And I have grown. The sports editorship of The Crimson consumed me whole for a year, but I emerged newly aware of the value of leadership, responsibility and a good night's sleep.

When I left the paper behind (except for an occasional column) this past January, I was both happy to have stayed on board for so long and ready to go.

February was out with the jive and in with the love. It was a blast, that is--a wholly joyous, abundantly restful, nearly perfect blast.

Then on March 8 of this year, just as senior bars were starting to become an integral part of my college experience and academic minutia were being relegated to life's back burner with increasing frequency, Joe DiMaggio passed away.

Former Crimson Managing Editor David L. Halberstam '55 once compared DiMaggio to an ice cream cone that you don't want to melt too soon. It is appropriate, then, that he died the same year I graduate from Harvard.

My mythic adolescence ends for real today, when I say goodbye to Harvard and its emblematic athletics. If I have learned anything in the last four years, it is that Harvard and Harvard sports live in their own impenetrable bubble.

At Harvard, coaches are never fired, they gracefully "resign." At Harvard, at least for women's sports, the chants from the bench have the power to bring you all the way back to Little League.

At Harvard, parents galore attend each and every game, even from the far reaches of the continent, often bearing pastries, sandwiches and other assorted goodies. Had I been a varsity athlete, my parents would not have routinely made the trek up from New York. I guess they just don't love me as much.

Or perhaps they are simply not as wealthy and carefree. At times it seems that Harvard families have advanced beyond such trivialities as budget constraints. The subculture of upper-middle class New England soccer moms is alive and well, folks, and it is to be found in the stands of Ohiri Field.

Mind you, I do not criticize, I merely observe. I observe that Harvard athletics, like Harvard itself, is a world of insiders. It is a rich, white landscape with speckles of brown and yellow, a conservative fantasy that I managed to slip into four years ago.

And now, the bubble has burst. As I make the leap into a newer world, part of me recognizes that is also a realer one, and shudders. After all, it remains to be seen which world Harvard has prepared me for.

All I can say for sure is that the ice cream is melted, the tent is up in Tercentenary Theater and Joltin' Joe has left and gone away. Welcome to the Big Leagues.