Inspire, Summer 2005

Inspire 21 When it came time to leave Cedarville, I think we were all a bit worried about how well we’d maintain the friendship. Over the years, we’ve been separated by both distance and life changes: Jim and Mike moved to other cities. Bud moved to Texas. We all got married. Mike, Jim, and Mark had kids. But at each step, they’ve remained my best friends. We’ve kept in touch over the years through any means available, from e-mail to instant messaging to blogging. One of the most creative and effective tools we’ve used recently is the Xbox Live service. Video games had always been a favorite diversion when we lived together, whether we were offering unsolicited “coaching” when one of us was playing a single-player game, or going head-to-head and trying to make each other mad enough to throw the furniture. So when the Xbox video game console launched the Xbox Live service, which allows users from any location to play together with a simultaneous voice chat, we jumped at the chance. After buying the consoles and getting online, we quickly marked off one night a week as a permanent Xbox night. And now each Tuesday, even though the other things happening in our lives are vastly different than they were 10 years ago, we may as well be right back in a Cedarville dorm room. The conversation flows in quick bursts, interspersed with the action: “Hey, you tiled your backsplash, right? How much did it cost to rent a tile saw?” “Everybody still in for the Spring Break reunion trip next year?” “Grenade!” “Mark, I owe you a check for the U2 tickets.” “They’ve got a sniper on top of their base. Anybody got a clear shot at him?” “Hey guys, Carrie and I are having a baby.” And it was on a typical Xbox Tuesday that Jim and I had set our trap for Bud in our favorite video game. Jim sprung into Bud’s view and fired his weapon, which was just enough to draw Bud in the few remaining steps, right on top of the remote charge I had laid. I squeezed the detonator trigger on my controller, and Bud was momentarily obscured by a cloud of smoke, then launched skyward. As I watched the body of one of my best friends in the world arc gracefully through the air, I thought of how fortunate we are to still be sharing these moments together, 10 years after we first met. But there wasn’t much time for reflection because Mark would soon figure out what we had done to his teammate, and he’d be looking for some payback. Phil Wittmer ( pwittmer@gmail.com) is a senior communications analyst at LexisNexis. He lives in Oakwood, Ohio with his wife, Mackensie. Y ou sit in chapel your freshman year surrounded by hundreds of unfamiliar faces. The idea that you will build lifelong relationships during the next four years seems impossible to believe. For these two Cedarville alumni (whose days of freshman chapel were long ago), the impossible is reality. A lifelong friendship forged in nursing classes, a shared dorm room, and late-night Young’s runs has been rekindled in a very unexpected way. They met in a “trial by fire” (freshman biology class) and soon discovered they were both nursing majors. It seemed fitting that they should be roommates. The only way Becky Davis Dye ’89 was going to survive chemistry was through the tutoring of Lynn Costley Thieret ’89. The only way the two of them were going to survive the nursing program in general was through many all- night popcorn-fueled study sessions in the elevator, where they were the least likely to disturb the beauty sleep of all the non- nursing majors. Becky and Lynn supported each other through clinicals as juniors (missing all those chapels due to hospital schedules that year made them realize how meaningful chapel had become) and made the big move from Printy Hall into Willetts their senior year. The best part of living in Willetts was spending time with Miss Taylor, fondly dubbed “ET,” and living in a dorm room on the side nearest the road. It made for an easy getaway, not that they ever took advantage of that of course (except for the time they kidnapped ET and took her to Young’s, returning after curfew to ride around the Lawlor parking lot, honking while ET crouched in the back seat hissing, “Girls! Get back to the dorm!”). While Becky and Lynn finished up their coursework, they both prepared for graduation and the state nursing boards. They knew that graduating meant saying goodbye. Of course they would keep in touch, but they understood that life has a rhythm — birth and death and everything in-between cannot From Printy to Berlin B e c k y D a v i s D y e ’ 8 9 a n d L y n n C o s t l e y T h i e r e t ’ 8 9 by Sarah Dye Kelly ’95