Linfield University Astrophysics Day 33: My Swan Song
The clock hits 12 am. It is officially July 17th, 2026. A brand new day, and our second-to-last. Yet nothing feels different. No grand pronouncement of dread and despair as my time here comes to an end. No sudden wave of sadness as I realize I must say goodbye. Just the slow march of time as we all head towards the inevitable. It is still night, and I have not yet registered the coming of the new day. As I drift off to sleep, I think about how relaxing “tomorrow” will be, how relaxed everybody will be, finally done with our posters and papers and learning. Perhaps a deserved break and respite after all the work we’ve put in.
“LECTURE STARTS IN 3 MINUTES! GET OUT OF BED!” is all I hear as Jacen and Saul slam our door open. As I am jolted wide awake, and hastily check my phone, it finally hits that it is 8:17 am. I have, in fact, overslept as usual, and have already started panicking in my muddled state of mind. Perhaps not the start to the day that I envisioned, but certainly a harbinger of the events that will unfold in the next 24 hours.
Nothing feels off when we get to the classroom. It is 8:20, and there are literally 2 people there, as usual. I’ve been lied to, misinformed, and cheated out of 10 minutes of extra sleep by my friends! Alas, there is no way to go back to sleep now that I’m here, so I might as well get down to work. Wait. Work? I get hit by another realization, not the first and definitely not the last of today, that there is in fact work to be done. NOOOOOOOOOOO. Just like the previous 30+ days, there are assignments on Canvas to be grinded out. However, these assignments are just a tad bit different.
My first thought? THERE’S THREE ASSIGNMENTS. Oh no. That’s three more than I can handle right now. My second thought? I’M GETTING PAID TO TAKE A SURVEY. YEAHHHHH. FORTY WHOLE DOLLARS. My third thought? I sure am hungry today! And with that piece of wisdom, I get started on tackling this work. The first survey is an extremely comprehensive reflection of our time at SSP. 64 whole questions. And somewhere along the line, I get lost in my memories, thinking about all the fun I’ve had with my friends here, and all the amazing moments and new things I’ve tried. Then it finally hits me. Today is our last full day here. There is no more tomorrow. No more “we’ll do that later”. And certainly no more banging on each other’s doors trying to wake each other up. And as I think about all this, tears start welling up. Out of sadness for what I am losing? Out of joy for what I have gained? Or maybe my eyes are just dry? I guess we’ll never know.
As everybody slowly trickles into the classroom, in various states of disrepair, the only sounds are the ambience of the clicking and clacking of the keyboard, a far cry from the normally boisterous room comprised of people talking over each other, a faculty member lecturing, or just human noise in general. And as everybody finishes up the surveys and reflections, I look up to see three people playing Hollow Knight. Jacen, Gavin, and Rastin. Our very own three musketeers of playing Hollow Knight, with Anshveer (or Big Boss, as we call him) their Monsieur de Tréville, instructing them through loud whispers, and guiding the three of them through the game. And now we play the waiting game (or video games apparently). For the large part, all of my friends have finished the requisite work, and now we are pretending to look busy while trying to pass the time. I, for one, am grinding away at Zooniverse, this really cool citizen science website that allows me to help classify astronomical images for the purposes of research!
Welp. There it is. Dr. R has given us the green light to leave the room if we’re done. And suddenly there is a huge wave of migration into the classroom next door, room 117, our home away from home, where we seek solitude and peace (for video gaming purposes). As I walk in, I spot the row of signed asteroid frames lining the table at the front of the room, frames that every person at SSP has signed and that will be taken home by every person here. And in the back of the room, of course, is a row of 6 computers, all with Hollow Knight opened. The irony. The juxtaposition. At the front of the room, Ms. Yazzie is making final arrangements and discussing official business with students. At the back, us. A sea of wailing gamers, producing various sounds of distress.
And now, it’s time to say goodbye to my computer. Thinkbook #27. My constant companion for the past month, finally being factory reset. Never would I have ever imagined that the first farewell I’d say at SSP would be to my computer.
For our final lunch at Linfield, it was surprisingly brief, with the main highlight being some delicious raspberry churros. I would attribute this to the fact that with packing on everybody’s minds, nobody really has the appetite to eat too much. Speaking of packing, I did not do ANY packing this afternoon. Instead, I played pool with Rastin. And in this singular afternoon we both underwent an enlightening transformation, receiving a divine revelation: we are both absolutely atrocious at pool. Indeed, I probably pocketed more of his balls than my own.
Then came dinner. Dinner was the first real sign of farewell, a grandiose gesture from Chef Marcus and his amazing team at Linfield. A catered dinner comprised of more utensils than I knew what to do with, a delicious three course meal, and a table full of my best friends, surrounding me one last time. At the end, my good friend Max and I presented Chef Marcus with a large thank you card signed by everybody at SSP, along with some impromptu speeches expressing our gratitude and appreciation for him.
