Saturday, August 24, 2002
So much happened today.. don't even know where to start. Okay. Jessica, Rachel and I all slept in because the alarm didn't go off for breakfast. Oh weeelll.. sleep is good, right? We did some more work on our room, and it's now basically put together completely. We still have to lay the carpet, but neither Jessica nor I had the strength or will to do that today. The rest of our suitemates moved in. They seem okay. Jess and I are the only freshmen, but Krystal is a new transfer, so she's getting used to everything, too. Rae and I ate lunch with our parents, and then I finished unpacking my clothes. Went to a skit thing with my family and Krys's family, then I said goodbye to my family for the rest of the day.. they went back to West Liberty. I went and got a shake with Jess and Krys, and then Jessica and I had dinner with Will and Jamie from Summer Studies last year. I love Will. We won't get into Jamie.. he drives me up a wall and back down it. I have never shoveled french fries into my mouth so fast lol. We had a freshman picture in front of the SLC (student life center).. all 950 of us. It was nuts. We were all crammed into this tiny area and had to do a group hug. The picture's going to be posted to the web site soon, I think, soo maybe I'll upload a copy to here. We split into our small groups after that for about 3 and a half hours.. my leaders are Jeremy and Josh, and they both seem really really reallllllly nice and cool. We had to act out being a mousetrap. Don't ask.
After we were done w/ our small groups, Jessica, Krystal, Janna, Susanne and I walked down the street to Colonial's for late night pizza. And the drama began. This group of guys waved and honked from a truck as we went in, and turned around and followed us in. To make a long story short, they sat down at a table right next to us, turned on a football game, and proceeded to be as obnoxious as possible. They live in Cedarville, but they go to Clark State, a school right down the road. I couldn't handle it.. maybe it's the stress of moving in and meeting a billion people, or missing my friends, or needing a hug, or wanting to ride Spot more than I can describe.. but it upset me a lot. A lot. I couldn't wait to get out of that restaurant. I still have a headache from it. And it sucks because I know if I were home, there would be some way to relieve this tension tomorrow. I prayed a tooon tonight, believe me. :) I don't even know why they got to me so much, but they did. I'm still upset about it. I was so in their faces, as was Jessica, and I was just not myself. I need another hug. I'll go visit Jessica. lol She's the only person around who I feel comfortable hugging. Yet. We all know me and the hugging. I <3 hugs + cuddling.
OH! I got to see Ben Howard today. I freeeeaked out. He gave me the biggest hug. We were in Summer Studies together last year, and I hadn't talked to him since I left. It was soo good to see him, I've missed that kid so much. He doesn't have the Internet at home, so I couldn't e-mail or IM him, and I didn't have his phone # since I left a day early. So bad. Anyway, we're together again. He's such a great kid.. siigh. I haven't met his girlfriend yet. She doesn't go to school here.. they've been together a year, so they're probably one of those disgustingly cute couples like Rachel and Erik. lol I love you guys!
So that's my day.. now I have half a pizza sitting in Krys's refrigerator. And a Ramune sitting on my desk. And the wall next to my bed is half finished with being wallpapered with pictures. I'm going to take a Motrin and sleep some now. It's 2:19 am. I miss you guys!! Write me soon.
Friday, August 23, 2002
Well here I am. At school. I don't know how to put the last twenty-four hours down, so Ill just sort of ramble and you guys can try to follow along, okay?
The twelve hour drive wasn't really that bad. Not at all. I slept some, talked with my mom, read a little. It passed. I drove for a long time, too, but then I started to get sleepy, so I handed the wheel back over to my mom. We stopped at K-Mart in Columbus and I got two magazines, a watch and 24 bottled waters for $4.00. It was my deal of the century lol. We picked my dad up at the airport, ate at Steak 'N Shake (ohmigosh, I love that restaurant. I'm definitely enjoying that part of being back in the midwest.) We went to the Mariages and spent the night. I called Jess and talked to her for a while.
This morning, we got here and it was crazy. We had housing and keys to deal with, moving in (let's not go there) and all kinds of crap. Jessica and I have the absolute coolest setup.. complete w/ fridge and freezer, microwave, Rock 'n Serve, rice steamer (lol), doorbell, cordless phone, new curtains, a huuuge whiteboard.. okay I'll stop now. But trust me, it's cool. We went to a party tonight and had a blast.. oh wait, I forgot to talk about my suitemate. Her name is Krystal, she's twenty, and she's a transfer from Michigan. The sweetest girl EVER oh my gosh. She and I went over to the party and jousted and played tug of war on these huge inflatable mats.. it's sort of hard to explain, but there was a lot of giggling and bouncing going on. I met up with about forty people I knew from last summer. JOEL'S BACK.. soo many people are back. I'm excited. The rest of our night was an event. We played Big Booty with some guys we met, introduced ourself to the freshmen men's soccer players and fooled around with our mailboxes. Now we're in our rooms, being domestic. We hung curtains in my room and now Rachel is building shelves for Krystal as Jessica supervises. We're drinking Ramunes and listening to.. something, I dunno. But it's nice.
