Lessons to Live By
by Kevin Cool

Every morning last summer, before the mist had lifted from Johnson Pond and before the first car showed up in a Colby parking lot, a young man emerged from a tiny tent atop Runnalls Hill, stretched and stood for a moment to look out over the campus that had been his home. For Condon Medalist Matt Russ '96, those were special moments.
"Just waking up in the field and walking down to campus before anyone else arrived was a nice feeling," said Russ, who was working as a student assistant in the admissions office. Then he added, laughing, "It wasn't entirely rugged. I did take showers."
Living in a tent for an entire summer is a very Matt Russ thing to do. A native of Cape Elizabeth, Maine, he says his love of the outdoors was one of the reasons he transferred to Colby from Brown University after his first year of college. "When I'm out in the wilderness, especially the Maine wilderness, it's a time I can think clearly," Russ said. "I seem to have a double life--the solitude of hiking and canoeing and the enjoyment I get from being with my friends."
Colby has given much to Russ and he to it. Admired for his achievements in the classroom and elsewhere, Russ also is just plain nice. Which probably explains why he was such an effective ambassador for the College when leading campus tours for prospective students and parents, and why he was selected to represent the graduating seniors this spring as class speaker. His speech, which celebrated the power of stories--how they are shared and why they are treasured--conveyed to the commencement audience the importance of community. "The most important thing that Colby gave to me was a community of friends," Russ said. "That's what I was trying to get at in my speech--for all of the classes and activities that I've participated in, the common denominator was the people I met. That's what I'm going to remember most about my time here.
"Specific conversations, experiences shared with other people, things I've learned about other kinds of lifestyles. When you meet kids from other parts of the country and from other countries and you hear how they spent their childhoods, whether in L.A. or Mexico or wherever, you just come away with this different vision of humanity," he said.
Now, Russ and his classmates begin another journey on another plot of soil. Russ is returning to Ireland where he spent his junior year in the Colby in Cork program. He isn't sure what he will do there except that it will involve an "artistic project." He may write and illustrate a children's book about traditional Irish fishing vessels known as curraghs, he says. There is no definite plan. Russ is simply, in the parlance of Joseph Campbell, "following his bliss."
"It's a tough time," Russ said. "A lot of my friends are going to New York City into investment firms and I admire them. They're doing some high-powered stuff next year, but I can't see myself finding fulfillment in that. At least not yet."
No word yet on whether Russ will end up sleeping in a tent on an Irish hillside. "We'll see," he said.
Indeed we will.