People put a lot of weight on last words.

So I’m going to do it too, running the incredible risk of doing something that’s been done before — something that a columnist must never under any sane circumstances do — because I’m in an altered state of mind. Altered, mind you, because of words. I watched the sunrise through the blinds and I have yet to go to sleep and it is all words’ fault.

Under sane circumstances, I myself am fascinated by the idea — what are the last, and I mean the Last, words I want to spend my ultimate breath on? The ones that will just hang there, in the air, until someone opens a window or maybe writes them down and they live on, for a little longer at least?

It is a reflection of humankind’s obsession with its own mortality. Words, if recorded or remembered, allow us to escape our fate. Whether “Oh yeah,” (the parting phrase of a friend’s grandfather who died enviously in the act) or “I finally get it now, life is —,” these words transcend the unattainable, the inconceivable: human made immortal.

And humankind’s fixation on having the “last word” is a reflection of its self-obsession. Our words are an extension of ourselves. The self-preservation of having the last word is a survival tactic. But it also becomes the air in our pair of deflating floaties — pride on the left and vulnerability on the right arm — shoring up our ego.

This teasing unfeasibility of last words is a main impetus for many an all-night, fiery debate about the especially susceptible topics of politics, religion, race, etc. Tensions build and innocent discussions erupt into debaters ranting around in a circle, trying to bite each other’s tails.

Yesterday morning’s topic was a fan favorite, close to our hearts, heads and wallets: education.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit I’ve got a problem. Some people have a way with words; it seems more often that words have their way with me. Last words are the worst — my verbosity refuses to make room for them, my perfectionism refuses to accept they won’t last and my nature refuses to let me settle for anything less than having them. Reckless, hopelessly idealistic and likely obnoxious.

It’s taken me a lot to restrain myself from sharing last words with a kind person who commented on my last column online. The person made several points to be considered and even reiterated a few of my own, but also seemed to somehow miss the point altogether. The five hours I spent debating a topic on which my friends and I largely agree might reveal my personal addiction to words. Instead, last night I managed to wrestle my illogical lust for the last word into a tolerable (I hope) series of eye rolls and hand gestures, like a third base coach waving the runner home.

Both of these examples share the benefits of our fascinations with last words, even though sometimes it may just seem that we’re talking in circles or not hearing each other at all. Because in the morning, though my friends and I still sat on the same green leather sofas with conversation concussions, I had arrived somewhere completely different than when I first opened my mouth.

After all this talk, I realized what keeps the University thriving. I have hope for the future because we’re still talking. Listen closely and you’ll hear it: Ah. The sweet dissonance of discourse.

Listen to your suitemates freshman year, who begrudgingly consider your largely ignorant interjections into conversations about relativity.

Listen to the sister who writes convincing letters lauding the laurels of the sorority system.

Listen to any and all cell phone epics about the Middle East and theology that take place while you pace the sidewalk outside the toga party you are supposed to be attending.

And those doosies over campfires about restlessness and satisfaction.

Listen to the classic but critical ones about love and whether it exists and if it does, how to not screw it up.

And pillow talk. Words managed on runs. Over a beer.

Just this past Monday, I saw a recent and important example as the Cornell community commemorated the 40th anniversary of the Straight Takeover. In the heated debate about the Straight, some expressed disappointment at the eclipsing of real issues. Others expressed disappointment that such a high level of activism does not exist on college campuses today. Where has that spirit gone that gave life to college campuses in that bygone era and made them breathe fire?

It’s important not to get dazed by nostalgia or to take events out of context. But if the last election has proved anything, it is that we are not quite the Quiet Generation that we’ve been dubbed. We’ve all been talking all along. Maybe our voices are hard to hear over all the noise. But they’re there. And this discussion breeds hope — the mere existence of the possibility for progress. These talks are the stuff of some of my most lasting lessons at Cornell, and now the stuff of me.

No matter what you say, there’s value in us talking. So, if you want to make the veins in your eyes pop with something that makes me seethe, be my guest. I’ll stay up with you all night if that’s what it takes. Not because today I get the last word. Because when we are done we won’t be where we started — something gets into our thick skulls, something different, enriching ourselves, our words, or just our walk home at seven in the morning.