The Wandering Sagittarius

Things to Know XXIII

2012-01-26T22:23:00.002-05:00

- I keep temporarily losing my phone.

- What that really means is that I keep leaving it various coat pockets or backpack pockets and forgetting, for a while - usually about two hours - where exactly it is.

- I'm kind of okay with that.

- We're having a bit of a heat war in our house.

- Namely the guy I share a wall with phoned Buildings and Grounds yesterday night and told them he "had no heat" and they came and turned it up to 70 (when it had been at 68).

- I think he's trying to smoke me out of my room so he can move in here and have the bigger room, the nicer view, and about twice as much heat vent.

- I don't really think that, but it makes for an interesting thought.

- Mini fridges can freeze coffee creamer when turned all the way up.

- Found the previous out the hard way Tuesday morning.

- I will most likely crawl outta bed tomorrow morning and walk to breakfast because not only am I out of coffee creamer - as mine froze and had to be thrown away - but I'm also out of milk.

- Pretty sure my Focus was hit by a train.

- "Take a yard stick and whack it."

- Sometimes I forget I have a tattoo.

- Having a plan doesn't necessarily always mean you have to like the plan you have when it took a lot of tears, internal screaming, and faith in places you weren't quite sure you wanted to put faith to begin with in order to get said plan.

- "Peter Pan is the boy who never grew up. Peter Pan is the dead boy. Neverland is the land of dead boys."

- Thank you, Modern European Drama for completely changing my worldview on the subject of Peter Pan and thus rendering the childhoods of four college students a little more skewed.

- All things considering, it does kind of make sense.

- Paperwork sucks.

- Sleep is good.

- Have I mentioned my Focus has been hit by a train again?

- I have been distracted by YouTube for the past hour and a half, and need to actually go finish the rest of the play I need to read for tomorrow morning, bright and early at 8:35.

- I love my schedule.

- I also love my dorm bed when I'm not feeling like my corner single is a sauna in disguise and trying to enhance my Weight Watchers.

- Speaking of that - at least 4 pounds down. And still going strong.

- There's something morally right and confident-building in there somewhere, but I'm a little bleary-eyed to really attempt to decipher that.

A Well-Adjusted Individual

2012-01-25T16:35:00.002-05:00

Least, that's what I feel like. Or have felt like the past few weeks.

I guess what brought this on is when my friend and I were sitting in the pub this early afternoon having lunch and talking about the issues she's currently having with one of her housemates, and she looks at me and basically says she'd have been a crying hysterical ball of a mess that would have to be dragged out if she'd gone through the past month the way I have - meaning changing the graduation date, the various meetings with professors that I'll have again in the fall, meeting with my adviser, meeting with my adviser and my mother - and she also mentioned I've had to grow up quite quickly with this in a short period of time. That I've done really well adjusting and that's something she wouldn't have been able to do.

Which sort of really got to me because it's one thing to hear it from an "adult" but it's another thing to hear from one of your peers. It was also further compounded by one of my professors from last semester who, upon walking by the airport lounge on the second floor of the science building remarked, "You look a lot calmer than last semester." Which, yes, I suppose I do.

Mostly because I am calmer.

I've had to make fairly big decisions. I've had to give things up. Neither of those two have been particularly easy, and I guess I hadn't truly realized that. I've had my wake-up call - it's kicked me thoroughly in the ass, hard enough to bruise - and that's what we're going with. It's like a New Year's Resolution on steroids, one that's going to stick around a lot longer than just the first week.

That being said, this is week three of Weight Watchers and I'm still going strong. If I lose another pound at the end of this week, that makes five pounds total. I'm pretty proud of that. I'm also pretty proud of the fact that I do my homework very regularly, and I do it in a timely fashion so that my nights aren't quite so late and hectic, and there's a calmness to my life that hasn't been there in three years. I've probably said this before, but I really feel like I have the whole college thing down now.

Too bad it's taken the circumstances it has to get me to this stage. But that's how the story goes, doesn't it?

First Week in Rewind

2012-01-23T21:27:00.002-05:00

It's really fantastic when your first week back at college only has three days in it, and lab is not included.

Things have been going fairly smoothly in my corner of the universe. 'Course, I say that, and now things could, according to Murphy's Laws, take a nosedive. But, well, such is life.

So far I've been doing a much better job about utilizing my time - including my weekends - and getting things done starting in the afternoon when I'm done with class and not waiting until the evening. To the point where the play due Wednesday for Modern European Theater was done this afternoon by five-thirty - having been started Friday afternoon - and my Food for Thought reflections on the reading for Bonding With Food was completed tonight and already emailed to my professor. Inorganic readings were done this morning - along with practice problems, though a visit to office hours is in order because I'm a little fuzzy on certain things - and the problems from last Thursday "due" in class tomorrow have been completed. Tomorrow I get to see how right I did them.

It's been a good start to the semester and I'm determined to keep it going. This not waiting to start homework really does make life a little simpler, in terms of getting things done, not feeling overwhelmed, and actually feeling like a decent student.

There is, however, a long way to go until May. But we'll keep chugging along.

And Sometimes We Lose

2012-01-11T11:15:00.002-05:00

Back when I first started blogging, I made a promise to myself to be honest here, in this space. Not quite to the level of posting my journal entries - mostly because those have far more four-letter words than one would expect - but honest enough about life. Or the parts that are my story to tell, because a lot of what's happened in the past, oh, almost a year now, really, haven't always been mine to completely divulge.

This, however, is.

It's no secret last semester was difficult. In retrospect, it might have been too much. The experience, at times, was great. I'm not Superwoman, and I make no attempt to be on a regular basis, unless it's when I'm spending the day with my niece, and then, yes, Aunt Olly has both X-Ray vision and a little bit of magic up her sleeve. But in this setting, we don't always win.

Sometimes we lose.

This one of those moments when the best laid plans of mice and men and all that more or less falls out. Rather than graduating this upcoming May with my American Chemical Society Bachelor of Science in Chemistry degree, I'll be returning for another semester in the fall as I'm three courses shy for my degree. And three courses is one too many to be able to walk across the stage and then come back to finish. As it stands now, I'll graduate in May 2013 with both my bachelors and my teaching certificate.

There's nothing really easy about this acceptance. It's something you - or rather I - have to come to grips with and I have the support of both my family and my academic adviser. It was a difficult decision, especially when I could have dropped down to a Bachelor of Arts and graduated this year missing only one course. But the BS carries more weight. And, ultimately, for me to do what it is that I want to do - not to mention fulfill what I've been working towards for four years already - I decided to stick with my BS.

I've also come to the decision that, when I find an appropriate replacement, I'll give up being Editor in Chief of a school publication. It was something I enjoyed doing, but, it's not possible, given the circumstances. I will, however, for my sanity, continue to try and play Club Soccer, because that's one of my passions that I have only just gotten back. Not to mention it's not as large a commitment as an every-other-week publication.

Currently, that's where I stand. As for going back to Wales at the end of the semester? With all of this, as it is, and the probability that I'll take a summer course somewhere to help try and ease the load in the fall, it looks like my feet will be planted firmly on this side of the Atlantic for the time being. Which was also a difficult decision to make but one that's for the best.

This is the plan. There might be some developments to change this around a bit, but, in reality, this is what we're going forward with. And for as difficult as it was to sit down and write this, believe me, it's been tough to swallow.

But, as I am assured by multiple people, we will get through this. And, one thing I keep coming back to it, from my own sibling and my cousins, who have been through higher education, it doesn't matter what path you take, just as long as you arrive at your destination.

Murphy and Me XXXXIII

2012-01-07T18:08:00.002-05:00

Halfway through orgo Monday it dawned on me there were two weeks left of classes in the semester. Ten days. That was it. Then three days of Reading Days - where, in some cases, freaking out about all the reading not done over the course of the semester is a requirement - and four days of finals. Then home. For a month. Half of us would be ready to be back by New Year's.

There was, however, a lot to do in ten days. Including a massive formal lab report that was going to eat my soul before Friday.

Good things to look forward to. Positively enlightening.

Oh. Shit. I was going to attempt to not procrastinate on my T-S Britain paper and actually start the damn thing before the night before it was due. An all-nighter did not need to happen. Mostly because my orgo exam was seven to ten that same night, and a decent amount of sleep beforehand was labeled as helpful.

Holy zone out, Ollie.

Then again, we were doing synthesis, which was not one of my favorites. Still, it was better on all accounts than physics.

There was no lab that afternoon - thank God - and I swung through the Pub to use the last of my snack money on a Starbucks peppermint mocha. The line was a bit long, but with no where else to be it was perfectly fine.

While fumbling for my mp3 player in my peacoat pocket, a group of Smithies came in behind me.

"So, do you guys know what Lori saw this weekend?"

Oh, Lord. Save me or strike me dead from whatever binge drinking glory story was sure to follow.

"What did she see?"

Would be great if the line could move a little faster. And how friggin' deep was this coat pocket?

"She saw Murphy with a girl."

Yup. This line needed to move. Now. Our campus wasn't big enough to have multiple men by the name of Murphy.

"Oh. Why do you think I care?"

There was a sigh and for the love of all that is holy where was my mp3 player?

Someone snorted. "Because ever since you found out about his new girlfriend you've been asking nonstop about her. And every time you see somebody and they say how happy he is with her you sulk." There was a pause. "And that she's pretty."

Found the mp3 player and promptly dropped it, the headphones my fingers tangled around the headphone cord. Fantastic. I picked it up, plugged it back together, and started digging for my Vera.

"Pretty could mean not pretty. They could have just been being nice."

Really? Just - Really? My cheeks flushed. The person ahead of me moved and I stepped up to the cashier. "Venti peppermint mocha with skim milk, please." Handed her my card. "Should use the last of my snack money."

The girls behind me were silent for a few moments. Until I had my Vera in my pocket and in the process of untangling my headphones.

"So, what's her name? If you know it."

Not necessary for me to hear. Head down, I went to the other end of the counter for what served as the pick-up area for drinks. The student making them was a bit backed up. The girls behind me showed up almost with me, and as I'm only human, only the right earbud was in.

"Ollie. Her name is Ollie."

"Tall vanilla latte with soy?" That voice was oddly familiar.

Tanya's head appeared around the side of the milk steamer. Her eyes widened briefly, looking between me and whichever Smithie was, presumably, Manda. I shrugged, not daring to say anything.

"Venti peppermint mocha, skim milk!" Tanya called, and I reached for it, snagging a lid with my other hand. "Hey, Ollie."

"Tanya. Good to see you." Death by stare, if I wanted to tempt fate and turn around.

"You, too." Her brown eyes darted between me and Manda. "Tell Murphy I said hi."

"Will do. Thanks." Taking a deep breath I turned and looked for the first time at Manda. It had to be her - none of the others had such a death stare goin' on. She was skinnier than me, preferred to pass spandex off as pants, and carried an oversize Vineyard Vines tote rather than a backpack. Really the only outward thing we had in common was our hair, and that led me to the conclusion that Murph had a thing for brunettes.

Peppermint mocha in hand, one earbud in, and with an audience, I really wanted nothing more than to say something incredibly snarky - probably about her spandex - and then walk away. She'd look scandalized, I'd be smug, and it would, for all of ten seconds, feel like a victory. That was the idea.

The reality was I looked at her, she looked at me, I tucked the other earbud in with a smile and walked away. Because my parents raised me to be the better person. With that firmly in mind it was fairly easy to let the rest go.

Not to mention, from the sound of it, Manda wasn't completely over the break up. The particular aspect of dating is hard in a small school and not easy to deal with in general. God knows I'd be a walking train wreck whe - if, go with the if - we ever broke up. A much bigger train wreck than Bobby could ever hope to cause as I really, most likely lo - really really like Murph.

Yeah. Definitely in deep shit.

It was snowing. Big, fat flakes miraculously clinging to the still-green grass and sidewalks. Even the upper stairs from the Pub to the space between Coxe and Gulick were covered. Not a light snow, either, a full on no-other-goal-but-to-make-life-miserable kind of snowfall.

My peppermint mocha was too hot to do anything but sip at on the way back to Jackson. If this kept up - and stuck - I was going to need to dig out my Timberlands, as my Chuck Taylor's wouldn't cut it with the powdery stuff.

Having nothing else to do the for rest of the day presented a bit of a problem - what, exactly, to do to fill the time? As always there was the looming pile of physics reading or the slightly larger pile of back work - an entire book, by this point - for T-S Britain. Could always work on the monstrosity of a formal lab report. There were also lines to be memorized for acting, namely our monologues for the final, from The Laramie Project.

And, as always, there was the idea to say screw it and nap. Naps were glorious.

