I am a terrible storyteller.
My friends will vouch for that. They have listened to my ramblings for four years, nodding along with patient interest and sometimes even laughing at the punch line when I finally get there. I actually find $5 at the end of all my stories now without their prompts.
In the four years that my friends have listened to those long-winded stories, they have also starred in the stories that I will someday tell my coworkers and kids (as we sit around the TV watching the Irish crush some inconsequential team for a national championship and then celebrate my firstborn child's acceptance into Notre Dame).
They will hear stories about Domerfest and "Ain't No Mountain High Enough." Stories about Justin Bieber and stealing gummy worms from the LaFun candy wall (I actually need to apologize to all the nice ladies who work in the Huddle). I will tell stories about gold body paint, about standing in the middle of the end zone drenched in the pouring rain and overwhelmed with joy. Stories about an administration that sometimes failed us and sometimes raised the bar for us even higher. Stories about the way the Grotto is the warmest place on campus, even in the cold of a South Bend winter, even in the cold of loss.
They will hear stories about cookie monsters and breakup wine. Stories about the Lyons Hall storage closet (well, maybe not). They will hear stories about cigars on the bridge and Flat Tuesdays. I will tell stories about my favorite Observer coworker Cindy. Stories about 90s Night at Legends and stories about belting out Avril Lavigne songs on the stage at Finny's with reckless abandon. Stories about jumping into the lake naked with my best friends in the middle of the night ("Catherine, I saw your butt!"). Stories about probability.
They will hear stories about the four women who have earned sainthood for living with my alarm clock. Stories about Aurora, who picked me up when I wiped out in front of Hot Brad From Dillon during our Frosh-O scavenger hunt, who has been picking me up ever since. Stories about Eileen, who will always be my all-time favorite romcom partner, who truly earned the Lyons Hall Spirit Award. Stories about Catherine, whose brain isn't wired for science like mine, but will someday deliver my babies. Stories about Lauren, who by some amazing miracle is still my friend after all these years, who can't ever use the correct form of "you're," but who always is my person anyway. Stories about these four women who put up with the thousands and thousands of words I wrote in this paper - and if this column has turned into more long-winded rambling about how much I love them, then so be it. They deserve all the words, all the world.
I will leave this school with a degree (I think), and I'm pretty psyched about that (thanks, Mom and Dad). But I'm also leaving with four years of stories. I have many more than four years of stories ahead of me, stories that will star those coworkers and kids, stories that will change me even more than finally earning this degree will. I can only hope those years will make me a better storyteller as they continue to shape me, because these four years are a story I'm never going to stop telling, no matter how much I ramble or how badly I massacre the punch lines.
(And then I found $5.)
Megan Doyle is graduating with a degree in English, as well as a minor in the Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics and Democracy. She would like to thank Starbucks and Nutella for everything they both have done to get her here. Megan can be reached at megandoyle823@gmail.com.
