was dismantled. Professor Wang was still there. She really missed our Chinese 320, our “Chinese Army,” and our unparalleled energy. We had fabulous people and a really tight community that once made SR truly feel like home.

With Mike, we took a tour of the dead Simon's Rock campus, retracing these memories. It was a long, heavy day, but absolutely fabulous. It's been two years, and everything was changed.

Mod 7 was locked against the afternoon air. Staring through the glass, I remembered the generations of students who called it home. I remembered the exact way I used to arrange my room, and the exact angles of the countless sunsets I captured from my window. My banner and curtain still sat there, so were the chairs, but we ourselves, may never step back again.

The Physics classroom was hollow. Standing there, my mind still echoed on that April Fools’ Day, how we all tricked Mike with the wrong answer. Now, the room was stripped bare, reduced to a quiet graveyard of cardboard boxes, packing tape, and cold notes reading “Moving to Bard.”

I remembered the endless late-night chem lab sessions and office-hour grinds. Now, David had retired, leaving behind rows of silent chemicals and equipment. As the sun dipped low, colors flickered across the empty benches, igniting the abandoned beakers and flasks with brilliant shades of amber.

I stared at the glow, wondering if they were analyzing the flame one last time. Lithium? Calcium? Potassium? But the burners were cold, the notebooks were closed, and the only element left in the room, was loneliness.

The trees standing before Fisher remained calm. They held this grace during those long, quiet summers and winters.

Seasons change. Winds can always come and strip away the leaves, scattering us into the unknown. But our memories are different. They remain deeply rooted in this soil.

Even SoCo had changed hands. The town itself kept its warm, cozy embrace, but everything just felt so different.

Late night, we paid one final visit to Lake Mansfield. I stared out over the water—dim, cold, and utterly placid. I remembered countless times I had walked past this shore, with different people across different chapters. Time flies by, and our paths eventually parted. Now, I was by myself, wrapped in total darkness.

We know not when the next daylight will return
May the dark keep our memories, forever.

Good night, Simon's Rock.