{"id":196632,"date":"2026-05-19T12:51:06","date_gmt":"2026-05-19T12:51:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/196632\/"},"modified":"2026-05-19T12:51:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-19T12:51:06","slug":"thank-you-bethlehem-the-brown-and-white","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/196632\/","title":{"rendered":"Thank you, Bethlehem – The Brown and White"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s become my end-of-semester tradition to make my rounds.<\/p>\n

During the final week of classes, I\u2019ll leave my apartment, trudge down the hills and head into the heart of the Southside.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll start at a caf\u00e9, laughing with the barista who knows my order by heart\u00a0 \u2014 a large latte with whole milk topped with an extra shot of espresso \u2014 from the sheer number of times I\u2019ve shown my face there.<\/p>\n

Then I\u2019ll slowly make my way across town, stopping into every store and restaurant I frequented to check in, talk about summer or winter plans and bid farewell.<\/p>\n

For each semester, this became clockwork.<\/p>\n

Each year, that route expanded. It always seemed to get longer; there were more stops I felt obligated to make along the way.<\/p>\n

During my first year, I was welcomed with open arms to the Homebase Skateshop family, even though I couldn\u2019t even skate. Upon constructing a skateboard for me, I hiked up behind my room at Drinker Hall to an empty parking lot to hop on a board for the first time.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, I am not Tony Hawk. I clipped a rock and wiped out, gashing my knee and elbow.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Even then, when I returned to Homebase the next day, Aidan Wilson still encouraged me to persevere and take my bumps.<\/p>\n

Homebase\u2019s family became my first real connection outside of Lehigh\u2019s campus. I still proudly wear my \u201cHome Team\u201d crewneck and hat to support my local skate shop.<\/p>\n

Sophomore year, I\u2019d spend hours chatting with my favorite barista at Saxby\u2019s. Over the hisses of the milk frother, I learned about her aspirations to travel, only to never see her again when I stopped by in May 2024.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I hope that she\u2019s out there somewhere, her eyes wandering the world she longed to see.<\/p>\n

This year, I reported on a three-band punk concert held at Homebase<\/a>, plunging into an endless world of original music. My ears rang from the intensity of the buzzing guitars as I scribbled chicken scratch handwriting into my notebook.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I loved every second of it.<\/p>\n

The event rekindled my love for punk rock music \u2014 the genre that filled my Spotify top songs lists in high school. I hadn\u2019t gotten lost in music for years. Now, I\u2019ll be first in line at performance venues to feel that escape. I\u2019ll support the bands I now call my friends one final time.<\/p>\n

With each passing year, these stops represented a \u201csee you later.\u201d I\u2019d knowingly return three months later, when campus became lively and filled with students again. It never fully settled in that this reality could be crushed, or maybe I didn\u2019t want to accept it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Father Time can be cruel in some ways.<\/p>\n

Now, I\u2019ll be making my final rounds. It\u2019s bittersweet. There\u2019s a gloomy reality that some of these people, many of whom I would share laughs and stories with nearly every day, I\u2019ll never see again.<\/p>\n

How do you properly say goodbye to a city that has done nothing but love and support you?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Especially one that has never physically asked for anything in return.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an answer I don\u2019t even know. And to be honest, I probably will never know \u2014 I\u2019ll forever be trying to pay it back.<\/p>\n

Bethlehem is truly a unique place. There\u2019s a bustling arts scene, the college newspaper where my name will be forever etched in bylines and the place I found love.<\/p>\n

Time doesn\u2019t move as rapidly here as it does at home in New York City. But it also isn\u2019t the slow, soothing pace of my harbor-filled hometown in Long Island. It\u2019s somewhere snug in the middle.\u00a0<\/p>\n

There\u2019s enough motion to leave me yearning to explore more. But also a steady pace where I can stop and appreciate the beauty of the people and art around me.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s all I could have ever wanted for my four-year home.<\/p>\n

So, in preparation for my final rounds, I wrote over 40 thank-you cards, expressing my gratitude to the people \u2014 my professors, my peers, my interviewees and friends \u2014 who shaped me into the person I have become walking across Goodman Stadium\u2019s stage.<\/p>\n

When I make the crosstown trek in a few days, there will be a litany of stops \u2014 the most I\u2019ve ever made \u2014 to drop those cards off.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It feels right for a grand finale.<\/p>\n

But amidst all that, I\u2019ll be missing the biggest card of them. No handwritten words or stamps. Just a flurry of best-kept memories addressed to the city of Bethlehem.<\/p>\n

And to that, all I can say is I hope I\u2019ve made you proud.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s become my end-of-semester tradition to make my rounds. During the final week of classes, I\u2019ll leave my…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196633,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[5877,153,155,154,4520],"class_list":["post-196632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-4-minute-read","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-edit-desk"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196633"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}