A Texan in Memphis: It's a Birthday Party!

Ladies and gents, we have reached a milestone. A person, or rather an establishment that is near and dear to my heart is turning 125 today! So let's take our hats off to Ouachita Baptist University for reaching it's Quasquicentennial! (Yes, I looked it up)

Well OBU is doing something really neat for its birthday. The alumni office is asking people to blog about their favorite Ouachita memory. I thought this would be an impossible feat considering I have quite a few, but I figure for the sake of the blog and for the readers, I would narrow it down.

My favorite Ouachita memory is... living the dorm life.

Tigers for Life

When I first was thinking about OBU, there were a couple of things that were holding me back. The first was that there were only about 1,500 students. I come from the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex! My high school had more students than that. How on earth could I enjoy the small town of Arkadelphia with the small school to match? My second concern was that I would be living in a dorm until at least my senior year. After hearing all the fun times my friends, who were away at big universities living in apartments, I thought there was no way that I could possibly have fun in a cramped.. old.. dirty.. dorm room.

Boy was I wrong.

Within the first week of being OBU, I met more people, NICE people, than I ever did at the university I transferred from. I couldn't believe how welcoming the entire campus felt. I also settled into my dorm room fast and realized how much fun it was to meet all the girls on my hall. I started off in Maddox and loved every minute of running into other girls' rooms and constantly borrowing clothes and having fellowship with everyone.

Blowing up balloons for a surprise party. Group effort.

I lived in a dorm my entire Ouachita career. I started off in Maddox and ended in Gosser (or.. as some call it.. the "new" dorms). While living the dorm life, I met some amazing girls that became my best friends and some even my roommates. It was like I had a slumber party every night in college!

Slumber party with roommates/friends!

There are many more memories I can write about for Ouachita... Beach Reach, Tiger Tunes, random trips, CDAs (Campus Drive Arounds), EEE... but at the end of the day, when I went back to my dorm with my best friends.. the best memories were made with the conversations with friends. Whether we were laughing or crying or laughing until we cried, I will never forget those days.

And now.. my favorite pictures of my time at Ouachita for your enjoyment.