A senior column

Ah, the senior column. Time to say something profound.

The funny thing is that most Chronicle seniors dread these things. After years of hiding behind bylines, we have to emerge from the shadows and have our headshots attached to 750 words that perfectly encapsulate four years of Facebook photos.

Sorry to disappoint.

OK. Now that the pressure's off I want to talk about Shooters. More specifically, I want to 'fess up about something that's been weighing pretty heavily on me for the past few weeks: I've only been to Shooters three times. And two of those times were during the summer, when the bull was out of commission and Durhamites outnumbered Dukies.

(Senior Suggestion No. 1: Stay in Durham one summer.)

Of course, this means that I've only been to Shooters once during the school year. But-to my defense-I danced in the cage. You see, Rich-a good friend of mine from high school-decided he would take a break from oh-so-dull D.C. and see Durham. His one request: "We need to go to that place that was in the Rolling Stone article." You know, the nightclub where "Sex & Scandal" happens at Duke.

(Senior Suggestion No. 2: Don't believe everything you read in newspapers/magazines/blogs. Luckily this rule doesn't apply to The Chronicle because, as I was told many times as editor: "Nobody reads the [expletive deleted] Chronicle!")

But back to the senior column at hand.

I mean, this is sacred space. I could have taken this opportunity to announce my official resignation as a sports journalist or talked about how this is, you know, "not a senior column." But I was never a "sports journalist," which makes resignation near impossible, and I'm not Andrew Yaffe, which makes aggrandizing self-deception more difficult. (It's OK. We worked 80 hours a week together last year. Besides, he has incredible hair.)

I could have gone on any number of diatribes about puddles, fat cats, language/math/science T-reqs or the free iPods every member of the senior class got freshman year and then saw break by mid-sophomore year. And then there's the fact that we never won a basketball championship.

I could have also waxed nostalgic about this paper no one reads. Because, in all seriousness, I don't know what I'll do when I can't make the two-flight trek up to 301 Flowers every day and say "Hi" to Rolly.

You see, when you sit in the editor's desk in 301 Flowers, there's this odd sense that you're a part of something much bigger-that you're "standing on the shoulders of giants," as Newton put it. For a full year, The Chronicle allowed me to appreciate what it's like to get the most out of each and every day.

Or I could have spoken about the giant among giants: Matt Sclafani, the former Chronicle editor whose legacy first brought me up to 301 Flowers freshman year. This was a 21-year-old guy whose compassion, work ethic and dedication to The Chronicle led him to blueline pages from a hospital bed while he was dying of cancer in the early '90s.

These were the people who looked over our shoulders at three o'clock in the morning. I'm still honored to think that I was the 102nd editor in this line.

So, why Shooters?

Why not? For one, I doubt you would still be reading if I had started with a quote from Schopenhauer.

But more importantly, Shooters-like having Hasnain Zaidi as a Facebook friend-is one of those things all Dukies have in common. Like white alumni tents and hazy LDOCs, it's one of those experiences that you can't quite capture in a Facebook album or a senior column. And it's an experience that I would have taken for granted if not for the fact that a friend had decided to make a weekend trip down to Durham. I guess that fact is one of those "senior regrets."

And as for the senior column thing. Well...

(Senior Suggestion No. 3: Try writing a senior column sometime before you graduate. Preferably as a senior.)

Ryan McCartney is a Trinity senior. He is current editorial page managing editor, former editorial page editor and former editor-in-chief.