With the start of Family Weekend today, get ready to say your thank yous.

You’ll probably be thanking your parents, or your roommates’ parents, for everything for the next few days – the free laundry, the free meals, the free beer, the happy memories. But don’t forget to thank your parents for the greatest gift of all: your life here at the University of Dayton.

The fact that you are here is probably the culmination of a long series of achievements that would not have happened without your parents. Without our families, the majority of our lives would have been pretty unremarkable. Our home was our launching pad for the success we’ve had in college, and without that launching pad, it would have been a lot harder to get off the ground.

Does that mean that all of your accomplishments – every trophy you won and every grade you earned, every job you held and every college acceptance letter you opened – belong to your parents? Of course not. The goals you have achieved in life belong to you.

But imagine how hard it would have been to get where you are today without a parent to drive you around town to soccer practice, or to help you study for your big chemistry exam, or to help you get through the rough patches in life when you might not have succeeded as much as you’d hoped.  Our parents may not have given us everything, but they gave us all of the tools to get it, right down to our personalities and our genetic code.

Take a moment this weekend to hug your parents and thank them for the help that they’ve given you along the way. And if they’re chipping in for your tuition, squeeze them a little tighter.

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