Parents’ weekend is a joy that only comes once a year. The only purpose of the weekend is to compare how much the parents love their children. Some will make journeys from foreign countries just to see their kids for a few days — parents who love their kids — while others decide against driving a mere half-hour from their Nashville suburb — parents who, for a lack of a more appropriate word, “dislove” their kids.

The cause of the differences in love is the difference in wealth because, as any good American knows, money equals love and love equals money. Looking at the stats from last year’s parents’ weekend, one clearly sees a pattern: Nearly half as many senior parents showed up for Family Weekend as junior parents, nearly half as many junior parents showed up as sophomore parents, and nearly half as many sophomore parents showed up as freshman parents. Again, the reasoning is clear: love.

The freshman parents have only paid one tuition bill so far and as such still love their kids. However, as time goes on and the list of bills paid to Vanderbilt becomes longer, parents start to wonder how much they love their kids. Fewer and fewer parents attend Family Weekend until the year after senior year no parents at all show up. Let that sink in: No parents showed up this year for the Class of 2008. Clearly, their deep reservoirs of love have gone the same way as their finances.

What made this shocking discovery even more troubling to me was the revelation by my parents that they would not be making the journey next year. Instead, they have already planned to go biking in France. It’s ridiculous. Even if they weren’t coming to see me, they could at least watch Vanderbilt lose to some powerful Southeastern Conference team after sitting in hours and hours of lectures on a Saturday afternoon, but they prefer France to that.

Either way, I feel sorry for them. Parents’ weekend is always one of the most happening weekends around Vanderbilt. There’s so much interesting stuff to do that one wonders why Vanderbilt doesn’t host it every weekend. If I had things my way every weekend would be Family Weekend, but for now I’m stuck eagerly anticipating next year … with or without my parents.

—Phil Ingram is a sophomore in the School of Engineering. He can be reached at philip.d.ingram@vanderbilt.edu.