After dinner comes what is probably our last official series of group farewells: group photos and the award ceremony. Everybody congregates at the academic building, and we tackle the group photos at the direction of our faculty. Then, the awards ceremony. Every TA and faculty member stood up to give their own thank-you speech, a series of emotional overtures to the presentation of our awards and certificates. Throughout the whole process, there was the continuous accompaniment of sniffles, permeating the auditorium as everybody tried to hold back tears and emotions. What came next, however, was a complete surprise to us all: paper plates made by Dr. T and the TAs, adorned with drawings and a short phrase, encapsulating our most outstanding or memorable traits. Capturing our quirks and oddities, these plates drew my mind to my fondest memories of each person on stage: “Big Boss” Anshveer, which was our affectionate nickname for him due to his intellectual superiority and commanding presence; “The Next Yo-Yo Ma” Caleb, for his talent with the Chinese yo-yo; “Mr. Worldwide” Rastin, who knows four different languages and traces his roots back to many nations around the globe; “Bird” Jacen, who introduced bird calling to our entire cohort; and so many more.
The final group activity of the night is watching Inception in the auditorium, with delicious snacks provided by Caleb (shoutout to his grandmother for some amazing cookies!!), and surrounded by my friends who find it sacrilegious that I’ve never watched Inception before. The movie was amazing, but the underlying themes of the fleeting nature of reality and dreams and the pain of farewells maybe hit a little too close to home. I still haven’t fully processed the implications of leaving SSP tomorrow: no more falling asleep to the sound of Gavin scrolling on his phone, no more saying goodnight to Caleb after coming back from the academic building at 12, no more squeezing into the boys’ bathroom to hear four other people yelling at each other across stalls and showers, and no more delicious meals from Chef Marcus. Just me, myself, and I.
To conclude the night, I pick up my final piece of memorabilia from my time here, an asteroid photo frame designed by my teammates Izzy and Maya (Ursa Miners for Life!!), and signed by every single person here at SSP. Then, I head back to dorms to resume the main event of the night: shoving everything into my suitcase. Miraculously, I manage to finish just before 11 pm, feeling extremely proud that I have procrastinated a few days’ work into two hours! Yet suddenly, the room feels empty, without all our trash strewn across the floor, without our personal belongings placed on random shelves, and without the certainty of a tomorrow at SSP.
And that is how I find myself in a blue plastic chair, smack in the middle of this beautiful lawn, surrounded by the night sky and its all-enveloping darkness. I look up, and time seems to stop. One of the few times in my life I have taken the leisure to pause my life and admire the beautiful stars. I see the Big Dipper, Polaris, Vega, Arcturus, and so many other stars, unnamed but not unseen. After an hour, I look up again, and discover that the Big Dipper has appeared to move across the night sky. And that’s when it all falls into place — everything I learned this summer is not some abstract concept living only in our minds and notebooks: the twinkling of stars due to atmospheric turbulence, the movement of the celestial sphere due to the rotation of the Earth, and asterisms and constellations I’d only ever seen before on star charts.
It’s honestly a really wild feeling. Back home, there is so much light pollution, I see about three stars a day, and more likely than not two of those are airplanes. But here, even fighting through the glare of these streetlights, or my classmates’ collective brilliance, the beauty of the night sky still outshines it all. The same stars that exist above my house, just visible for once. And sitting here, in the middle of the night, I feel a strange sense of calm. Harsh yellow streetlight on one side, ancient starlight on the other; the sound of crickets, the hum of building generators, the crackle of electricity; so much to see, so much to feel; and yet underneath it all, lies a silence. Temporarily whisked away from other humans, it almost feels as if it is just me, myself, and I, in the wilderness, the great outdoors.
And under the gaze of Mother Nature, McMinnville has become my Walden, a place of self-discovery and a breeding ground for novelty. New people, new memories, and new experiences, all from this 5 week stretch of living here. And as I relax into my chair, contemplating all of my many feelings and emotions, July 17th draws to an end. With that, our last full day at SSP is basically over. One last farewell to my fellow participants, to the faculty, and to the Linfield staff. We may go on our own unique paths from here on out, but I am proud to say that they all converged here, at this specific place, during this exact time. Getting to know every single one of you has genuinely been an honor, and I hope to see many of you again soon!
Lucas Q., out.
-
Lucas Q.
SSP Participant
Hi everybody! I’m Lucas Q., hailing from the Bay Area in California! I really love physics, astronomy, and basically anything STEM-related, and I love competing in Science Bowl! You can probably find me taking pictures of sunsets, clouds, flowers, or animals in the great outdoors, or attempting to engage in any sport known to man indoors (and failing miserably).
