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Footsteps

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Harry Crytzer (CGS ’94):

We hurried across the street, my oldest brother and I, to find the right doorway for my graduation picture. In my hands I held a yellow and dated photograph of our father, in his graduation outfit, not quite smiling but sporting a look of just having completed something big. My father passed away when I was young, and I grew up holding on to that photograph like I was holding on to him, and now it was my turn to recreate that picture.

My brother and I picked the doors towards Bigelow Boulevard, which didn't match any part of the building in the picture, so we headed to the Forbes Avenue side. Nothing matched there either, as well as at the next entrance. By the time we got to the Fifth Avenue side, we were both out of breath and kicking ourselves for picking the wrong direction. But it was clear to both of us that we had the right place. So there, standing in the same place in front of the Cathedral of Learning that my father stood when he graduated in 1951, I stood in my cap and gown. As I tried to remember the expression on my father's face and figure out how I would duplicate it, I could only smile with my—and my brother’s—sense of accomplishment in finding the right spot.