The steps by the College Store were nothing but treacherous and it was by pure luck I didn't find myself on my ass.

Dev and Murph were going out as I was heading in.

"Hey." He gave me a one-armed hug and a kiss on the forehead. "Oh, Colby might ask you for some of the girls' last names."

That was appropriately cryptic. "Okay."

"Colby's got something up his sleeve," Dev said, stifling a yawn.

"What time did you get back?" When Murph and I had returned from dinner Sunday, Devan still hadn't gotten back from Maine. Murph, at the time, had had no clue as to the geographic location of his roommate. Neither, ironically, had Dev himself.

"Six this morning." Dev shrugged. "Figured if I went to sleep I wouldn't wake up for class."

Having nearly once been a victim of that, sometimes it was better to stay up and mainline coffee than attempt to sleep for a couple hours.

"Yeah. When I woke up my roommate was magically back and swearing at his computer." Murph grinned. "But, we gotta go." He gave me another forehead kiss.

A rather disheveled Smithie came through the doors next before I had my Vera out and nearly whacked me in the face. It was a difficult catch with only one hand and this was one instance when spending summers waitressing was a good thing for more than a steady paycheck.

The walk to the fourth floor seemed longer than normal. My Starbucks had to be set on the little round table Jo and I did homework at for me to have a free hand to get my shoes to the side of the door and not face-plant. Then to find the Vera, then the room key, and -

Oh.

Balanced on the door handle was a rectangular-shaped package wrapped in newspaper, complete with a red bow.

A birthday present.

With a note on my white board that read:

It's late but you already knew that. Happy Birthday.
-Love Murph

I unlocked the door, ferried in both the present and my Starbucks, and went about getting comfortable. It was slightly warmer than normal - not by much - and once the light was on, the door shut, and I had on the first sweatshirt available, the Starbucks sat on the dresser with me at the end of the bed, newspaper package next to my thigh.

The bow wound up stuck to the dresser. Bearing in mind it was newspaper and not specifically wrapping paper - a copy of The New York Times by the look of it - I was a little less careful than otherwise.

He'd gotten me a movie. He'd gotten me my own copy of Moulin Rouge. There was a sticky note on the front with another message.

Present also includes dinner and viewing of movie. How does next Sat. work?
-Murph

Works for me, Murph. Works for me.

I passed the rest of the afternoon reading my month's worth of back chapters for T-S Britain. The snow continued to fall, and the wind started up at some point from the north. It was turning downright nasty out there and shortly after four I propped open the door to get some heat from the hallway.

Ordering in Chinese was beginning to look very appealing. Rather than walking all the way to Saga in this shit passing for weather, at any rate.

Jo popped her head in around quarter past five. "Dinner? And did you see you have a message from Murphy?"

"Yeah. It went with my birthday present." My copy of The Reformation looked like El had taken a blue marker to its pages, but highlighting was the only real way for me to retain information when reading, especially something so thick as history. I flopped it carelessly to the side and pulled the neck of my sweatshirt - Murph's by the smell and the size - up to my nose.

"Moulin Rouge and dinner," she said, putting the DVD back in the moon chair. "Very cool. Dinner?"

"I thought about ordering from Main Moon?" Lowered the sweatshirt. "I don't wanna go back out in this."

Jo looked at the window - the shade was almost always up for Henry to get natural sunlight - and the tree branches on the other side of the glass whipped back and forth. "I told Maria I'd meet her for dinner." She shuddered. "Better bundle up."

"Yeah." There was no way in hell I was leaving the building tonight. "I'm probably gonna order in. Have fun with Maria."

Jo wandered back across the hall and I let my head thunk against the wall. A hundred and fifty pages later and no so much as a dent in the workload. Talk about Karma for a lifelong procrastinator. Damn it. There was only so much British history I could handle.

A break would probably be for the best. Not to mention my email hadn't been opened all day and was probably full. No surprise that between Facebook notifications, general HWS spam, and suggestions on where to study for finals, there were about forty new messages. One of them was from Colby.

Need Some Help
From: HOLBURN, COLBY
To: KARIZSLOWSKI, OLIVIA
November 30, 2009 11:30 AM

Ollie,
I'm planning on having everybody for dinner Friday (the last day of classes) but don't know everybody's last name. Like the girls who were at movie night that one night. And there are no Sasha's at all in the directory. Help?

Colby

'Course there were no Sashas because Sasha's actual first name was Alexandra. Sasha was a nickname.

I hit reply.

Colby,
Josephine Cornish
Alexandra Meyer-Roberts (Sasha)
Cara Freislow
Better put me in the CC so they don't just delete it.

-Ollie

That should be fun, all of us for dinner.

Facebook was after email and there was nothing new there. The picture of Murph and I at Halloween was still my profile picture.

Pretty could mean not pretty. They could have just been being nice.

Clicked the picture to enlarge it. Murph - broad-shouldered, hazel eyes, beautiful, slightly crooked smile - and me. In a four-year-old pirate costume that wasn't as loose in the bodice as it used to be. Which made sense, considering my high school sophomore self was skinnier than my college sophomore self. But by how much? Was it noticeable? Had I gotten fatter since soccer season ended? We had until February as a break, but was there a need for me to get back on the treadmill sooner?

There are parts of me I'd rather get rid of. My love handles. That bit of my back just above my rear end but before the rip at the end of the my spine. The way my middle back skin rolls when I move just right. Those were parts of me I wasn't particularly fond of. And my thighs? Larger than normal, definitely. A life spent playing soccer year-round.

Twenty years old and now wondering how pretty I was. Which, of course, leads naturally to Murphy and what he thinks and the idea of possibly having, at some point, sex with Murphy, which leads to giving up my virginity, which then leads to if I'm not good with seeing myself naked, how am I supposed to let somebody else? Somebody being Murphy. My boyfriend.

What it all boiled down to was the fact that until I got over the fear of my own body, Murph and I wouldn't so much as start for whatever level was next

Of course it wasn't Manda's appearance that brought on that happy revelation, it had just brought it front and center at the moment. When there was enough academic stress already to choke an elephant.

Jeezus. What. A. Mess.

On the other hand - as there was always another hand somewhere - Murph chose me. He could have walked away at any point but he didn't. He wanted me as his girlfriend, free and clear. Not a replacement for Manda.

Just like he's no replacement for Bobby. Murph never could be, either. They were too different. It was comparing apples to oranges with the only common factor between them being the fruit market they were bought at.

"Ollie?"

I turned in the chair. Murph was looking at me with an expression that clearly said he'd been trying to get my attention for a while. It was rather adorable, really.

"Ollie?" he repeated.

Oh. Right. "Yeah. Sorry. I think I just compared myself to a fruit market."

If he found that little tidbit of insight weird it didn't show. He shrugged instead, and said, "You'd make a pretty fruit market."

Good to know we're on the same page, whatever book it might be in.

"Sorry." I closed the laptop and went to give him a hug. "Thank you for the birthday present."

"You like it?" He grinned.

"Very much. And dinner and a movie next Saturday sounds great." The first of three Reading Days. Perfect for taking it easy before freaking out about papers and exams. "I'm gonna order Chinese for dinner, you want an egg roll?"

"Sure." He settled on the end of the bed. "How was your afternoon with the Brits?"

I dug by the side of the mattress for my phone. "Bloody brilliant." Took a few minutes to pace on the green indoor-outdoor carpet while ordering dinner, glancing occasionally at Murph. Anywhere from forty minutes to an hour. I snapped the phone shut.

"Ollie?" Murph toed his shoes off in front of the mini-fridge, the thump lost in the burst of noise echoing down the hall from the other door. For something to do - and since this was a conversation nobody else needed to hear - I kicked the door stop under the pirated TV table and waited for it to close.

"What's wrong, Ol?" Murph piled my T-S literature and notebook and dropped them onto a pile of dirty laundry. He turned to face me when I sat in the middle of the bed, swiveling his whole body with a suppressed wince.

How the hell to start this conversation?

"I met Manda today." Apparently by blurting out information like it burns.

Murph blinked. "Where?"

"At the Pub. Oh, and Tanya says hi." Maybe this would be easier than originally anticipated.

"Was she nice to you?" There was a tone in Murph's voice I hadn't heard before. Like he was trying to keep his temper in check.

"For the most part." It was true - she hadn't come right out and said anything to me, just about me. There was a distinct difference. And nothing bad, either.

Murph gave me a stink-eye worthy of El.

"Really." Which got him one in return. "She's not over you, that much is obvious."

"Not surprising," he muttered. He looked at me fully. "I broke up with her."

There wasn't anything to say that wouldn't sound both cheesy and cliche. Murph didn't need me to say anything other than, "You make me happy." Today, tomorrow, for as long as he was content with me, he made me happy.

Murph, in a feat of contortion, curled on his side between me and the dresser, his head on my thigh. My bigger than average thigh. Damn it.

"I did nothing but sleep all weekend. Why am I still tired?"

"Because it's only been a week." I rubbed the back of his neck. "It takes longer to not feel wiped out."

"It sucks."

"Yeah. I know." There was a lull. "You have a lot to do these last two weeks?"

"Start final papers." Murph relaxed further. "I only have one sit-down final the second day." He rolled to his back to look up at me. "What about you?"

"Last slot on the last day." Which meant going home Saturday morning instead of Friday night. "Physics." My hand migrated to his chest. "It's great."

He snorted. "Okay." His hand came up to hold mine. "Can I hang out here for a while? Dev's passed out on his laptop in the middle of econ spreadsheets."

"Of course. Might need to do some reading but yeah. You can pop in a movie or watch TV if you want to."

"When you get up to get delivery. Then I'll movie."

The warmth of his chest seeped through his layers into my palm. Part of being happy was being comfortable. I was comfortable with Murphy. It was being comfortable with myself that needed some improvement.

Murphy and Me XXXXII

2012-01-05T09:51:00.003-05:00

[Sometime this weekend there will be a rather legit nonfiction post from me. Promise. At some point this upcoming weekend.]

The shenanigans started way too bright and early. Though the Happy Thanksgiving text from both Murph and Liam - with separate ones from Sasha, Cara, Em, Mel, Jo, Dev, and Colby - were both greatly appreciated and slightly unexpected. At least the volume. Dev's was shorthand and rather sleepy, but he was either still awake or had only just gotten up, and was therefore excusable.

Dexter, after pacing up and down the short hallway outside the bedroom for what seemed like hours, finally nosed open the door and decided to crawl in bed with me. And happily wash my ears.

Coffee was in order. Immediately. And Dex followed me down the stairs - almost bowling me over - and I staggered down the last few steps and almost into the stove.

"Look who's bright-eyed this morning," Dad chuckled. "Coffee, sweetie?"

I weaved around Mama and Aunt Janelle, who was a regular at our house for morning coffee on weekends and holidays, and beelined for the fridge - and the coffee creamer.

While wearing a flannel shirt that wasn't mine. A flannel shirt that was way too big, even considering I liked my winter sleepwear tops bigger. Shit.

Oh well. Live and learn.

"Cold in Geneva?" Janelle asked once I'd sat down, coffee creamer at the bottom of the mug. It would mix when Dad poured the coffee in, thus not requiring the need to dirty a spoon. Not that it mattered, as we had a dishwasher.

"Very." Mama handed me my freshly filled mug from Dad.

"It's a little big, don't you think?" Mama this time. "And a bit like something your Uncle David would wear?"

Uncle David's style was borderline lumberjack some days. There was no way to win this argument. Damage control, yes. Win? Hell no.

"Is it yours?" Dad finally chimed in, as expected.

Cue flaming face. "I'm borrowing it until B and G comes and actually fixes my heat." Go big or go home. "He's got, like, four." Which was true. The boy had multiple and he hadn't put up much resistance when one had come with me.

Then again, we'd had bigger problems regarding Murph's appendix and everything else had been relegated moot.

They seemed to absorb that and I sipped my coffee. The little black flip phone was upstairs - which was fine - and when Dad started taking rolls out of the oven, the only reaction appropriate was to salivate. And then steal one off the tray. As Aunt Janelle did the same, Dad doing anything other than semi-glare was rather pointless. It was tradition.

"Ollie, when do you want to do your birthday?" Mama asked.

To anybody else it would have been an odd question, but it was fairly standard procedure in our family that a birthday party rarely occurred on the the actual day of birth. We usually held out for the weekend - since it was better than, say, a Tuesday - and whoever was celebrating go to pick dinner and one form of dessert. Yellow cake, chocolate frosting, and cookie dough ice cream, please and thank you. Though rumor had it Dad was making cheesecake sometime today.

