just desserts.

The university experience can be likened to the experience of a several course meal. Freshman year or that first semester is like an appetizer; the in between years are the main course; and the completion of another

school year or even an entire senior year is like the dessert. While some might prefer to do without, dessert is the most delicious part of the meal for many.

This year we have chosen the yearbook theme “Just Desserts” to signify

By Krista Goodman

02 -- COVER Photo by Jessica Bills. Pictured: Francis Malkai

the sense of rich, bittersweet completion. Whether you are a freshman just completing your first year or a graduating senior, a sense of accomplishment and completion at the year’s end is something that we all have in common.

In order to reach that completion, a lot of hard work and effort goes into a long journey. God has a lot to say about hard work in the Bible.

“Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means.” - 2 Corinthians 8:11

It is our hope that each time you flip through the pages and look back

through the year that you experience the richness of everything that led to the dessert. Most importantly, we hope that the desserts are an extremely rich and bittersweet part of your university experience.

Further, the dessert is not all that completes the experience, but many treats occur along the way. Those random adventures with your friends or those late nights during finals week that are memorable because they involved more or as much laughter as they did studying. Those and everything in between complete the richness of the college experience.

-- 03Photo by Jessica Bills. Pictured: (left to right) Nichelle Trulove, Krista Goodman and Jennifer Price

Savoring the sweetness of your senior year

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I n other countries, it is a regular day phenomenon to start off one’s meal with desert. The logic of such a custom lies on sound and stable reasoning. What if one was to die during the first course of a meal?

Eating ordinary staple foods of nutrients is no fun. Life is short, more specifically college is short.

College is a time to be cherished, savored, not to be rushed, not to be procrastinated and not to be shoved to the corner. It is a time to enjoy, to experience new friendships, to live as a stupid teenager before the world barges in saying, “Grow up and eat your healthy brussel sprouts.”

Dessert should be enjoyed first and foremost. Just as seniors and any college student should stress less and expand their fun horizon and taste of the sweets CBU has to offer.

Looking back on college, it is baffling to see the similarities between a three-course meal and the different years.

Freshman year is comparable to the beginnings of appetizers. Sometimes you taste a savory plate of nachos and other times you order a salad and it turns out there is not enough dressing and one can taste the healthy in each leaf.

Just like freshman year, sometimes you have an amazing first year from friends to activities to classes. Other times you focus too much on friends, too much on activities or too much on classes and you wind up with an “incomplete” and a few not-so-delicious first semesters.

Sophomore and Junior year can be compared to the main course (like hamburgers, chicken, fish, steak or pasta). These years, you have figured out better who you are, who your friends are, what you want to major in and what you are doing with your life. Sometimes it feels complete right there.

Most of the time we stop at this point in our life meal. However, we leave out the most important aspect...dessert.

Senior year is the dessert of college.The stress fades as the year wraps up and you learn to enjoy more. You

might indulge in weekend trips or treat yourself to out-of-town adventures. You might reward yourself for all your hard work. You find joy, excitement, pleasure and tastiness.

Majors can be counted as the flavor of the ice cream cone that is college. Deciding your major means deciding what path to be taken, what people to meet and where all your time will be spent.

Francis Malkai, senior engineering major, explains his inspiration for his major came from an unlikely source. “To be completely honest, I never gave much thought to my major growing up. When it was finally time to decide, I had an unusual fascination with the marvel comic character Iron Man,” Malkai said.

It is a brilliant process how inspiration comes to us. Melissa Chestnut, senior early childhood studies major, was once drawn to another major. Through her parents’ love for orphans she came to find a new major to call her own.

“My entire life I thought I would major in English so that I could write books and short stories--as that has always been a passion and gifting of mine. However, my senior year of high school that all changed. So I came into CBU knowing what I wanted to pursue, I just had to figure out what they called it here,” Chestnut said.

Speaking of English majors, let us pretend we are in a creative writing class. The assignment is to compare a dessert to your college experience.

Nate Lawrence, senior, tackles the project head, explaining what college means to him in the dessert world. “It’s a banana split. You start with a banana, which is awesome and fun, but can be a bit awkward in certain situations. (Freshman year) You then add some ice cream and things seem to work out a little better. (Sophomore year) Then, you consistently add more toppings as life goes on. And the cherry on top? I haven’t gotten there yet...I’m saving the best for last!” Lawrence said.

Bianca Johnson, senior, explains that her college experience was like mint chip ice cream “because sometimes there were challenges (like memorizing books from the Old Testament and reading court cases at 3 in the morning) which are best represented by the hard dark chocolate chips. However, there were times where I had a blast with my friends and the opportunities that I was given, which would be best emulated as the mint ice cream because it is cool and smooth.”

With the final bites of the dessert, younger students can look up to seniors to see what and what not to do.

“Being from New England, California is completely different world. I suppose I didn’t take advantage of where I was, didn’t see and do as much as I had wanted to or make a whole lot of good friends. But I still enjoyed being here and enjoyed making the friends I did,” Christiana Grochmal, senior, said.

“I wish, my freshman year, I knew that life didn’t have to be picture perfect. It was really hard for me to transfer so much, because I thought life was supposed to be a straight line. I was definitely wrong. I would have saved myself some grief having known this ahead of time,” Jenny Miner, senior, said.

Continuing students can be encouraged to make the most out of their college years and enjoy every bit of the sweetness of college.

By Jessica Bills

(Interviews by Jessica Bills, Jennifer Price and Krista Goodman)

Photos by Jessica Bills. Pictured: (Main p. 3) Melissa Chestnut. (p.4 left) Francis Malkai. (p. 4 right) Krista Goodman. -- 05

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A s the hot fudge drizzles atop the luscious ice cream, so the final

days of college seem to slowly melt away. No matter the dessert

that seems to define senior year—banana split, cheesecake, pie,

cake or ice cream—all desserts must come to an end.

Some desserts are enjoyed slowly or devoured in one bite but in the end

they are all eaten up. Similarly, the college experience may seem to drag

on, or it may zoom by in a flurry.

However, in order to enjoy the dessert for what it is—the finale, the

end, the BIG BANG!—you also have to enjoy the main course. Regardless

of whether main course is dry or bland knowing the best is saved for last

completes the meal in and of itself.

As you reach the last bite, the college experience must reach its last

hoorah. It is one final moment that is simply...bittersweet!

By Jennifer Price

-- 07Photo by Jessica Bills and Jennifer Price

Angelos 2012.