On the eve of commencement, President Campbell hosted a dinner party in his home both to honor Mr. Noble for the honorary doctorate which he will be receiving and to thank him for the year of service which he has given to Carthage and specifically to the Carthage Choir. What was especially nice about this gathering is that President Campbell wanted the guest list to consist almost entirely of good friends of Mr. Noble rather than notable Carthage people. So the guest list included Mr. and Mrs. Campbell – of course- and one member of the board of trustees – but the other ten people there were the guest of honor himself, eight hand-picked friends of his, plus my colleague Mark Petering, who is a Luther grad. So rather than being a fairly stuffy and stilted affair, as it so easily could have been had it been approached differently, it was instead a warm gathering of friends that could not have been more pleasant or enjoyable.
Actually, one of the things I liked most about it was that Mrs. Campbell assigned our seating and did so very carefully in order to split up spouses between the two rooms. . . and I was fortunate indeed to be seated with Mr. Noble, Mrs. Campbell, Cathy Gentes (a dear friend of Mr. Noble’s whom I have grown to know and like over this past year) and several other friends of Mr. Noble who have come for the weekend. (One couple, the Vaalers, had a daughter named Anne who was a two years behind me at Luther, sang in Nordic during my senior year, and knew my brother Steve really well. The other couple, the Nelsons, live in Decorah and know my sister Randi. (Mr. Nelson works in Luther’s development office and is a super nice person- as is his wife.) Anyway, around our table was Mr. Noble, Mrs. Campbell, Cathy Gentes, Mrs. Vaaler, Mr. Nelson, Mr. Gorton (a member of the Board of Trustees) – and me. In fact, Mrs. Campbell asked me to sit at the head of the table as co-host, which sort of took me aback for a moment. . . but this turned out to be a great group of people who so easily chatted with one another and could not have been more pleasant to be with.
There is something a little bit scary about such a gathering. First of all, you’re dining in the home of the president himself and there is this undeniable tension between trying to enjoy one’s self and be entertaining on the one hand. . . and on the other to be correct and proper and use the correct fork and not talk too much or in any possible way draw undue attention to yourself. Somehow we all managed both, I think- and when I looked at my watch and saw that it was 9:30, I could not believe that the time had flown by so quickly. . . which is the best compliment you could give to a party.
The most challenging part of the evening, actually, came afterwards when I had to rush home and try to get our guest bedroom in shape for an unexpected house guest. Cathy Gentes had to return home to Illinois in order to play organ for church tomorrow morning, but her husband George was planning to stay up here and go to Baccalaureate- if he could find a vacant hotel room, that is. That’s when I offered him the use of our guest bedroom- an offer which he gratefully accepted – but that meant that I had to run home and get 4000 cassette tapes off the bed and out of the room. (They are now piled HIGH on the bed in our other upstairs guest room, which used to be our computer room and has now basically become a room-sized junk drawer.) That will allow us to go together tomorrow morning to pick up Mr. Noble and bring him to campus and shepherd him through a full day’s worth of festivities. culminating in the commencement exercises at which he will receive an honorary doctorate. And I will be the faculty host who actually places that doctoral stole around his neck – something which I can scarcely believe. Then again, I ate dinner in the president’s house tonight and didn’t spill a drop on myself! So clearly, All Things Are Possible!
pictured: dinner tonight at the president’s house. My wife was seated at the table in the other room. (That’s where they put all of the trouble makers.)