I told Mama Saturday sounded good. That way those going out for Black Friday didn't have to hurry home.

Aunt Janelle stayed for another cup and a half of coffee before heading out the door with an "I need to get my ass home and be productive" though how much productivity could be achieved on a national holiday was beyond me. There sure as shit wasn't anything I was going to be rushing off to get done - physics included - and that was both understandable and fine by me.

I did not come home to stuff my face and do homework. Well, yes to the first and hell no to the second.

"How is Murphy?" Mama asked. "Did he go home?"

"Yup. He and Liam and Colby are heading back, still on the road, I think, and he's doing okay. He's tired."

"So were you."

True. Very true. "Yeah." Took another sip of coffee. "He'll probably sleep better when he gets home." Until the sores on his heels go worse. "He got the card you sent." Because, once I'd gotten back from the ER that night...morning...whatever, whenever the hell it was I finally made it back to Jackson, and had gotten enough sleep to function, my first step had been to call Mama. Then text Izzy. Then text multiple people to ask how they were doing. Then, predictably, there was a nap.

There is no shame in napping as a college student. So long as it's not during class.

"What was it, again, that happened?"

"His appendix exploded." Rather gruesome, now that I think about it. But more or less gruesome than a six inch long, skinny twisted cyst a doctor pulls surgically out of your lady parts?

Yeah. That's a toss-up.

Mama headed upstairs to take a shower and I sipped cold coffee, occasionally trading remarks with Dad about the turkey, and he proudly said he'd made pie.

"Oh. What kind of pie?" Pie is good.

"Cranberry-raspberry."

Normal pie is good. This might be a train wreck. "Fantastic." I picked up my coffee mug. "Can't wait to try it." When, in reality, I was beginning to think I wanted to wait until Christmas to have a bite.

It was a small crowd for dinner - only eighteen - and it was a regular food feast. Turkey, stuffing, broccoli, green beans, rolls, somebody brought sweet potatoes to go alongside the regular mashed potatoes, and a dish of corn because Dad doesn't eat any vegetable but corn. Between dinner and dessert was copious amounts of coffee to go around.

Izzy and I wound up next to each other on the end of the table closest to the corner cupboard, watching as the desserts were brought out. Cheesecake, Dad's pie, and somebody had made some sort of pumpkin mousse concoction in a graham cracker crust.

Pretty soon, along with a fresh cup of coffee, I was staring at a slice of Dad's pie and wondering what, exactly, it was held together with. Or rather, failing miserably at being held together.

The whole smelled like syrup. Pancake syrup.

"Hey, Dad..."

"Yeah, Ol?"

"This have maple syrup in it?" Somebody had to ask. As with most cases, it's usually me. Scratch that - it's always me.

Dad grinned. "Yup."

Great. Absolutely fabulous.

Izzy leaned over and whispered, "Chomp chomp."

Damn it. Generally, you take it, you at least tried it. As it was a holiday - and a new recipe - and I had an audience, fork found pie and pie found mouth.

Regurgitation was not an option.

"Shut up," I growled at Izzy after getting that first bite down. She laughed. Ah well. Can't win 'em all.

It was late - early, by my more recent bedtime standards - when I finally crawled between the sheets to curl around Edgar. He smelled, very faintly, of Murphy - a combination of his cologne, general boy smell, possibly shampoo, and probably whatever he used for laundry detergent. But it was Murph.

The phone buzzed. I tugged it onto the mattress with me and flipped it open. New text from Murph.

u awake?

Love T9. Yup. Hit send. Waited. Saw the light from the screen before it buzzed.

how was dinner? and the fam?

How to phrase this... Dad made a pie held together with maple syrup. Yeah. Self-explanatory. Other than that it was great. They asked about you. Even el. She'd come right up to me, looked around, and gone, "Where Morefy?"

The ceiling had a new patch of faint blue in the dark.

awwww :) ma and da asked how u were and about ur heat

Yeah. Still no heat. I'll just bring another blanket back. I pressed my nose into Edgar's fluff. Edgar smells like you. Send.

Damn I was tired. The buzzing jerked me awake.

yeah? :) miss you

Oh, Murph. You make my heart hurt. So much. I miss you, too. So much.

I sent that message and then opened another, typing I love you. Writing it made it feel more real. More tangible. But it was so difficult to say.

It's not that the feeling is wrong or superficial. It's not forced. It just, like so much of me when it came to things like this, circles back around to Bobby.

Bobby was the first real relationship I'd had, off and on all through high school and into the summer before my first semester at William Smith. We'd said those three little words, but, if it was true, shouldn't it have been more difficult to say goodbye each time we took a "break"? It should have hurt more, shouldn't it? It didn't. We cycled on and off and there wasn't much more to feel than lonely for somebody to spend time with, to hold hands and be comfortable with in those months we were off.

Murph and I are comfortable, but different. A different kind of comfortable. We were inherently different than Bobby and I. And those three little words...I wanted to be absolutely sure.

This was one thing in my life I didn't want to lose, that four month mark be damned. For the first time, this feeling for another felt bigger than me. A lot bigger.

Murph's newest message had arrived five minutes ago.

when do u think ur gonna be back on sunday?

Should be back before dinner. Why? Askin' me out on a date? :) Not that we made too much of a distinction between unofficial and official dates. What the hell was the difference, anyway?

The mattress shivered. That little flip phone had a mean vibrate.

u kno it ;) but yeah dinner sunday?

Predictable. Utterly predictable.

Yes. Dinner Sunday. As I'm falling asleep, I need to say goodnight. Night, murph.

Edgar got crushed to my chest. Much like normal.

The phone buzzed again.

night ollie :) sleep tight

I proceeded to do just that.

Murphy and Me XXXXI

2011-12-31T12:07:00.004-05:00

Murph moved back to the fishbowl three days later. He didn't move well - or fast - and he looked much the same as he had when he was lying in a bed on the second floor of Geneva General. Pale. Borderline paper-white even days after emergency surgery. He spent a lot of his spare time sleeping, a phase I remembered well because it took almost all my energy to go to class and focus that first week back almost a year ago.

Murph had left the fishbowl unlocked so I could swing by and see him in the afternoon. The major perk of having morning classes was being done by one-thirty, except on lab days.

The room was as dark as it could be at two in the afternoon. There were some Get Well Soon cards on the desk, including one from my parents and one from Izzy and her family. El had made some scribbles on the inside in blue crayon, which had made him smile.

He lay on his back, Smokey and Edgar propped on the inside pillow and keeping a careful plastic eye on the sleeping college student. I pulled the desk chair over and curled in it.

The months peeled away.

"You're gonna be here when I wake up?"

Mama pushed my hair from my face. "I will be here when you wake up."

The nurse - a twenty-something Russian by the sound of it - wheeled me, bed and all, toward the OR. He gave me roughly half of what was gonna knock me flat and I spaced out for a minute.

One moment there was a gurney under me, the next there was a metal table and it was cold. The surgeon - maybe it was him, maybe it wasn't - leaned in. Matchbox Twenty filtered through from somewhere.

"Hi."

"Hi." He smiled, pushing something into my IV port.

"I like Matchbox Twenty."

Everything went dark.

Mama had been there when I woke the first time and then promptly went back to sleep. Woke up sometime a little later and tried to stay conscious.

Though knocked out completely is a little less fun than being consciously sedated - eyes open but definitely not all there.

"Thinkin' kinda loud, Ol."

I clutched at the chair, almost slipping out of it. How long had he been awake and looking?

"Sorry." Got settled again and smiled. "Hi."

"Hey. Whatcha thinkin' about?"

"Surgery." No point in beating around the proverbial bush. "Mine, that is." I'd had plenty of time to think about Murph's in the ER. Think. Freak. Repeat. "I - I missed the first El went tubing. I'd been out of surgery about a week and going up and down the stairs was about it. I sat in the kitchen and drank tea." And absolutely hated it. But it was beyond my control.

"This winter, then."

"Yeah." It just needed to snow first. "Yeah. How you holdin' up?"

"I spend a lot of time in this bed. Sleeping."

Yeah. Knew all about that, too. The only time I'd been "up" had been to be fed a pain pill and then it was Goodnight, Gracie.

Murph made an aborted move to roll over and settled back with his eyebrows drawn together. "I hate sleeping on my back."

Which made two of us. It would be another two or three days before his heels got sore enough to add to his problems.

"My heels hurt, too."

Or not. Make that sooner. "Yeah. I know about that, too." I curled in the chair and balanced well enough to rest my cheek on Murph's pillow and blinked. "You hungry or anything?"

"Not really."

"Sick?"

"Not right now."

He reached up and tangled his fingers with mine, the digits rather cool. Gently touched my forehead to his, relieved when it wasn't overly warm.

"At least you're not feverish." Which was honestly a good thing. Fevers were usually bad.

"I'm just bored." He looked at me, blinking and breathing. "I'm not gonna break."

It took me a few seconds to figure out what he meant, and my first instinct was to panic. What if he accidentally tore something? What if I accidentally made him accidentally tear something?

"Ollie." He waited until he had my attention. "Please."

Good Lord, when did he get Anime eyes?

This was going to take some strategizing to make this as painless as possible - relatively speaking.

Ultimately what we wound up doing was Murph sitting up long enough for me to slide behind him to put my back against the wall he used as a headboard. There was a pillow shoved in the small of my back and another under my shoulders, and then I had roughly two hundred pounds of football player against my chest, lower body wedged between my thighs. Thank God for my wide hips.

Most of Murph's weight was still on the mattress, though his upper body was supported by mine. I carded my fingers through his hair, softly rubbing the tips of his ears and asking him at least fifty more times if his belly was still alright.

"Yes, Ol," he said, a big palm on my thigh, the warmth easily felt through denim. "My stitches are fine."

"Don't want you to die or anything." It was oddly reminiscent, in that moment, of the first night spent in this bed following the first ER trip.

"When are you going home for Thanksgiving?" he asked, turning his head to press his nose into my neck.

"Oh, shit, that's tomorrow, isn't it?" I'd completely spaced on that fact. Tomorrow was Thanksgiving. No wonder Mama had called to ask when the hell I was coming home. Also no wonder she'd been suitably confused when I'd said no idea.

Murph snorted. "Yeah, Ol, that's tomorrow."

"Then either tonight or tomorrow morning. I haven't started packing." Because a major holiday had totally, utterly slipped my mind. Who does that? Me, apparently. "When are you going?"

"Colby, Liam, and I are heading out tomorrow morning. We're driving separately because Liam wants me to be able to stretch out. Colby's car's gonna be the pack wagon." He snuggled closer. "And Liam likes to drive in the daylight more than the night."

Which was understandable. Most of my family - myself included - was shit at driving after dark.

I snuck my hand down the back of his shirt to rub his shoulder.

"I still have to give you your birthday present."

Took almost everything in me not to freeze. "Oh. You didn't have to."

"I know." His fingers tightened briefly on my thigh. "I wanted to, though. I even wrapped it."

I pressed a kiss to the top of his head. "Thank you." All I could say, really.

He lay there, simply breathing, and still enough to make me wonder if he'd fallen asleep.

"What are you excited to eat tomorrow?" he asked.

"Stuffing." It was a no-brainer. Stuffing was awesome. "And broccoli." Broccoli smothered in cheese. Fantastic. "You?"

"Sweet potatoes and sliced cranberry."

Hopefully not together.

"But we shouldn't talk about food right now," he said, making an abortive move to lay on his side.

"Can do." Went back to running my fingers through his hair. "I'll go home sometime tonight. I'm not overly worried."

"'Kay." His head got a little heavier.

I'd stay here until he got up - figuratively speaking - from his nap. Then maybe go pack some of my corner single into Fred and start the forty-something miles home. But for now, this was the definition of contentment to lay there and be Murphy's pillow. Not like it was a hardship.

Lugging shit down four floors of stairs sucked. Didn't care that it was dirty clothes - most of my closet - but it still sucked.

What was going to suck even worse was hauling the mini fridge down at the end of the year. But that was in the future, not now. Now was piles of dirty clothes, textbooks with homework that probably wouldn't get done anyway, and the laptop, phone charger, and cord to the mp3 player. That should have been sufficient to survive at home for three or four days.

I packed Fred and then went back to the third floor fishbowl to say one last goodbye before heading home. There were quite a few voices in the fishbowl - more than just Murph and Dev - and I almost decided to forgo knocking. Almost. But not quite.

It was quite the off-key, not totally in unison "Come in" in response, and pushing open the door revealed all my boys. With the amount of bodies - and luggage present - the room did feel a bit crowded.

