Published in The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 7, 2009

Some of us are still waiting for the tomatoes to ripen.

He had always thought the word was a synonym for a four-bagger in baseball. Alternatively, the animated father of Bart Simpson. He had never been required to read the real Homer. Never struggled through the Iliad or the Odyssey in high school—not in Greek, not in English, not in prose translation, not even in one of those comic-book versions they make for kids. Before he came to Puget Sound, he had never run into the name Odysseus.

Somehow, for me, it was like coming home.

Tomorrow is my mother’s birthday—the 92nd time this date has arrived with her name on it. It’s a big day for her, of course, but also for my sister and me.

Now I can really see it.

As we have said from the first day of our campaign, I have come to know that each of you is one of a kind, just as the university you have supported so generously is such a unique and singular place. I am aware that you each have your own distinct Puget Sound story to tell. You have been inspired or influenced by a certain something or someone at the university and have invested in it with one hope or another in mind for the future of this great place. And as I think about thanking you for what you have done, words fail me.

I wake up to music every morning. It's not coming from a clock radio; I don't have one. And it's not students performing at the School of Music, within earshot of our house, during early-morning practice sessions. Not that early. This is music no one else can hear-it's playing in my head. Sometimes it's a tune I'd heard on the radio the day before. Sometimes it seems to have mysteriously welled up from my unconscious, a memory sparked by an unremembered dream. Sometimes the song expresses something I worried over as I drifted to sleep the night before or a challenge in the day coming up.

Constant. Infinite. Irrational. Transcendental. What does this combination of qualities evoke in your mind? An account of the divine, perhaps? The story of perfect love? The mystical state of undifferentiated oneness with the universe?

If I were to tell you that what I have in mind is a commonplace relationship we have all encountered, what would you think? And what if I were to tell you it’s also a number?

I don’t think of myself as a foodie, exactly, although I have been so accused. I am a serious diner, though, and I believe nothing more divine than a thoughtfully prepared meal at a great restaurant with someone you love. I also admit to being hooked on that TV cooking competition Chopped. But a foodie? I am afraid there is just a lot more cacciatore in this Jersey boy than cordon bleu.

“There’s a darkness on the edge of town.” I find myself singing that song to myself a lot these days.