Recalling UT Memories

By Ralphine Major

Spending hours at home during the onset of the Covid pandemic prompted me to tackle a huge task—purging and sorting boxes full of pictures. Browsing through them reminded me just how special all the people in the pictures are to me. Most of the images I had long forgotten, such as this one of my brother on his graduation day from The University of Tennessee (UT). Wayne and I were commuters and carpooled to class. Gasoline was around thirty-five cents a gallon in those days. In the last couple of years, he has been able to reconnect with two of his favorite marketing professors.

Graduation was held at Stokely Athletic Center, a place where he and I both worked between school sessions collecting student fees. Stokely was also the place where we watched Tennessee basketball greats Ernie Grunfeld, Bernard King, and Rodney Woods at point guard create magic on the hardwood. We could never have imagined a time when Stokely was not a part of the UT campus.

As we celebrated Wayne’s birthday this week, it seemed a perfect time to reflect on this special day in his young life. While the leaves are turning, the weather is cooling, and football games are being played, I can see on the horizon another school session coming to an end. Smartphones and cameras will be poised to create lasting memories of more graduations. In the seasons of our lives, years from now someone else may be sorting through digital photos and remembering their special moment at a graduation somewhere on the UT campus.

Words of Faith: “I will be glad and rejoice in thee: I will sing praise to thy name, O thou most High.” Psalm 9:2 (KJV).