Murph sat on his bed in the much same position I had earlier, still much too pale. Colby was leaning against the windowsill and Liam hovered by Murph's dresser. Dev was haphazardly throwing a multitude of things on his bed and into a duffel bag, computer already packed out of sight.

"Hey, guys." I hopped onto the foot of Murph's bed. "Gettin' ready to get outta here?"

"Dev is," Liam said, jerking his head to his left. "Where you goin' again?"

"Rockland, Maine." Dev muscled the duffel closed and leaned against the bed frame. "We decided to go to Aunt Sarah's for Thanksgiving, and Pop and Papa decided to wait until after Pop got home to leave. So we can all take turns driving through New England at two in the morning." He seemed incredibly thrilled with this idea.

"So, you and your dad and grandpa?" I ventured.

The room went oddly still. Cue wanting to shrink through the floor. How off the mark was I?

"Chill, guys," Dev said, reaching for a photo taped to the wall. "She doesn't know." He handed me the picture. Dev resembled neither of the men in it, and it had nothing to do with the fact that the one on the right was African-American. "Papa's on the left and Pop's on the right."

"Cool. And you have siblings, don't you? Sisters?"

"Yup. And we're all adopted."

I handed the picture back and the tension bled from the room. "I have one sister. I can't imagine how you deal with multiple."

Dev shrugged. "It's a gift. We're swinging by Logan in Boston to pick up Claire and Mackenzie. They're flying in from California. University of San Francisco." He re-taped it to the wall. "When are you heading out?"

"When I say goodbye to you guys. Car's packed."

"Yeah. We watched," Colby mentioned casually.

I stared. "You watched?" Didn't know whether to snark at the creepiness or the fairly ungentlemanly behavior. Settled on appropriately scandalized, instead.

"You were doin' great," he said, fighting a smile.

"Asshat." It rolled out before my brain could say otherwise. I turned to Murph. "How you doin'?"

"Ready to go home." He rubbed his eyes.

"You need another pill?" Liam asked.

"No." He reached for Edgar, wincing. "Here. Smokey's going to Lake Placid."

Moved closer to get Edgar. "He probably needs to go back to Townsend." Sat back, the stuffed animal in my lap. "I should probably get going before it gets later."

I left Murph for last, starting with Dev and doling out hugs. Murph got a little more than a hug, along with the suggestion to actually rest this time, and I picked up Edgar on my way to the door.

"Hey, Ol?"

"Yeah, Murph?"

"Text me when you get home?"

"Will do." Waved one last time, swallowed those damn three words, and managed a relatively normal, "See you in three days." I'd probably worry about him until he, Liam, and Colby got back to Lake Placid and didn't bother to fight the feeling. Not this go 'round, anyway.

Fred started first time and with both Henry and Edgar in the front seat, we pulled out of the mostly empty parking lot and started for home. The radio was one - as was the heat - and there was hardly anybody on 14 with the exception of the truck traffic. Got lucky enough to get behind one of those and we ran 70 all the way to the village limits.

It was going on eight when I backed into the family parking lot. Computer, Edgar, Henry, probably just locked the keys in the car and didn't give a damn.

Home. Sweet, sweet home. Nothing else at this point mattered.

Doors were a bit tricky with full hands, but once in they could be kicked shut easily enough. Fired off a text to Murph once inside the kitchen and had set everything down without breaking it or myself. There were giggles from the stairs. El sat on the second step, face pressed between the slats as much as possible without getting her head stuck, grinning madly. She had a few more teeth, too.

"Hey, kidlet."

"Ollie."

I picked her up on th way up the stairs. She wrapped her arms around my neck, still giggling in between asking me how long I was home for and if I knew tomorrow was "Thanksgibbing."

Damn it was good to be home.

Murphy and Me Insert: Registration

2011-12-31T11:39:00.003-05:00

[So, back when I was first doing the beginning of November scenes for Murphy and Me, back around when they were playing for Liberty Leagues and the right to go to the NCAA tournament, that's also when HWS does registration for the next semester. It's fairly important, more than slightly frustrating, and does deserve its own scene. Here it is.]

I'm not a fan of tedius things and my ability to keep a schedule is...lacking at best and nonexistent at worst. Schedule meaning keeping track of important dates that don't have exams and/or labs due.

Like registration.

The first reminder it was that time was the course catalogue that appared in my mailbox. Next sign was the advising week sign-up sheet on Montrose's office door.

Yep. Time to sit down and figure shit out.

So, while procrastinating on physics homework yet again, I sat on my bed and tried to make a cohesive schedule. Mostly, I tried to figure out what to use as a fourth course that would entertain me.

Putting it together was like a puzzle. A rather annoying puzzle, but still. A puzzle.

There was some shuffling in the hallway - Jo was by the partially open door. She stepped around it when I motioned her in. "You got yours done yet?"

She smiled. "Yeah. Can I borrow your orgo book?"

"Yeah." She was already borrowing my intro book, so it made sense. And was fine by me because I didn't have any intention of selling it back. It was going in my "reference" library. "I don't have a fourth yet." And it was bugging the shit out of me.

"Anthro, maybe?" she suggested, climbing up onto the foot of the bed.

"Eh." Anthropology was no entirely my style. "Maybe I should do a Bi-Dis. Izzy says those are good."

"Bi-Dis?"

"Bidisciplinary. Two subjects, two professors." Probably twice the work and twice the fun. Most likely not in that order. "This Two Cities idea sounds pretty cool."

"Sociology and economics." Neither of which I had any experience with except for ACE Economics back in high school. Hadn't gone too badly, either. From what I chose to remember.

"Go for it." Jo glanced at some of my attempts at scheduling. "Who teaches 280?"

"Krugen." I scrubbed a hand across my face. "Physics two might be the death of me. Bensen."

"I've heard he's good." Jo put the paper down. "What classes do you have with Murphy?"

I leaned back against the pillows. "No idea." We hadn't talked about classes, mostly because he had his own degree to fulfill and I had mine. If we overlapped that was great, but we weren't going to be one of those couples who had classes together by design. There were times I didn't want to see Murph, despite how much I lo - liked him.

Where the hell was my head lately?

"No classes together?" Jo fiddled with the hem of her pants.

"Not by design." Just wasn't us.

"Oh."

"Yeah. I think I'll go with this." Handed her the schdeule with Two Cities in it. "Physics, the second half of intro, Two Cities, and Craft of Fiction." Oh, the life of an unofficial creative writing minor and chemistry major. Positively joyful. "When do we register, again?"

"Wednesday. Seven."

Great. Had to be up early anyway, so it wasn't a big deal. Could register and then head to breakfast and have plenty of time.

"Okay." I fumbled for my phone. New messages. Two from Izzy. Two from Murphy. Ironically, he was reminding me about registration. Bless that boy.

"Wanna do dinner tomorrow?" she asked.

"Sure." Glanced around at the array of papers on the bed with us - none of them physics related. "I think I might actually need to do homework now." Also might pop in a movie. Maybe The Princess Bride. "You're more than welcome to stay."

"I need to go call my aunt. She leaves for Turkey later this week." She slid off the bed. "Maybe some other night."

"No problem." Or maybe it was a Ghostbusters II kind of night.

Jo left and I looked at my physics book. Better yet, let's just go with the first season of Leverage. That should work.

These were the mornings I desperately wished for a coffee pot. The Fire Marshal would probably take it, but it would be worth it. So worth it.

At five minutes to seven I - and the rest of the sophomore class - booted up the computer and logged into PeopleSoft. Registration was done online and two minutes before go time, and waiting at the last stage before actual registration, I clicked open another tab to, predictably, Facebook.

Pop.

Murphy McRiley: hey
Olivia Karizslowski: Mornin' sunshine!
Murphy McRiley: devs already swearin

Checked the time and clicked back to PeopleSoft. The trick was to be neither too early nor too late. The clock in the bottom right of the screen hit seven and sophomores clicked almost as one. The page gave me the loading symbol and I sat there, staring stupidly at it.

It froze.

"Shit!"

Clicked out of the tab. Tried to, anyway. The entire browser had frozen. Double shit. Mozilla popped up with a happy fail message to which - like most others in the building and across campus - shrieked, "Shit!"

Firefox finally closed and I clicked open a new session, going first for PeopleSoft and secondly for Facebook.

Murphy McRiley: ol?
Olivia Karizslowski: got closed out by firefox
Murphy McRiley: shit
Olivia Karizslowski: no kidding

The system was a sad combination of every synonym for slow ever created. It took forever to keep back to my academic shopping cart in the program, two which I got bumped again from the last stage and literally growled at the screen. Damn it.

Third time must have been the charm because it went through with all green checkmarks, despire the fact none of the prerequisites for Two Cities were there at all.

Olivia Karizslowski: Bumped twice, still got everything. You?
Murphy McRiley: 2 for 4 gonna need to sign as overload. friggin juniors
Olivia Karizslowski: Backups?
Murphy McRiley: make that 1 overload
Olivia Karizslowski: That sounds better.
Olivia Karizslowski: I gotta go. Breakfast. Bye.

At least that was over for another semester. And I did need to go since I was currently roughly ten minutes behind getting my ass out the door for breakfast. And nothing was ready to go. Damn it.

Escapades and Shenanigans

2011-12-07T22:20:00.003-05:00

Last night (this morning, really) I set my alarm and accidentally set it for 8pm. Shortly after that, in my haste to unplug my computer cord from a barely reachable power strip wedged between the fridge, dresser, and movie crate, I accidentally switched it off and have yet to fix the damn blinking time that currently reads 1:30 in the afternoon. Needless to say this was the type of morning where liberal amounts of Kahlua wound up in my coffee, which, thankfully, I remembered to grab on my way out the door.

My analytical lab is under the impression I'm probably going to drop dead from caffeine ingestion very shortly, due to the amount of coffee I ingest on a regular basis. The only saving grace is that, according to our most recent analysis by HPLC, there less of a caffeine concentration in dark roast coffee than light roast (mostly due, we think, to the roasting process in that you literally bake the caffeine out of the bean). Also, I usually only drink after that first cup of coffee unless it's going to be a seriously hellish night, and then all bets are off. Usually by that point I've been to Timmy Horton's and am probably contemplating a Dunkin run.

The highlight of my day came this afternoon - closer to dinnertime - when my housemate found she had locked herself out of her room. Naturally, she called campo (campus police) to come open her door. So we sat there in the living room for a further five minutes, when I calmly remarked, "Don't you have a bottle of vodka sitting on your dresser?" She looked at me, muttered, "Shit," and we immediately began planning how exactly we could get in that room to hide the so-called evidence. Campo had already taken a bottle of booze from us earlier in the week (it was left out, they came to let somebody in, we got an email from Res Ed and all found it slightly hysterical), and, well, long story short, we remembered there's a fire escape going up the back side of the house, conveniently stopping at the window of our house manager who happens to share a bathroom with my locked out roommate. House manager was not at the house. There wasn't enough time to get shoes on, so, out the door we go - her in socks, me barefoot - and around to the back of the house.

K: I can't do this. I don't like ladders.

Me: Okay.

Keep in mind it's pitch black outside. With no lights on to light this damn fire escape.

You guessed it - barefoot up the metal ladder in the middle of December, move the screen out of the open window (bless you, B & G, for having the heat so damn high), foot in the waste basket after sliding off the chair in front of the window, stagger across the room, open door, go through shared bathroom, hide vodka, fix everything like you'd never been there, and wind up in the living room with semi-frozen feet. The guy showed up about three minutes later to let her in.

Mission accomplished; crisis averted.

Even better was the conversation we had while randomly watching an episode of 30 Rock we found on Comedy Central.

T: So, gin and tonic is just gin and tonic, right?

Pretty sure my housemates have made my senior year so far. I couldn't ask to live with a better group of girls (and three guys) than I currently do. They keep me smiling through the week.

For All This Life

2011-11-29T09:58:00.003-05:00

I've been on this earth twenty-two years. In those subsequent years, the toughest things I've had to do have been walking away from a great relationship with a wonderful person because I was going away to college, getting stuck in an airport for a single night due to a sudden monsoon in Philadelphia, having unexplained belly pain resulting in surgery my first semester of college, leaving my mother in an airport twice, only this time it was her that was leaving and me that was staying (not that it helped), calling my mother a few weeks later to tell her I wasn't coming home and didn't know when I could even think about getting on a plane and getting across the Atlantic, and the following five days of living in the Virgin Atlantic terminal at Heathrow Airport.

It's a toss up of whether all of the previous - collectively - trumps the past four months.

