Trees and PhDs

Last year I bought Michaela a Claremont McKenna College shirt. Gotta get her hooked on my alma mater early! She’s expressed interest – in a vague, 4 year-old way – in the concept of college and in learning more about CMC, so I decided to take her for a campus visit. Mike is out of town this weekend and I thought it would be a good way to keep us busy (hello, two hour car ride each way!).

We started our day with a trip to The Bagelry. My favorite! I always get the Route 66 sandwich on a sundried tomato bagel.

I let Michaela pick her food; she went with a chocolate chocolate chip bagel, toasted with cream cheese. Healthy!

After lunch, we headed to Claremont McKenna, where I showed Michaela the fountain students get tossed into on their birthday (she was fascinated by that, giggled at the idea of her mommy being thrown into the water), the dining hall, the dorms where I lived and met some of my best friends, the classroom buildings, and Story House (where student mailboxes are).

There were some things that made me laugh, like this:

North Quad (the part of campus where the “party” dorms are) on Saturday afternoon, showing the remnants of a Friday night party on the lawn.

And things that made me shake my head, like this:

This is Benson, the dorm I lived in my first two years. Apparently it’s being expanded. I’m sure it also is being upgraded. Which is funny because I remember when they did some renovations in between my freshman and sophomore years, and it seemed so fabulous. (Take away: I’m old!)

Claremont is known as “The City of Trees and PhDs,” and I’d promised Michaela crunchy leaf piles to be able to play in. CMC has some trees, but the Scripps College campus is much better for that sort of thing, so we walked over there and found a lovely tree-lined stretch where Michaela played to her heart’s content.

After a leaf fight, we went back to the car and drove to my other Claremont visit must-have : 21 Choices! When I was in college, a “tres small” size fro yo was like, $1. Now it’s more like $3 or $4. (Again: I’m old!) But it’s worth every penny to see Michaela enjoy it.

Of course, given how much CMC costs these days, I should probably save my money…

(Michaela, peering into the CMC admissions office)