Building bridges beyond UA&P
Dr. Concepcion Lagos
Some of the people I admire most in life are former colleagues who have moved on to assume the greater demands of the world. They were workmates who have become friends and are comforting faces when you bump into them in places you expect them to be, in pursuits you share. They have moved on with broader responsibilities, grander stages, and, oftentimes, entrench themselves in bigger universities. Planned meets or surprise encounters are a gift. When we meet, we feast on shared memories: common friends, forever villains, insider jokes, wins, and losses. The years and distance collapse because in the blueprint of life, this is how longer bridges are built. I find that such connections even expand the University’s reach, far beyond what any organizational chart or strategic planning can accomplish.
What I take particular pride in is this: these friends now in different workspaces do not mock nor deny where they came from. They hold no snobbery toward the institution where we once walked together, with its still-old, musty carpets, the well-polished 1990s marble floors, the dysfunctional OHP projectors, and the same growling air-conditioning monsters. Whatever prestige they now carry, they carry without lingering bitterness for what they are aware has shaped their being one way or another. They speak of UA&P with a fondness that is honest precisely because it does not erase the hard parts. They remember the frustrations, limitations, and issues that drove them to seek something larger. That is real, fair, and admirably honest to the gut. That is worth respecting. In retrospect, it’s worth appreciating how UA&P and all its challenges prepared them for their next climactic chapter.
And then there are those like me who choose to remain. Is it inertia? Fear? No exit strategy? Who knows. Perhaps I’ve prayed, weighed, and chosen this? My love for UA&P is like loving your nagging parent or annoying sibling, idiosyncrasies and all. I choose to love it, sometimes hate it too, but as of now, the love remains. We perhaps do not need to share the same destination to remain connected. We only need to honor what each of us has done. Peace, perhaps, comes from knowing that a full life is not a life that claims every possible space, but one that inhabits its chosen space with intention and without apology. For what a precious gem it is to have full purposefulness in where you belong and, alongside others with the same zeal, strive to make things better together, joyfully, genuinely, perhaps painfully yet proudly.