It's been difficult. That could be the understatement of 2011, truthfully, if sitting in my professor's office and, after going over the last exam and talking about where to go from there, fighting on three separate occasions not to cry is any indication. I've done really well since the first month of the semester to not let the center of my brain hijack the rest of it, which is the sort of scientific way of saying I haven't let myself panic as badly as I used to. It's probably not good for my heart, either, the amount of caffeine I ingest on a regular basis.

I don't want to use the word overwhelmed but that's really what it boils down to. Between what's going on up here - no need to insert the laundry list of stuff as that's already been done - and what's going on at home, it's difficult to get the distance required. 45 miles doesn't feel like 45 miles. Even if it were 3,000 I don't think it would work. Sometimes there's just not enough space on the planet to get the distance that feel necessary.

It's also difficult to not let the distance you need hurt the people who need you.

Yeah, that's one I'm still trying to wrap my head around and there are days when I'm successful and days when, well, I'm a giant fail at it. Lately, it seems that my failure days outnumber my non-failure days. It's a struggle, more often than not, to find my motivation and my Focus (slippery little bastard), and to do all I need to do when the only thing I really want to do is curl up in my amazingly comfortable dorm bed and block out the outside world and sleep for a solid eight hours. My beloved sister insists I can sleep when I'm dead, which I think has taken root in the back of my head because it's ten past midnight and I'm working on homework. I'm hoping - more or less planning, actually - to be in bed by three. Which means I have some things to get done right the hell now.

The bright side is that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. There's the fact that spring semester is going to be glorious. There's also the fact that I will be returning to Wales two weeks after graduation for three weeks. Yup, I was accepted into the summer program, and will be returning to a place that grew to be a second (third, maybe?) home.

But there's a lot to do between now and then. A lot to do. Still, there are days when you sit there, think, get a little lost in your head and wonder can I do this? Am I good enough to do this? Have I gotten in over my head? The next thought you think is the true kicker.

Is it really worth it?

There are days when I go cross-eyed looking at my own reflection in the mirror really wondering if the ends justify the means. I've been assured by numerous people they do indeed, but here, right here in this hot as hell corner room, you wonder. You really, really wonder.

Sitting here introspecting isn't getting my lesson plans done. And you know how much I love those damn things.

15 Reasons to Love Knitting

2011-11-28T18:31:00.003-05:00

(These are in no particular order.)

1. It's like a reset button for my head.

2. Imaging poking vital areas of the body with a bluntly sharp object - especially someone you're not quite fond of - produces a rather shark-like smile.

3. Something has to bring me out of my coffee induced delirium for me to actually get some decent sleep.

4. Repetitive motion I don't really have to think about does wonders for my blood pressure.

5. Revisiting #2 is also quite good for my blood pressure.

6. It's a fairly productive way to procrastinate.

7. Knitting is soothing.

8. When you finish a product, people look at you like you've actually accomplished something worth talking about.

9. Two very important concepts: Pretty colors and something shiny.

10. It's not a miracle cure by any means, but it works.

11. Teach someone to knit and you've possible taught them to clothe themselves for the rest of their life.

12. Revising #11: Or until their attention span runs out.

13. I'm really a 94-year-old woman at heart.

14. It's fun. (Yes, that's all there is to this one.)

15. If you're really good at it, you can do it both sober and drunk.

Hysterics

2011-11-26T00:11:00.001-05:00

I dunno whether it's because I'm in that kind of mood or because it's quarter after midnight, but I found this to be more than slightly hysterical. The only reason I went looking for this particular song? It's been stuck in my head since I heard it this afternoon after taking my grandmother to get her car from the repair place.

It's okay to headbang a little. You know you want to.

This is when I think I should probably get out of this chair and crawl into bed.

Double Double Digits

2011-11-25T10:20:00.002-05:00

It's the only way I could figure to describe the fact that today I'm 22. Double double digits. Two twos.

As for what I'm going to do on my birthday, well, I've got my copy of The Strategic Teacher open and a curriculum unit to pretty much finish. That's my plans for the day. My plans for the next year? To continue to wander, live, love, laugh, and enjoy every day on this earth, even if getting up at 7:30 and ending that day well into the next is the order of business.

I figured my next milestone was 30, whereas my mother has assured me it's 25. How about we just shoot for tomorrow, first.

Appropriately, this video - this song rather - has been one that's been stuck in my head. Here's to living uncharted.

Looking in All Directions

2011-11-23T22:15:00.003-05:00

A little while ago I sat at my mother's good oak table in the kitchen (for future reference - and general FYI - we have two tables: one is a tile-top we use generally, when it's just us [my sister, niece, and our parents] or us and our aunt and uncle, and the other is the Amish-made oak table with four leaves that we only use at holidays or other occasions when absolutely necessary) and thought back through the various Thanksgivings I've experienced over the past few years.

Most of them were held at the house I used to live in; I was 11 turning 12 at the tail end of our week at Disney World, so we ate Thanksgiving dinner at Port Orleans; there was the year we ate at my sister's house (in which my uncle pegged me in the jugular with a roll from across the kitchen because I said "chuck me a roll"); one year I decided not to go to Rhode Island and was the only one in the house and spent the weekend painting the room I was going to move into when we moved; I spent on Thanksgiving in Rhode Island, having been picked up at college on the way through the Thruway; and last year I cooked Thanksgiving dinner for my English and Welsh flat-mates, who then surprised me with a cake because Thanksgiving was also my 21st birthday.

Of course, interspersed with that, have been the holidays I've spent puking my guts out because it's fairly well-known tradition in this family that for one of the three holidays - Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year - someone is going to be sick. There are years when I'm only down for the count at one, and the memorable year where I accidentally had two birthdays in the same year because I didn't have my party until February, due to illness.

Tomorrow, of course, is Thanksgiving. For as much as the last six months have been rather interesting - and at times more than difficult - there's still a lot to be thankful for. The family is healthy, we're happy (for the most part, there are some things that just....just can't be easily fixed right now or that are flat-out going to take time) and we're all going to be gathered in the kitchen and generally just being us.

I'm good with that.

Not to mention I have the biggest craving for stuffing that I can't seem to explain. Seriously. Big bowl of stuffing. Gravy. That's all I want.

And then the day after I'm really hankering for some burgers, chips, and birthday cake. But I have a feast to get through first. A feast by the name of Earl. Yes, we're the type of family to name the turkey we're going to be eating. It's been a tradition ever since I can remember, and we've gone through George, Igor, Edgar, Oliver, and many, many more. It took roughly 20 minutes to decide on Earl.

We're a little quirky. But I wouldn't have us any other way.

Have a fantastic day with your family (both chosen and the ones you have no choice in the matter) and your friends. Happy Thanksgiving.

Focus Meets Train

2011-11-14T10:33:00.002-05:00

I made a Facebook status sometime last week that detailed the fact that my Focus, my beloved Murfee, had more or less eaten too many cookies, rolled down the back hill, and was subsequently hit by a train as it passed by the house.

That should give you an accurate picture of how my semester has been going. Between two education seminars, four classes, a minimum of 20 hours community service (which, honestly, is actually 45, due to where I'm living), and three labs a week, I'm impressed that I'm still upright, mildly functioning, and haven't given myself a massive heart attack due to my caffeine consumption. I am, however, out of my meals provided by the Colleges courtesy of my meal plan, which isn't a big deal as I have a house with a kitchen, and thank sweet baby J that I have a coffee maker otherwise life would be more difficult than it already is on some days.

There is, however, a light at the end of the tunnel. That light is next semester's schedule - which I've already registered for - and it is glorious. No class on Mondays and I'm done on Fridays by 10:00 am. Essentially a four-day weekend my senior spring. Which brings me back to this happy fact:

I registered for my last semester of undergraduate classes.

Which prompted a whole string of thoughts, most of them involving four-letter words and something that sounded very similar to I don't give a shit what this semester turns out like as long as I pass everything with the minimum grade required to have it count for my major.

It's kind of sad, really, as I started off the semester really hoping that I'd be able to pull of a solid 3.0. At this point in my life, the more realistic goal, however hard it is to swallow, is that I'll be very lucky if the hard work that I'm putting in this semester results in the minimum grade required to have all this shit count for my degree. It's not like I'm slacking, but having three chemistry courses all over 300 level is, well, not only time-consuming but soul-sucking in a way that you haven't really got a concept of until you actually get there.

I'll be amazed if I have any sanity left at the end of the semester. That's when I'm assuring myself that I'll be able to sleep, while my sister assures me that I can sleep when I'm dead. That's true, too, but I'm hoping to hold out on that for another couple of years, at the very least.

In other news, I was at a Ben Folds concert this past weekend and it was absolutely epic. Truly one of the highlights of my senior year and I'm really glad that I went. He's an amazing musician - and a piano player that words can't adequately describe - and it was an awesome experience.

The fact that my 22nd birthday is coming up in 11 days hasn't really registered, either, because it's not like I'm going to spend it relaxing. I'm most likely going to spend all of Black Friday - my birthday - working on my curriculum project: lesson plans, assessment criteria, rubrics, the whole nine yards and whatnot. It's going to be painful on multiple levels, but it absolutely has to get done because there's only so many weeks of class left.

It's not supposed to go this fast.

So, now that I need to prepare myself for my analytical class (don't get me started), I'm going to spend the next few hours of my life trying not to freak out about the fact that I flat-out forgot I have a lab write-up (thankfully not a formal) due today and the mother of all formal labs due tomorrow. (But maybe we can convince her to change that to Wednesday.) Couple that with an exam tomorrow evening, auditions for the winter and spring shows on Wednesday (with a prepared monologue, too) and this week is going to be fairly busy, culminating in another exam next Sunday and a project for Econ on the Tuesday before break. With all of that is who-knows-what coming down the pipes in the education courses and, really, people are wondering why I drink the amount of caffeine that I do? How else do you expect me to get through a week where my hours of work have bypassed the hours in a week?

But that's more or less what I've been dealing with for three months.

So damn difficult to think through that it's almost over. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Here's hoping it's not an oncoming train.

Things to Know XXII

2011-09-26T22:51:00.003-04:00

- It's possible to lock yourself out of your room four times in one day.

- The first time is due to operator error and the last three are due to a malfunctioning doorknob.

- At least, that's the story I'm telling.

- My room is a damn hotbox.

- For some reason, Mother Nature has decided to have a hot flash, and she's taking it out on the rest of us.

- I sleep better in cold than hot.

- There's a spider bite the size of a fifty-cent piece on my left calf.

- I might, for the first time since high school, get an A on a chemistry exam tomorrow night.

- Having your shit together academically is actually quite nice.

- My calf itches. For obvious reasons.

- No, I'm not really sure where I picked that thing up and I'm hoping it's gone by tomorrow night. It's damn annoying.

- I haven't checked my campus mailbox in days. There shouldn't be anything in there, as Netflix hasn't had time to go and come yet.

- I brushed my teeth and then cracked open a beer. Yes, I know this doesn't make sense.

- Mondays are a little rough.

- From the amount of flashcards for my analytical exam on Friday, you'd think it was a history exam instead.

- I color-code things.

- Most of my classmates and I marvel at the soccer player who shaved his mustache because they finally lost.

- It was a little startling to see him without facial hair, honestly.

- Not that we didn't take the mick out of him about it in the first place, but hey.

- I wonder if I can stick this back in the fridge for later.

- Considering my day starts tomorrow at 6:40, I'm crawling into bed now.

Since When?

2011-09-24T22:53:00.004-04:00

Hi. It's been a while, hasn't it?

At this point I hope there's nothing swimming in my coffee mug that's been sitting on the floor since I left for soccer roughly six hours and twenty minutes ago. The coffee mug that takes all four cups from my coffee maker in one go with room to spare. It's the equivalent of heaven for this chick.

One assumption you could make as to my absence from my lovely blog - and my lovely blog reader, which keeps up me to date on what the rest of you happy people are doing - is that I've been busy with my last first semester of undergrad. Yeah, you read that right. I'm a senior. Believe me, it's still terrifying to me, and it's been a month since I've moved back to campus, and we're going to be starting week five already, which is another jaw-dropper. As a result there hasn't been much Murphy, and I apologize for that. However, trying to keep Murfee (my Focus) occupied and on task has been an uphill battle some days. Specifically the ones where I get out of lab and all I want to do is crawl into my dorm bed (which, if you haven't seen my Twitter, I BIG PUFFY HEART) and sleep for at least six hours. But I can't do that. It would be unproductive and one thing that I've managed to be is productive.

With some extra incentive, too.

I started playing soccer again.