Rachel gets to spend the night, which is cool. Hard on her back, though, cause she has to sleep on the hard floor with only a sleeping bag.
Note: the shelves have now taken 35 minutes to put together.
I have spider bites or SOMETHING on my legs and they're annoying me.
I <3 Ramunes. They're from Japan and they open like champagne and there's a marble floating in it. I'm so easily amused.
I miss you guys back home! E-mail me soooon if you haven't already. I'm going to go be domestic with the others. I'm out. It's 12:56 am.
Wednesday, August 21, 2002
Okay. Yuck. I don't have a lot to say.. a lot has happened, but I guess I'll summarize cause I don't feel much like thinking about it right now. I'm really upset and I have a headache from crying. I just said goodbye to Dave, Ben, Chad, Jon + Ralph, and it upset me a lot. I mean, I knew it was going to be bad, but I had no idea it was going to be this hard.
Yesterday was gooood yet slightly stressful. Last minute shopping + packing, loading the back of the truck, going to the barn. I visited Chris and Paul.. I wanted to see Whitney, but she wasn't there. Oh, and I dropped Megan's shirt off at her house. Then a bunch of us went bowling. (I miss you Dayna!) Some of the kids from Naugatuck came down, and that was cool, because I wanted to see them again. One of them, Jesse R., had been gone most of the summer, and I didn't know if I was going to get to see him again before I left, but I did, so it was good. After bowling, we went to Bickford's and then to the apartment. We watched part of 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off' and played a little bit of the question game. Josh sang for me and I spilled my juice. I was starting to stress a little because of certain events and people, and the whole shadow of having to say goodbye hanging over my head. I left the apartment at 1:30 or so and Dave slept over. We stayed up until 4:00.. he ate one of my pancakes, too. Chocolate chip.
Today was.. no words. I'm still in shock from all of the goodbyes. Whitney came over and said goodbye, then I went to the barn and said goodbye to everyone there, including my horse. Wow. Then the Bennetts, and Jessica wrapped her arms around my legs and wouldn't let go. She's the best kid .. then over to where I used to work to say goodbye to my kids. And last, but not least, to Erik's parents' house to say goodbye to the boys. I cried. I don't want to think or talk about this now. I'm out. 5:02 pm.
Monday, August 19, 2002
Today has been sort of slow. I mean, it was full, but I've been going through it in sort of a trance. I can't believe I only have three days left here. I got up at 7:00 and went to the barn to feed breakfast; I went straight from there to work - my last day. I took the kids to the library and the Half Moon for pizza. It was sort of a 'do happy things so I forget to cry' day.. the Half Moon was a distraction. Nolan tipped his chair over and Oliver charmed the waitresses - a typical day at work. I cried on my way out, but I didn't let the kids see. I'm going to go back and visit them tomorrow or Wednesday. It's so hard to leave them behind; I've been with them every week, two or three, or four days a week, for a year. I don't know how I'm going to do without having them around. I might complain about them sometimes, but I really do adore those children. They're a big part of me and who I am, and it's sort of hard to explain. I've seen them go through so much, and I feel like they're my little brothers and sister.
After there, I went by First Baptist and said goodbye to Auntie Jo (Lubin's wife). I didn't cry. No more tears today. I decided that when I got into Mufasa after work. I went to Dayna's, and helped her pack some.. she was mostly packed, but then her stupid dog peed on her suitcase. Stupid Harrison. So she had to redo all of her laundry and some stuff has to be dry cleaned, and the suitcase had to be Lysoled and powdered and vacuumed.. so I did what I could to help her. Poor D was having a horrible day. I did what I could to make it better, and then left when she went out for ice cream.. I went to Dean's house to see him and his family, and Ralph and Erik showed up there a little bit after I got there. We went up to Sweetnuts for ice cream. I don't know.. it was hard to see Dean, but it was good for me at the same time. I don't know if I'll see him again before I leave for school in three days. Wow. Three days. It's really starting to hit me.
Okay, I'm going to go hang out with my family.. I think my daddy is making my favorite meal for dinner. Yum. 4:58 pm.
Sunday, August 18, 2002
All I have right now are random thoughts..
What you see on the outside is almost never what you have on the inside (remember the whole onion/parfait scene from Shrek?). Everything that someone appears to be has another layer underneath it; it's so easy to decorate the outside of something, but the inside can never be warped into something other than what it really is.
