Joe used to be one of the cleaning staff in Hugel at night. Two years ago, my sophomore year, I met him in the hallway of Hugel because I used to stay up late in Hugel doing physics homework till 2-3 in the morning. I used to see Joe every night at around midnight walking around with his cart, cleaning all the blackboards and whatnot. We have had a lot of really good, really deep, pensive conversations about life in general. He told me about how he buys lottery tickets, and he was one digit off from $1 million. He dreams to retire and go travel with his wife around the world. He would tell me, “Be honored that you’re here. Work as hard as you can, and don’t waste your life away.” He worked really hard every day in Hugel. All the STEM majors make a lot of mess. He would tell me about his back pain while cleaning, and I would help him clean once in a while. It’s just one of those personal connections you make. —Dominic Zhang ’21