The above statement gets it's own line because, for any of you that don't know, I had to stop playing soccer little over two years ago because of my health issues. I wasn't able to keep the fitness level required to be an official Heron, and it was a big step to realize that, and an even bigger step to realize that wasn't a path I could easily follow anymore. A path that was more hassle than it was worth, despite my love for the game. Two years later this feels like a second chance at doing what has been my first true love. I get to put my spandex on for a reason other than wearing it to bed, strap on some shin guards, and buy new goalkeeping gloves because my other ones have literally been shredded.

Soccer is keeping me sane. It's relaxing. Not as relaxing as knitting, which my dad brought my knitting needles to me today, so I'll spend some time unwinding with that before I go to bed. I have a second chance to do what I love.

And it's my senior year. There are a finite number of "tomorrows" for me.

Now, I could take another post to do one of my favorite "features" but that would take a little more time and, frankly, two posts directly after one another is a little odd. So, think of this as a shortened Things to Know. Kind of like an unexpected present.

- "Holy F--k that's a big spider!" (While in a car in the middle of campus)

- "Are you inebriated?" "No, I'm a chemistry major."

- I apparently can't communicate in written form to save my life. Or my lab report grade in analytical.

- To the professor that said students spend less than 10 hours per week on their work outside of class - I spend 10 1/2 hours a week in lab.

- I make a trip to Coldstone once a week. This seems to be an okay arrangement with my brain and my hips.

- I finally put up all my posters, cork-board, and Vera photo thingy last week.

- It's the beginning of week five, if you need a reference for the previous.

- I found my bedroom floor Wednesday, because I thought my mother was going to actually come in the house when she came up.

- It's five weeks in my senior year of college.

- Where the hell did the time go?

- I have a houseplant named Henry, and have named the majority of his babies after the subsequent English monarchs.

- Not one of the posters hanging on my walls is hung straight.

- My Focus is a slippery little bugger that likes to play on the train tracks out behind the house.

- Speaking of which, one of these days, when the damn train goes through, the hill and the house are going to slide into the freakin' lake.

- The prospect of graduating and going on to grad schools scares the shit out of me.

- While the previous is true, I think I'm ready for it.

- Why do men feel the need to sit with their hand in their pants? Or is this something only collegiate-age men do, because it's kind of awkward.

- My biochem partner for the first week fidgeted more than my niece when she has to potty.

- I carry on conversations with my houseplant like he should be answering me back. But you're supposed to talk to your plants, right? It helps them grow, right?

- I feel like I've been given a second chance at soccer, and I'm going to take it. Every minute of it.

- My mother and sister have been canning fiends lately. The result is that I have a jars of raspberry jam, applesauce, spaghetti sauce, and salsa currently in my possession.

- You'd have thought I was asking for the universe on a silver platter when I asked if I could have a jar of sauce.

- But yes, it's that damn good.

- I bought new colored pens from the bookstore on Friday and thought I'd died and gone to heaven during biochem.

- I have a love of office supplies.

- I finally hooked up the cable on Wednesday, just so I could watch Harry's Law.

- The fire marshal catches a glimpse of the tangled mess of wires that's everything on the one side of the room in a power strip, he'll probably have a heart attack.

- I could care less. Mostly because I'm a senior.

- And hell hath no fury like a Louise without her automated coffee pot.

Late-Night Coffee Dregs

2011-09-12T00:56:00.002-04:00

I'm well aware of what time it is and also aware of the fact that it's probably not a good idea to be consuming coffee at this hour, but I'm not about to let a good cup go to waste. Also, most of you know I do my best ruminations at roughly this time of night, usually when I'm trying to do something else that requires more focus and attention than I particularly want to give it. (It's lab reports this time, not education seminars, for once.)

The last you heard from me was a few weeks ago. I posted this pretty cool video about a flash mob - that I was part of - and said that I'd be back to talk about life in general.

First thing you should know is that I'm not living in a closet this year. I have enough space to have my moon chair and enough sunlight that Henry actually gets to live with me this year, rather than have to relocate back to the kitchen table at home because he's slowly dying of sun deprivation. As it is, he's continually growing and making my fellow floormates with their own plants rather jealous of the fact that he's huge.

Actually, they're really rather impressed that he's still alive. Most of them apparently don't make it past first semester of first year.

Of course Practical Magic is playing in the background and the most pressing thing I have left to do is my analytical chemistry lab report which involves the use of Excel, and we all know that I'm positively Excel stupid. I'll freely and readily admit that I am absolute shit when it comes to using that program.

The long and short of it right now is that the front of my week is more loaded than the back of my week. Monday and Tuesday see me going from very early in the morning until roughly five in the afternoon, and Wednesday is much the same, only with a later start. My saving grace is that I have only one class on Thursday, and Friday just has three. I'm lucky in that regard. That's the way I planned it.

It's not easy. But it's college. It's not supposed to be. However, the homework is getting done, turned in on time, and I'm doing really well with things. I was able to explain a physical chemistry problem to one of my friends (who's also in my class) and was really proud of myself that I could do it. I'm actually looking forward to that first exam in that class, because I think it will be the first time I get a B or higher on a chemistry exam. If that happens, I'm sending it home to mom and dad to be put on the fridge because, well, I'll be that proud of it. And they'll be proud of me for getting it.

But that's later this month. There's quite a few things between then and now. Including lab reports. I'm not getting any younger, and it's not getting an earlier (technically, it is, but that's really semantics at this point) so I'm going to go sit on my bed and work on my carbon-copy sheets and hope for the best when it comes to Excel. I think I'm going to need it.

MIA

2011-08-30T13:02:00.003-04:00

Where the hell have I been the past month and a half, right? Finishing up the summer, working, being an Orientation Mentor (helping new students arrive, orient themselves, and generally get the lay of the land before things kicked off officially yesterday).

There's a bit that's happened between then and now, and as it's the start of my senior year of college (WTF did that happen?) and I'm currently using my biochemistry textbook as a booster seat in my desk chair (yeah, I'm good like that), there's probably a lot you've been wondering about your crazy Sagittarius. Rest assured, you'll get some introspection into my ever-scary mind before too long. At this moment, however, I need to pack up my lovely laptop and head to lab (who has lab the first week? Seriously...) but I'll leave you with this. This being the flashmob I was a part of during Orientation. Yes, the words I and flashmob were in the same sentence by design. Scary, huh?

Anyway, check it out, have a laugh, and generally get ready to crash your way through the first half of my collegiate undergrad experience.

Note: This song has a Pavlovian effect on all Orientation staff, myself included. Just sayin'.

Murphy and Me XXXX

2011-07-20T21:00:00.002-04:00

[Quadruple X....Must be really good porn. Or Louise is having fun with Roman Numerals. Which, FYI, I had to look at the wikipedia page on them to know where the hell I have to go next. Methinks we might not have that many sections left. It's hard to believe there's been forty.

Anyway. Happy Thursday, Heather Ann. Hope this brightens your week.]

Don't ask me how, but instead of perpetually behind in four out of five classes (education seminar included; physics decided as a lost cause) I was now two weeks ahead in my education seminar and crawling (tooth and nail) from under the pile of history reading I'd heaped on myself. The easy thing would be to ask Murph, as he'd already taken the class. But that would be the easy way out and maybe against academic policy. Not that I'd bothered to read the eighty-something page packet the Committee on Standards stuffs in our campus boxes every year.

This was my own damn fault and I was going to get through it. Even if it killed me. Might not kill me, but would make me more batshit crazy than I already was.

So, on a Saturday night (in much the same fashion as Friday night had been spent) that's why I was slogging through page after page of Early Modern Europe with a heaping helping of The Restoration for dessert. Practical Magic was in the DVD player; as books and papers were spread all over my bed, I'd taken up residence in the moon chair, shivering. The heater, which wasn't doing a hell of a lot to begin with, seemed to have died completely. Buildings and Grounds hadn't gotten up here yet and Jo had already confirmed it was warmer in the hall than my corner single.

One answer was to curl in the same bed as my porta-furnace, but Murph hadn't looked too good earlier. However, there was always his closet and I know the boy owned flannel. Could check up on him while I was down there, too.

Check on boyfriend first, raid closet second, and take a mental health study break from the very screwed-up early days of the English monarchy.

That was my plan.

Since the weather had turned nasty wandering around in socks wasn't a bright idea. Once slippers were on, it was down to the third floor. It was warmer immediately outside my freezer of a room. Didn't wait long for Dev to open the door.

"Hey, Ol." Dev looked rather startled, truthfully.

"Hi. Can I come in?"

He looked behind him, at Murph. "He's not feelin' so hot."

I blinked.

"He's thrown up, like, four times."

And this was supposed to deter me how? "Okay."

Dev looked at me, cocked his head to the side and said, "Yeah, right, must not have been in my right mind to think you wouldn't want to see him after he's hurled multiple times."

"I'm not a sympathy puker." He let me in the room.

"Thank God neither am I." Dev shut the door quietly and peeked into the trashcan. "Murph? Murph, Ollie's here."

Murph had his comforter all the way to his chin, hair sticking up in every direction, face roughly the same color as paper. Long story short: he looked like utter shit. Adorable shit, but still. Shit.

I dragged his desk chair over to curl up in it so we were close to being eye to eye. "Hi."

He blinked. It was a look very similar to what I had worn while trying not to hurl. Carefully, one of my hands snuck under the blankets to find his and tangle our fingers together. "Think you got whatever I had?"

Murph's thumb spelled no on the back of my hand.

"Just general crappiness?"

He blinked at me again.

"You feel okay, Dev?"

Dev popped an earbud out. "What?"

"You feel okay?"

He gave a half shrug. "Yeah. Tired. But pages of econ spreadsheets do that. Liam and Colby were fine today and yesterday."

"Yesterday?"

"When I got back yesterday in the afternoon, Murph was already in bed with the trashcan." He leaned forward, elbows on his knees.

"Cheatin' on me with the trashcan?" I pushed Murph's bangs off his sweaty forehead, smiling when he snorted. "I mean, it's an attractive trashcan." He chuckled.

"Why are your hands so cold?" It was the first Murph had spoken and he sounded like he'd been gnawing gravel.

"I don't really have any heat in my room, which is why I'm going to raid your closet for a flannel before I go back upstairs." When stated matter-of-factly it didn't sound quite so bad.

"You have no heat?" Murph croaked, shifting uncomfortably.

"It's not that I don't have any, it's just that I don't have a lot..."

"Have you called B and G?" Dev asked, giving the hold on gesture to the computer. He must have been video chatting with someone.

"Yeah. They said maybe tomorrow." Which they said on Thursday. Not that the boys needed to know. They were already a bit outraged. "It's fine, it's just a little chilly." More like freeze your ass off, but, again, they didn't need to know.

Murph looked ready to suggest I stay with him, winced, and squeezed my fingers.

"What?"

"My belly hurts."

I leaned forward and kissed his forehead, apprehensive about the head coming off him. Usually the only way for me to sleep in the same bed as Murph was, basically, for us to spoon. Either him around me or him with his head on my chest. That worked best. Unfortunately, neither of those put him in the right spot if he needed the trashcan in a hurry. Which, from the bleary look of understanding in his hazel eyes, he knew.

"I'm sorry." Firsthand experience speaking - belly pain sucked. "I've got pills to take care of that."

Murph snorted again. "Might skip that, thanks."

Yeah, might not be the best idea out there. Not that I'd do it - I just wanted to make him smile. Mission accomplished on that front.

His eyelids were drooping.

"I'll stop by before I go to bed." He nodded; I kissed his forehead, then his nose before extracting my hand from his. He was half asleep when I put the desk chair back and gently snoring by the time I'd rummaged through the closet to find a flannel shirt. It was almost the size of a tarp, heavy, no doubt warm, and smelled of Murph.

"I'll be back in half an hour," I said to Dev. He gave me a thumbs up and went back to the man on the screen.

My corner single was positively frigid. Murph's flannel shirt went on over a cami and some leggings, the tails hanging halfway down my thighs. With the bed cleaned off in record time, I grabbed Edgar and headed back downstairs. Dev opened the fishbowl; only his desk lamp was on. Murph was out. It took some reaching, but Edgar soon sat next to Smokey, unblinking eyes on Murph.

"'Night, Dev."

"'Night, Ol."

Despite the fact that I sleep better when I'm cold and have to burrow, it took a long time for me to fall asleep. A very long time.

One minute sound asleep, the next moment wide awake and wondering what the hell had woke me up.

Bang, bang "Olivia! Ollie, wake up!" Thump thump bang.

Sounded an awful lot like Dev. A panicked Devan beating on my door. I scrambled out of bed and jerked the door open, almost mowing over my own toes. Dev stood in the hall looking four-kinds of panicked and wearing just a pair of a boxers.

"Wha - "

"Murphy won't wake up."

Oh, dear God, what?

