To the Massachusetts Daily Collegian,

I hope you’re doing well and my sincerest apologies for the belatedness of this letter.

As you can imagine, I’ve been avoiding writing this, as it is signals my time with you coming to an end.

Over the past four years, I watched the graduating class pen their emotions and words of advice so cohesively. Their sentences flowed, memories so clearly portrayed, perfectly grasping their experience in just one page, and it even felt like I too was there in the room with them.

Expressing my emotions has never exactly been my strong suit, let alone writing them down.

I’ve been typing, re-writing and pushing back this column for as long as I can remember. I even tried to write it with an actual pen — yes, those still do exist. First on a yellow legal pad, then on a gas receipt and finally on the back of a New Yorker magazine.

You and I have had to work through a lot, even when we just met. From almost losing our office, being swallowed whole by the inevitable decline of print journalism and then most notably, a global pandemic.

Getting to know you has been to say the least, a trying experience.

Through adversity, you and this community have remained strong and resilient. Along the way showing and teaching me the true importance of leading with kindness, honesty, empathy and always staying teachable.

Even though our relationship looks a bit different than those of others, my education being rooted — no pun intended — in vegetables and soil, not AP style, I too found a home with you.

For the past four years, you’ve been arguably the most consistent part of my life. My first day of college began with you, and my last day of college will end with you.

My fondest memories began in your old stomping grounds, which has now been newly coined the “old office.” Congratulations on the move by the way – I hope you like your new space.

Before the world was flipped upside down, I’d spend hours sprawled out on your old, worn-in couches, flipping through the words of past students in the archives, bound together by only a single thread. It became very clear to me early on that this place would be the defining aspect of my college career.

I often found myself reading the infamous door signed with words of advice from Collegian members past, staring at your walls that were littered with photos, news clips, signatures, handwritten manifestos from readers, or simply chatting away with other staffers who were just as enchanted by your affinity too.

You have given me some of my dearest friends and mentors, whose friendships and kindness have been unparalleled. Relationships that have carried me through personal losses, heartbreak, and the largest trial of all: coming to terms with the fact that I will never find a decent bagel in Massachusetts.

I have learned and been challenged in more ways than I can count. But here we are, at the end of the road. And although our time together has come an end, you’ll always have a very special place in my heart.

I’ll end this letter with what you’ve said to me before, and what I’ll say to you today: leave this place a little better than how you found it.

Till next time,
Morgan

Special thank you to my dear friends Annie and Rachel.

To my beyond patient parents. 

To Touri, Zach and Matt. 

To the resilient Collegian seniors, and the Collegian staff who came before, and will come after me.

And to everyone else who’ve I worked closely with, I would simply not be here without you.

Morgan Reppert can be reached at [email protected] or followed on Twitter @reppertmorgan.