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by Billy Frey ’98
Oh, The Places You’ll Go
Chances are when you graduated from high school you received Dr. Seuss’ guide to life, Oh, The Places You’ll Go. Nice book, very cliché. I received the good doctor’s book upon graduation from Danville High School, a mere three months before I was to go to my “place” . . . eight blocks down the street to good old Centre C.
My friends gave me a hard time about being afraid to explore a different city from where I grew up, but I was confident in my decision. I didn’t realize it at the time, but those eight blocks would take me through seven time zones, eight countries, and hundreds of memories.
Carl Sandburg once said, “nothing happens unless first a dream.” My dream began in Dr. Tom McCollough’s Religion 27 class my sophomore year. During his lecture, Dr. McCollough told about a trip to Israel he took every summer to work on an archaeology dig. As was (too) often the case, I was daydreaming about life outside Young Hall’s walls when I was brought crashing back to reality by a question. I incorrectly answered the question, but the dream was born.
And thus began my odyssey. I spent the summer in Israel, recording data and schlepping guffas in the hot summer sun, all in a center of the religious world. I drank Goldstar, hit the Jerusalem discos (yes, they do exist) and, most important, learned a lot. The study of religion wasn’t my calling, but traveling became the foundation on which I’ve built my life.
The following spring I took advantage of the Centre-in-London program and spent my semester in London’s famed West End. I couldn’t begin to regale you with the stories of traveling, studying, and partying with 27 fellow Centre students; partly because it’s a blur, but mostly because I was an economics major, not an English major, and I couldn’t begin to do it justice.
Fortunately the experiences didn’t stop there. After a summer on the beach delivering Papa John’s pizzas with Clay Curry ’98, I wanted to get started on my “career,” and I headed back to Kentucky. After a minor pit stop working in a bank, I joined Alltech Biotechnology, and I’ve been on the move ever since. I’ve worked in several European countries, ridden in private jets, and slept in castles. It’s been pretty glamorous, but not always.
Last winter I spent a couple months in the jewel of Eastern Europe, Budapest. The street sign said Borzgony Utca but I’m pretty sure if Hungary has an Eight-Mile Road, this was it. From the cold, concrete Soviet housing, to the fact that my Hungarian was very lacking, I knew I was in for an experience from the jump. However, the leaking heater didn’t drown me, I made sure to steer clear of the brown chicken at the local market, and I survived. I actually like Budapest. I even enjoyed the week I spent in Serbia. I spent New Year’s in a flat overlooking Budapest: a party with good food, good drink, and wonderful new friends . . . what more could a person ask for?
And now I’m the marketing manager for Alltech Canada. It’s a bit different from my first trip to the great white north with fellow Centre students Nathan Mick ’99 and Pete Carl ’99, but I’m enjoying it just the same. Toronto is a great city, and I still quench my European thirst with monthly trips to Quebec City and Montreal. Life is good.
There’s a common denominator in all of this, and that’s my Centre experience. Sure, it wasn’t all roses. I definitely ran counter to the school’s very emphatic social and housing policies. But at the end of the day I wouldn’t have the confidence in myself and the world around me if I hadn’t reluctantly signed up for Dr. McCollough’s class 10 years ago. And I wouldn’t have traveled around the world if I didn’t first travel those eight blocks with confidence in where it would take me.
Maybe there is a reason the old give that book to the young.
Billy Frey ’98 is marketing manager for Alltech Canada, part of an international biotech company specializing in natural animal feed supplements.
Centrepiece
Centre College
600 West Walnut St.
Danville, KY 40422
Phone: (859) 238-5717
Fax: (859) 238-5723
E-mail: alumnews@centre.edu
or johnsond@centre.edu