"Murph - His phone - And he didn't when he does - And Liam kept calling - "

Dev's panic was not helping my skyrocketing blood pressure. Not at all. No clue what I was supposed to be doing at the moment, but putting on pants seemed like the right kind of start. I was listening to Dev babble, almost hyperventilate, and generally freak out, and was trying to breathe while putting on jeans.

Something wasn't right with this picture.

Murphy won't wake up.

I grabbed my Vera, stuffed my feet into my sneakers, and sprinted after Dev trying to understand what exactly was going on. We burst into the fishbowl to see Liam slapping at Murph's pale cheeks. "Murphy! Murphy!" There was a pleading in Liam's voice that I'd never heard before.

I leaned against Dev's bed as he pulled jeans and a t-shirt on. Murph wasn't moving - didn't even look like he was breathing. "Did somebody call an ambulance?" Rubbed a hand over my chest, feeling like I was going to have a heart attack and concentrated on breathing.

"They're on their way. I'm gonna go meet 'em at the door downstairs." Dev was gone, the door closing slowly behind him.

Liam ran a hand through his hair. "Maybe - Maybe you can - "

He didn't have to get it all out before I was staggering across the room and behind to hold Murph's face in my hands. The heat coming off him was unbelievable. Almost frightening.

"Murphy," I said, lightly tapping his nose. "Mur - " My voice broke. "Murphy. Murphy wake up."

Nothing.

The paramedics barged in then; I stepped back until the desk rammed into my kidneys, grabbing at Liam's wrist with epileptic fingers.

"What's his name?" One of the paramedics - Toby - asked.

"Murphy. Murphy McRiley." Liam was surprisingly calm at this point. Jittery, but more calm than me or Dev who stood by his wardrobe chewing his fingernails.

"You look like family," Toby said while his partner pushed aside comforter and sheets to get to Murph. God, he was so pale. "How old is he? Allergies?"

"We're twenty and he's allergic to penicillin." Liam shuddered, trying to tune out the other paramedic giving stats into his radio. They didn't sound good. Not that I would know what the hell good or bad stats would be no matter how many episodes of ER I'd watched when I was thirteen.

"When did Murphy start to feel sick?"

Liam looked at me and I stuttered out, "He - He was fine Wednesday night. Said he was a little tired after our date." Pushed hair out of my face with trembling fingers. "It's getting to be the end of the semester. We're all tired."

"Did anything hurt? Was it just a head cold?"

The questions were almost overwhelming, especially when Toby's partner did something to make Murph jerk in pain, even unconscious. There was some talking amongst them, the phrase "Really needs a hospital" surfaced and they manhandled Murph - in his boxers - onto a backboard and then onto the stretcher waiting in the hall.

Liam threw on his coat and pressed a set of keys into my hand. "Have Dev drive. I'm going with my brother." He jogged after the paramedics and I practically threw the keys at Dev. There was no way in hell I was with it enough to drive. Not that Dev looked much better, but he wasn't shaking half as bad.

Couldn't tell you if we turned out all the lights in the fishbowl, or if it was snowing or raining, or how many red lights we hit between St. Claire and the hospital. It was cold, mostly because my peacoat was in Jackson and partly because I had no idea what was wrong with my boyfriend but we were headed back to the freakin' ER.

Dev got us there in one piece, somehow, and we entered the ER waiting room to a pacing Liam.

"What's - Did he wake up?"

Liam shook his head. "They're doing X-Rays or a scan or something to figure out what the hell's goin' on." He blew out a loud breath. "I called Colby and Ma and Dad are on their way. They were my next call after the ambulance." He sat heavily in a hard leather and wood chair. The kind that seemed to be in every ER on the face of the earth.

I fell into the chair next to him. "How did you know? That something was wrong, I mean."

He shrugged. "I dunno. Call it that mystical twin thing - I couldn't sleep. Knew Murph wasn't feelin' well and needed to talk to him."

Dev leaned against the soda machine on the other side of the room. "The phone kept ringing. And ringing. Murph always picks up. Even if he's passed out drunk he answers the damn phone." He swallowed. "I got up. Tried to wake him up and he wouldn't. I called Liam, told him I couldn't get Murph up. He came over, we dialed Campus Safety - I did - and he called an ambulance. We weren't waiting for Campus EMS to show up."

"Then you got me up?" Pulled my legs up and rested my cheek on my knee. "I thought he had what I had."

Liam put an arm around my shoulders. The three of us were the only ones there, muted CNN on the TV, and so quiet you could practically hear the gears in the damn wall clock.

Well, it was quiet until Colby came tearing through the halls like his ass was on fire.

"Colby?" Liam rose to his feet only to be caught up in the manliest hug I'd ever seen. When he got a hold of me it was like he was trying to break ribs. Dev didn't escape, either.

"Any word?"

"They're doin' tests."

I alternated between pushing up the sleeves on my borrowed shirt and pulling them over my knuckles. My hair was still a just-asleep mess and somehow - some-friggin'-how - I hadn't devolved into tears over the fact that my boyfriend hadn't woken up.

Maybe I should be thankful my stomach hadn't tried to make an escape.

ER's suck. Majorly.

"Ollie?" Colby was crouched in front of me. "Is there anybody you need to call?"

"Uh..." Where was my mind? Definitely not here.

"Sasha?"

Yeah. Sasha probably. I checked my pockets for my phone. "Uh...Can I...?"

"Here. Use mine." Dev handed me his BlackBerry. Sasha's number was already ringing.

"How do you - " The line picked up on the other end.

"Hello?" Cara. A very sleepy Cara.

"Hey - It's, it's Ollie."

"Ollie? What's wrong, Ol? Why aren't you callin' from your phone?"

I was having a harder time keeping it together talking to Cara than being in the waiting room with the boys. "I'm at the ER. Murph's - Murphy's sick. Really sick."

"Oh, honey." There was some shuffling. "We'll be right there."

"Oh, no, you don't - " God, everything was just spiraling.

"Olivia. We'll be right there. And tell Devan I wanna know why his phone number is on my girlfriend's cell." With that she hung up.

Dear God, could this night get any worse?

"McRiley?"

The four of us looked toward the desk to see a man in scrubs and a hair net. Liam stood, wiped his palms on his jeans and said, "Yeah?"

The doc did a double take.

"Murphy's my twin," he said with a small smile. "What's wrong with him?"

"It seems to be Murphy's appendix that's giving him problems. At the very least it's painfully inflamed, at the worst, it's exploded. This is a fairly routine surgery we're talking and we need you to sign some paperwork."

He'd gotten steadily paler but nodded, "Of course." Liam followed the doc to the counter to sign away.

"His appendix," Dev breathed.

Abdominal surgery. Deja vu.

Liam came back and sat wearily, rubbing at his face. "My brother's having emergency surgery to remove his appendix."

"You need to call your parents?"

"They're on the way." He chuckled dryly. "Da's probably doin' ninety on the thruway."

"Oh, God," I murmured, realizing that tonight, in the ER waiting room, I was going to meet my boyfriend's parents for the first time. Sleep-rumpled and in their son's flannel shirt, too.

Now I was really going to puke.

"Ollie!"

Sasha came through the doors like a force of nature to hug me, Cara not far behind her. This time I wiped at my eyes when we parted, me stretched awkwardly in the chair.

"Hey, you guys didn't have to come - "

"Olivia." Cara squeezed herself onto the chair with me and threw her arms around my shoulders. "You, my dear, are my girlfriend's best friend. Her sister. When you hurt, she hurts. When you're stressed, she's stressed. So, damn straight, hun, we're going to be waiting with you until that boy wakes up." She leaned close to my ear. "And he's gonna look at you and think damn, I worried that beautiful girl, but she's still here. It don't matter that you haven't said those words yet. You bein' here says it all." She kissed my temple and stood, hands on her hips and staring hard at Dev, all Southern business. "Devan."

"Miz Cara," he said, pocketing his BlackBerry.

Sasha had once called Cara her sweet-tea drinkin', peach-lovin' Southern shrew (even though the girl was only from Virginia) and as she was staring at Dev she was every inch of a strong-willed Southern woman.

Hell, I wasn't in the receiving end of that look and I was a little worried.

"Playing a go-between between best friend and boyfriend of the birthday girl is a bit hectic." He shrugged. "That's why we swapped numbers."

If I had a desk, I'd have whacked my head off the damn thing. "So, my boyfriend and my best friend were conspiring for my birthday?"

"And we're really good at it, too." Sasha grinned. While Cara had at least put on sweats, Sasha was rocking shorts and Uggs. I think I was too fried to really comprehend, otherwise she wouldn't have heard the end of it.

"Okay." Drew my legs up again, wrapping my arms around my shins. "I don't wanna know until Murph is well enough to enjoy it with us."

"Duh," Sasha muttered. "You had any coffee today?"

"A long time ago." A really long time ago, truthfully. My head thunked back against the wall. "Could really use another cup. Or four."

"Last thing you need is coffee," Colby muttered.

"Yeah, but she's not the one who parked in the wrong parking lot and ran through the friggin' hospital like he was a track star," Liam shot back.

We chuckled. Colby turned a fascinating shade of red.

"Anybody know what time it is?" Simple question, really.

Sasha grinned.

How an inquiry as innocent as the time turned into an off-key chorus of Happy Birthday, I've no idea. It happened anyway. It was my turn to be a funny shade of red, smiling tiredly.

"Thanks, guys." I'd been twenty for almost an hour. Twenty's not that much different than nineteen. Didn't feel any different, anyway.

We settled in, talking and glancing at CNN and that's maybe when I dozed off for a bit. I jerked awake and rubbed at my eyes. Liam was in the chair next to me, elbows on his thighs and fixated on the screen.

"Where'd everybody go?" There was one hell of a crick in my neck.

"Wandered down to find some coffee. I think." He took a deep breath. "My parents should be here soon."

Oh, shit. This was far from the ideal situation to meet the boyfriend's parents. We all knew it. Which was why it was just me and Liam waiting for Mr. and Mrs. McRiley.

"This wasn't how I imagined meeting them." Really, it was anything but ideal. "Middle of the night, in the hospital." Overwhelming. Just, overwhelming. "I don't even know their names."

"Dermott and Maggie."

"Irish."

He chuckled. "Very."

"Maggie?"

"Margaret." Liam smiled. "You'll be fine."

Great. Another McRiley that could read me like a freakin' book. And he didn't even have to look at me to do it.

"Do you know we're named after our grandfathers?"

Where the hell had that come from? "No."

He settled back, sprawling as best he could. "Yeah. Ma was an O'Hare before she married Da and her father's name was Allen. Ma took the Roarke that was his middle name for Murphy's. Grandpa McRiley's middle was Connor."

"That's cool." And nothing like that had happened in my family. Izzy shared a middle name with our mother - Marie - and there was rumor that one of my mom's ancestors, a Boyd, was named Mae. Which trickled down through the years to be my middle name. "Someone on my mother's side was Mae."

"Your middle name?"

"Yeah. Olivia Mae."

"You haven't told Murph that, have you?"

I shook my head. "I'm not too wild about my middle name, honestly." Partly because it was so damn short and partly because people said it no problem and then butchered my last name because they weren't paying attention.

The joy of being Polish.

"Karizslowski is Polish, right?" He was then on the receiving end of a ya think? look. "Are your parents immigrants?"

That's where he was going. "Oh, no. No, my mother's family has been here for a couple generations. My father's parents came from Poland between the wars and he was the second child born here. His older sisters were born in Poland."

"Big family?"

I shrugged. "Lots of cousins. Cousins with siblings." My family was, more or less, frickin' huge. "There's a lot of us here in central New York, but some in New England and a few in West Virginia, Minnesota, and Michigan."

"Most of our family is still in Ireland." His head thumped lightly against the wall. "Has Murph told you about our parents?"

"A little." Wadded myself in the chair sideways to look at Liam. "Your dad's a glassblower - and you haven't been allowed in the studio since you were twelve."

His head snapped around to look at me, eyes wide. "He told you that?"

"Yeah. And your mom works in insurance." Butterflies started in my belly. "What - What do...What are they going to think of me?"

Liam straightened, turning toward me. Blinked. "They are....They've been wanting to meet you since Murph told them he had a girlfriend. He emailed Ma some pictures of you from Halloween."

Which, okay, I'd done the same to my mother in our weekly, bi-weekly emails.

"Honestly, they can't wait to meet you." He swallowed. "It shouldn't be me introducing you. It should be Murphy."

"We can't control that." Not right now at least.

"I know."

Yeah. Not the ideal situation. From the borrowed shirt to the ER to the elephant in the room of not having Murphy here - this was crazy to a whole new level.