Scott makes me giggle. Whenever I have a rough day, and I come down to the barn, he makes me laugh and think of things in a different way. I never have to worry about having fun when he's around; he takes away my problems for a while, and dumps my wheelbarrow, and brings me juice, and sings with me, and listens to me and lets me give him advice. So Scott, if you're reading this, tomorrow we'll cribwalk and sing and promise each other to stay out of trouble, okay? :)
How come just when we're finally learning our lessons and getting our heads on straight something comes along that screws up the whole process? I know so much more now than I did two days ago, and I want to share it with people, but there's so much of my past that I have to deal with and explain before they fully get how much I've learned. I'm happier now than I was two days ago, but maybe a little more jaded, too. I understand a lot more, but there's no real way to apply it and I sort of wish there was.
**And why does it hurt to leave you behind
When I know that you won't ever truly be gone?
I carry you close to me all of the time
Without you, I know now that life can go on.**
I want to be at the cafe right now. I'm tired. It's officially 10:26 pm.
Yesterday was the best day I've had in a while, but it was also one of the hardest. I went over to Wallingford around 3:00 and drove past Dominic's soccer game - it was over, but I saw the effects. Poor kid got an elbow to the face, and his nose is soo swollen. I took Dayna home from the boys' apartment and showered and changed at her house; the heat is so disgusting. I left Dayna at her house to work on packing for school and went back to the apartment to hang out with Dave, Ralph, Erik and Rachel. We watched part of the Musketeer.. Rae and Erik went out to get food for the apartment, and Ralph went to his parents' house for a little while, so Dave and I got to talk and be there just the two of us. I miss him already. Even just sitting with him and watching a movie makes me miss him. We all gathered back at the apartment at six - Dayna, Erik, Rachel, Ralph, Dave and me - and went down to Dave's parents' house so Dayna and I could say goodbye to them.
Dayna and I left first, so we could have our own time in the car. We sang and laughed and beat the other car there by at least five minutes. lol It was really hard to be there. Dave's family is like my family - I have four brothers and another sister, and an extra set of parents. I'm especially close with Gillian, his mom. I call her "Mum" and she calls me "my love". Having to say goodbye to her for three months yesterday was the hardest goodbye I've had to go through yet. She held me and I held her and I wanted nothing more than to stay in Connecticut for the rest of my life. I almost couldn't drive my truck to the cafe.. Dayna kept rubbing my arm, and the three boys in the backseat were quieter than they've been in a very long time.
The cafe was fun.. Chad and Dave weren't working, they were just there to hang out, but of course they got sucked in because it was a concert night. The girl who played was very, very, very good. I had a roast beef wrap - specially made by my "fiance", Ben. lol.. he put extra roast beef and a billion potato chips on it for me. Oh, and a mango smoothie. Oh, and tiramisu. I <3 the food at the Lighthouse Cafe. We sort of wandered around.. the place was PACKED, not much room to move. We sat in the windows, on the couch, in the back room - wherever we felt like. Played poker, and generic geriatric Jenga (wow, long story). We went out to the green and sat on the statue for a while. Chad got told off by some stoned girl, and William (Dave's dad) went after him in mean teacher mode. Ralph was extra snuggly - he said that it finally hit him that Dayna, David and I are leaving. It's really starting to hit me, too. Our last Saturday night together. I cried when I left - I don't know if I'm going to see Chad and Ben again before I leave. But Ben said that he would walk up to my house if he had to (despite the fact that it would take him a good day lol).. so hopefully I will. I dropped Ralph and Erik off at the apartment, and Dayna off at her house, and came home. All I did was try to forget that I'm leaving. It worked.
This morning was okay.. reeeeally emotional. I played the piano in church, and I forgot my music, so I sort of made something up from the hymnal as I went along. lol. It turned out okay. Mr. and Mrs. P prayed for me, and presented me with a plaque from the church - so of course I cried then. Joe, who really is one of my closest friends even though I feel like I never get to see him, did the overheads with me and we fought over the placement of them like always. He gave me a note, and a copy of his band's CD (Dexter - good music - I'll hook you up if you want a copy lol) and I wanted to cry then, but I didn't. Gotta leave some emotion inside. I said a billion goodbyes, and I am completely drained by them. I have grown up with these people, and they are a huge part of me and who I am. My "boyfriend" Kyle (he's 4, don't get any ideas) hugged me for a really long time, and said he'd send me pictures. They gave me a cake and everything. His dad, Rob, is bringing me my favorite cinnamon buns for the car trip on Thursday. They're the best.
No more thinkin about goodbyes - I want to go eat, and my goal was to have all my packing done by the end of the weekend. Fried chicken, here I come. It's officially 1:37 pm. I hate my clock.
