This is already a monumental weekend in my college career...


...and it's only Friday night. Why, you ask, is this weekend unlike all other weekends? Therein lies the tale

Tonight, after the usual 5:15 Mass, someone noticed that a side door in the Basilica entry was unlocked. After debating the ethics of the situation for about 0.0002 seconds, Dan and I went up...

...into the bell tower. That's right. That holy grail of every domer's college years, that goal second only to getting into the Golden Dome itself, is ours. We ascended the increasingly steep and unstable wooden stairs, being reminded more every second of a rather tense scene or two from Vertigo. First we passed the St. Anthony bell, which is so large that they no longer swing it, for fear that it will cause structural damage to the tower. In it's glory days, they say you used to be able to hear it miles away, in Niles, MI. Now, they only ring it once a year, for ordinations, and even then they only hit it with one of those mechanical clappers, rather than swinging the whole bell (a feat which, reportedly required six "hefty" Irish to get started).

We soon realized that an entire party of fellow Mass-goers were joining us, onward and upward. The merry band continued on past more sets of bells, reaching, a few floors up, a walled-off cubicle taking up most of that floor. Inside was an interesting contraption of wires and wooden tabs--the bell organ. The sounds of this instrument can be heard playing the Alma Mater late on Sunday nights, but they really pull out all the stops on Palm Sunday, when the melodies of the hymns are rung out as we process into Mass. Although today, sadly, it's mostly run by an electronic keyboard in the sacristy, every so often a brave music student gets a chance to try their hand at it.

Further explorations afforded a view of the campus through the wall vents, nearly level with the needley side towers. Finally, after a few more flights of wooden stairs that (we tried not to remind ourselves) were surely not meant to hold more than 20 college students on an afternoon jaunt, the tower suddenly narrowed, and there was only a steep staircase, more of a ladder, really, leading up through an opening between some support beams.

Only a few of us at a time went up to the foot of the ladder, as this flooring was, if possible, less stable-looking than previous floors had been. At the top of the short ladder, I could hear the faint mechanical whirr of gears. I leaned over and reached as far as I could, and touched the back of one of the clock faces.

So, there you have it. No hunchbacks, heck, not even any bats in our belfry. Still, though, it was an exhilirating experience to be on the same floor as the bells at a quarter past the hour, feeling the sound ringing through my entire body.

Maybe Augustine was right, and forbidden pleasures really are the most alluring. But these were some darn good pears.