Whitney Cyr
Managing Executive Editor
For many seniors this year, Saturday, Oct. 20 marked their fourth and final Pumpkin Festival. While every festival holds something special for Keene State College students, seniors this year were especially nostalgic about their final year carving pumpkins, journeying downtown to survey the mass of jack-o-lanterns, or taking a part in some more traditional college experiences around the bars and at parties.
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Jake Blake, a KSC senior, said he completely enjoyed Pumpkin Fest this year, and an important aspect of that was because he lives off campus.
“It was a different than my first three Pumpkin Fest because I live off campus. Instead of going out with all of my dorm mates, I got to spend time with my roommates and my friends off campus. I spent some time with alumni too,” he said. Blake said with the guest policy on campus, students couldn’t bring up as many friends as they would have liked, but being off campus allowed him to be with a lot more of his friends than usual. “We got to invite more friends, much more friends. The biggest benefit this year was bringing whoever we wanted.”
In addition, Blake said it seemed as though Pumpkin Fest was much more organized downtown, which made it better than last year. As for it being his very last Pumpkin Fest, Blake said, “This is our last chance to enjoy it while we can and really make the best of it. Any other year, you can say ‘next year would be better,’’’ he said. “I think you make yourself have fun because you know it’s your last one. This was the best Pumpkin Fest for me by far, and I can say it was more fun than all the other ones put together.”
Olivia Martinotti said she had a lot of fun as well, but she didn’t go downtown this year. “Last year, I had about ten of my friends from home up, so I had to babysit everyone. This year, I hung out with my friends from school.” Martinotti said she was also upset this was her last Pumpkin Fest.
“I have the intention of coming up next year, but it’s not going to be a priority anymore,” she said. “I don’t like thinking about being a senior.” Martinotti emphasized she truly enjoyed this year’s Pumpkin Fest, but it’s upsetting to see it pass.
Stefan Cavezzali said he wasn’t as upset to see this being his last Pumpkin Fest this year. “Having it be my last year it was a motivator to make it a good Pumpkin Fest. My parents came up this year, and we went downtown. We were off campus this year, so my friends and I had more freedom,” he said. Cavezzali said with less Residential Life restrictions on guests, being able to have more friends up made his experience that much better.
“This is probably my final one, I don’t know where I’ll be next year. I had a bunch of friends, the one time of the year we get to see all our friends and celebrate being seniors and celebrate the four years that we’ve had together,” he said. Cavezzali said he and his friends were talked about if Pumpkin Fest was every single weekend, and they all agreed it would lose its charm. “There’s something special about the fact that it only happens four times during our college years.”
Whitney Cyr can be contacted at wcyr@keene-equinox.com