COLUMN: The magic circle

From Sonja Stumacher's "Fragments of the Sun," Fall '96 From Sonja Stumacher's "Fragments of the Sun," Fall '96After more than two decades, mother andFrom Sonja Stumacher's "Fragments of the Sun," Fall '96After more than two decades, mother anddaughter will complete their educationalFrom Sonja Stumacher's "Fragments of the Sun," Fall '96After more than two decades, mother anddaughter will complete their educationalcareers at the University - together. From Sonja Stumacher's "Fragments of the Sun," Fall '96After more than two decades, mother anddaughter will complete their educationalcareers at the University - together. Something about the slow unwinding of time, the endless spinning-out of days and months and years, strikes a resplendent chord inside and fits securely into the corner of human nature. An embedded pattern barely unfolds underneath this existence, one you cannot escape, a steady, oscillating movement that pushes you forward and pulls you back, throws your gaze ahead and turns your eyes behind, over your shoulder, again and again. You move, step and loop back once more, layering your footsteps on top of one another in a ceaseless, infinite circle. Life twists on its own whirling axis, turning forever back upon itself as moments steadily unravel in their constant, spiraling motion. The progress we make as human beings comes not in a linear, straight-forward direction, but rather with the retracing of tracks in the ground, with the ultimate return to that place from which we set forward, with the subtle changes we experience inside after pulling away and then falling peacefully back again. This is the rhythm we follow as we meander along the trail. A step away, a spin around, a return. A simple, solid, circle. One month from now, my mother and I will take a brief walk together. Just a quick jaunt, lasting only a few minutes or so. We'll begin at around 9 a.m. at Superblock, pacing side by side until we find ourselves at Franklin Field. We'll both wear long robes and square, awkward hats ornamented with tiny tassels. And, oh yeah, maybe three or four thousand other people will be walking with us. She and I will be completing a cycle, stepping toward an ending point, toward the breath and pulse of the "real" world beating beyond the walls of the University. Mom and I are graduating. Twenty-four years ago, my mother was enrolled here as a graduate student in Music. The inevitably unpredictable shape and motion of a twenty-something existence, however, caused her degree to remain unfinished with the advent of a newer and rather unexpected presence, of a child growing in the womb -- of, well, me. So progress interrupted itself, paused near completion, dangled unfinished in thin air for almost a quarter of a century. Her life moved forward, away, spinning its own circles and loops outside the lines dividing the University from the rest of the world. In the meantime, I find myself surrounded by the same lines that enclosed her at the very start of my existence. The lines follow a path I interrupted 23 years ago with my own body's movement and faint stirring. And now that I, the interruption, have reached the ripe old age of 22 and will myself at long last break away from the walls of the same campus, Mom has finally found the time, will, energy, presence of mind and whatever else it takes, to return as a student and to complete the final measure of her education at Penn. Yes, she came back, got herself a PennCard and hung out at the library 'til late at night with her laptop and too many heavy books. She met with advisors, jotted down notes, sent e-mail messages, grabbed lunch at the Food Court, drank coffee with me in the morning and slept at my house in the evening. She came back, at long last, to retrace and then to complete her academic journey. And so she finished. And so I finished. And so she'll march, and so I'll march, and we'll both graduate. Perhaps, then, the cycle she and I are about to complete represents not an end point but rather a tiny dot on a continuous circle, a small mark on the trail of our enduring, enveloping, round path. Surely my feet and hers will carry us on, far and wide, away from Penn and probably back again, too, someday. Maybe graduation symbolizes not a final closure but simply a moment to stop, to come up for air and look around, before plunging down into the next voyage. On May 21, we'll march together, I and my mother. We'll finish together and, finally, we'll leave together. And the constant, twisting, circular dance of life will continue, on and on, looping, rising, falling, enduring?. Goodbye, Penn. For the moment.