Page 249 - WhyAsInY

Chapter Eighteen
Mass Revival
SEPTEMBER 1964 – JUNE 1966
In which our author harnesses up, finds the social dorms and a new major, writes a thesis, finds Comprehensives to be an interesting exercise, takes the LSAT and one other standardized exam—and dons a white armband.
The second and final time that I saw my father cry came when, in September 1964, I did what I had vowed to do when I left school in November 1963. We were standing in the driveway at 975 when he
surprised me by starting to sob. I knew that the tears were tears of relief and that, until that moment, he had not been certain that I would be returning to finish my Amherst education. I did what sons do when they see their dad cry; I cried as well. We embraced (and I’m sure that I also embraced my mother), and I got into my new car—a Ford Mustang that my father told me was indirectly a gift from my grandmother—and started my return journey.
It was the original Ford Mustang, it was yellow with a white con- vertible top, it had “four-on-the-floor”—except that it was really a three-on-the-floor—and it was beautiful. (I will spare you the details of how I learned to shift while suffering a baptism by fire on the West Side Highway in bumper-to-bumper traffic.) My grandmother had passed away in 1962, and my parents had told me then that she had left a small
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