We lapsed into silence, uncomfortable and stretched, content to wait. Or, rather, wait and fidget in my case.

The doors to the parking lot slid open.

"William? Oh, William - "

Liam stood, automatically moving to hug his mother while I tried to continue to breathe. Wobbling upright, I hovered in the background, content to watch. Both boys looked like their father, only Dermott wasn't as filled out - probably because he wasn't a football player - and, unlike his boys, Dermott had red hair. Or what used to red, as he was slanting toward gray in places. Maggie was thin and not a whole lot taller than me. She had the dark hair her boys did and Murph's hazel eyes.

Hazel eyes that looked around her son to me. Through me.

"Liam..." Dermott said quietly.

"Sorry, Da," he said, reaching back and snagging my borrowed shirt sleeve. "This is Olivia - Ollie - Murphy's girlfriend."

Maggie smiled. "Hi, Ollie. I've seen pictures..." She trailed off. "Nice to finally meet you, only I wish the circumstances were better." There was a lilt to her voice that two decades in the States couldn't wipe completely. "I'm Maggie."

There was such a kindness in her eyes, such an understanding....Between physics, orgo, Murph in the ER, and turning twenty, everything was suddenly too much.

I burst into quiet tears right then and there.

"Oh, love," Maggie said, gathering me into her arms. "It's a bit overwhelmin'."

Didn't matter it wasn't my own mother, Maggie was still a mom and I needed a mom's shoulder to cry on right now. Which I did. Soaking up the warmth Maggie provided. This would be damn mortifying if it didn't feel so good. And if I didn't need it so badly.

"Sorry," I mumbled, pulling back and wiping my cheeks.

"There's nothing to be sorry for, Ollie." She rubbed my arms lightly. "And you made a very pretty pirate on Halloween."

Cue flaming cheeks. "Thank you." Gathering what composure I had left, I turned to Dermott. "Hi, Mr. McRiley." He shook my hand, looking closely at my tear-red eyes and then, much to my horror, my shirt. If he recognized it, he didn't say. Which was one of the better things to happen tonight.

"Nice to meet you." Dermott's accent was thicker than Maggie's. He smiled slyly, and that's when I really saw Murph in his father. "Cold down here lately?"

Not what I was expecting and, honestly, a hell of a lot better. "Yeah. It hasn't been too bad, but, um, I don't have any heat."

We sat, Liam and I, between Dermott and Maggie. The rest of our motley crew returned, and Maggie hugged Dev and Colby; I introduced Cara and Sasha. And then we sat. And looked at each other.

In silence.

Oh, Lord.

The drunks and mishaps started rolling in around three. Girls who had been out partying, frat boys worried about their passed-out brothers, and city kids who didn't have enough sense to read the warnings on the Jackass DVD's. We made small talk - or rather, Cara, Liam, and Maggie did as Dev, Colby, Dermott, and I kind of sucked at it - and around four-thirty a doc came out.

"McRiley?"

Maggie, Dermott, and Liam went to speak with him. Sasha sat next to me, holding my hand tightly in hers. Dermott and Maggie followed the doctor through the door and Liam came back to us, hands in his pockets.

"His appendix had exploded." There was a collective flinch. "Yeah. They removed what was left of it and cleaned out the infection. He's on antibiotics, painkillers, and should come out of anesthesia sometime soon. Might not come out of it for long, and he might just go right back to sleep. He's gonna feel like shit when he does wake up." He took a deep breath. "They've moved him to a room on the second floor. He, uh, he's gonna be just fine. Eventually."

I uncurled and hugged a shaking Liam. Now that he knew his brother was going to be fine he was more or less losing it. All the control he'd had since the whole fiasco had started - in the fishbowl and then waiting until his parents arrived, then with his parents - he didn't have to be calm and composed anymore. Now he could worry.

"They have visiting hours tomorrow, right?" Cara asked, prodding a half-asleep Sasha. "We should come back tomorrow."

Colby rubbed his eyes. "That sounds like a plan."

"You want a ride to your car?"

"Please."

They gave one last round of hugs and paraded out the ER doors while Liam led Dev and I through the hospital to an elevator. We passed the time waiting outside Murph's room (once we found it - we had to circle the floor twice until a passing nurse took pity on us) by playing the Movie Game - Start with a movie or an actor and then get another film or actor from the first one. So, start with George Clooney and get Ocean's 11, then say Brad Pitt, who was also in Fight Club. Edward Norton then gets you to The Italian Job. Donald Sutherland gets you to Pride and Prejudice and Kiera Knightley leads to Pirates of the Caribbean. That sort of thing.

Liam was a little scared at how long Dev and I could go without needing to start again.

Maggie poked her head out the door. "He's awake. A little disoriented and tired, but awake."

Dev shoved Liam into the room first then we waited a little more until Dermott waved us in.

Murph was still too pale to be healthy and hooked to both a heart monitor and an IV. Liam pulled gently by my sleeve all the way to the side of the bed and I slipped my hand under Murph's. He was definitely more drugged than our previous ER trip. Still, he gave me a ghost of his regular smile and whispered, "Hi."

"Hi, Murph."

He swallowed hard, like his throat was dry. "Ha - Happy Birthday, Ol."

And then, right there in front of his parents, I leaned over and kissed his nose. Just to see him smile.

Happy Birthday indeed.

Murphy and Me XXXIX

2011-07-14T13:47:00.002-04:00

[I get to change symbols at fifty. And yes, I had to look at wikipedia for that tidbit of information. Short section, but I didn't want to combine this with what's coming next. Happy Thursday.]

Maybe it was a good thing we didn't make it too far into the tournament. Playing soccer in a snow storm doesn't bother me (had to dig the peacoat out of the closet, finally) but we were more or less starting the downside slide of the semester. Couple more weeks until Thanksgiving, and after that it was a short foray into December and then finals would come up hard and fast.

Also between now and then would be my twentieth birthday.

So, considering all of that, it was probably a damn good thing we were knocked out by penalty kicks by Ithaca the following weekend. It freed up a lot more time. Time I should have spent doing back physics work and orgo practice problems. Time I spent doing anything but.

Except maybe driving myself absolutely batshit crazy with back homework.

Like I was trying to do on a Tuesday night. Finally had to say screw it and move onto T-S Britain from chem. Then again, having at least two hundred pages to read in one book alone (reading that was due three weeks ago) made the task rather daunting. Not to mention we were supposed to get a few inches of snow overnight.

Damn it.

My phone vibrated against the bed frame. Text from Izzy. Moulin rouge is on vh1. *squeeee*

Squee I did. Almost went headfirst off the bed trying to get the remote and was very grateful to find it had really only just started. Score.

Needless to say whatever focus I had left took a swan dive from the fourth floor to the sounds of beauty, truth, and love. And the sight of a green fairy shaking her ass.

I have up on anything academic two verses into One Day I'll Fly Away. The knock on the door came shortly thereafter. "Yeah?"

Murph poked his head in. "Hi."

"Hi." Motioned him in. My favorite part was coming up. "Whatcha doin'?"

He propped a hip against the bed, looking between me and the screen. "Wonderin' why my girlfriend hadn't answered when I saw her light was on."

"Oh." Checked my phone. Four new messages. "Sorry." I uncurled enough to sit up and drop a leg on either side of him. "I tried doing work, got a text from Izzy that Moulin Rouge was on - love this movie - and said to hell with it about an hour ago. Sorry."

"No, not it's fine." He turned to look at me straight on. "I just...Wanted to see if we were still on for dinner tomorrow at the Pub. And how you feel about last Saturday."

Or rather, how being knocked out of the NCAA tournament so early was sitting.

He bent to kiss my nose. "And - "

"And again? How many more are you gonna pull out?" I giggled.

"Funny," he grinned. "And - " He drew it out for effect, "You have a birthday coming up."

I did. November 22, actually. Five days from now. "You're planning something, aren't you?"

Murph smiled coyly; butterflies erupted low in my belly. "Maybe." He planted his hands on either side of my hips, leaning in and brushing his cheek against mine. He hadn't shaved this morning. "Can't tell you all my secrets." He pulled back to look at me. "Just some."

"Uh huh." My brain was goo. And there was a new sensation in my gut that was downright terrifying.

"I actually need to go do homework, so I will leave you to your movie." He kissed me gently. "See you tomorrow."

I squeezed his sides with my knees. "Yup. Seven?"

"Definitely." He hesitated on his way to the door, almost like he was going to say something. It was on the edge of my tongue, and after an awkward silence, he cracked a smile and said, very softly, "Bye, Ol."

Did that make us both cowards, that we couldn't say two words that were almost right there? Or maybe...Maybe it wasn't time yet. I lay on my belly, eyes on the screen and mouthing the words with Christian: like I've never seen the sky before/Want to vanish inside your kiss/Every day I love you more and more.

Come what may indeed.

That Song, You Know...

2011-06-30T11:00:00.002-04:00

Where have I been, right? I've been a little all over the place. Or, rather, I haven't. My beloved Oldsmobile failed to pass inspection (rust in the subframe) and he's bound more or less for the scrap heap, sadly.

Anyway, I've heard a couple of songs this summer that I really like and that like to get stuck in my head. I thought I'd share them with you.

Don't worry - There'll be an actual post from me sometime soon. Soon as I can figure it all out.

Murphy and Me XXXVIII

2011-06-16T15:50:00.003-04:00

[I think I'm reaching the end of my Roman numeral knowledge. Might have to start looking stuff up. Anyway - Here's a new segment for those of you who regularly read here, and those transplanted IP users, welcome to The Wandering Sagittarius. This might be a little easier on your eyes than what HarperCollins has decided to do to our beloved (sometimes infuriating) site. Enjoy.]

Rain spattered against the window, louder and softer depending on the wind gusts. It was shaping up to be one of those lazy Sundays only found in romance novels. Lazy Sundays that meant not getting out of bed until noon and with Murphy probably still sleeping downstairs. We hadn't stayed together last night courtesy of my monthly visit from Mother Nature. Sleeping sprawled face-down in the middle of a twin bed doesn't leave much room for anybody else. And, bless him, Murph hadn't taken more than a couple seconds to figure it out.

I crawled outta bed around twelve-thirty. Felt good to sleep in, truthfully. Brunch didn't appeal to me, mostly because it meant walking in the rain, so on went the computer, some Dave Matthews Band, and hello inbox full of Facebook notifications and tagged photos. Since yesterday was Halloween, it was practically a given.

And, oh, were some of these priceless. But what do you expect when a pirate shows up to a costume party at Robin Hood's house with the Blues Brothers and a grown up Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle? There was a photo of all of us. Then of Murph and Liam in matching suits and sunglasses; Colby looking dapper and Old English-y (tights included, the brave man); Murphy and me; me after having stolen Murph's sunglasses; Murphy and me when he picked me up in an attempt to get his glasses back, one of my arms around his neck and the sunglasses hanging off my nose. Hell, the knee-high hooker boots were even in that one.

Couple clicks later and that was my new profile picture. Yes, I was hopelessly romantic.

Besides - Robin Hood doing a fantastic Captain Morgan impression? Made me giggle when it happened and laugh outright in retrospect.

Lazy Sundays were made for curling up in a pullover, putting a movie on, and settled in with a book (textbooks included). Maybe some chips and salsa, too. Which, I had the chips, but as Jo and I traded off when we jointly went to Wegman's, the salsa was in her room. I grabbed a bowl and trucked across the hallway.

Jo took one look at me and grinned when she opened the door. "Good night last night?"

"It had its moments." Leaned against the door frame. "Do we have salsa left?"

"Yeah." She went to her mini fridge. "Dinner tonight?"

"Five-thirty?" Medium salsa went into the bowl. "Hopefully I can get something accomplished."

Jo snorted. "Right. Good luck."

It'd be needed. Sundays were an enemy. And with the mountain of physics reading that had been piling up it was going to be a battle. Then there was chem and T-S Britain and, of all things, a dog and vampire scene for acting.

Great. Just great.

The bottom dropped out of the temperature midweek, enough to start layering footless tights under my jeans and long-sleeves under tees. As there was no going back when the peacoat left the closet, it was the goal to leave that as long as possible. Winter hats, however, popped up all across campus as the north wind started to blow hard and cold.

Practices got interesting. Namely we broke out the spandex. Nobody wants hexagons on their thighs in this weather unless absolutely necessary. Mostly 'cause the ball felt like it was inflated with ice instead of air.

I spent one late night swearing my way through my T-S Britain paper that gratefully received a B and dropped five points out of ten on an orgo quiz. Physics stayed out of the equation completely, mostly for my sanity, and we slogged through the first full week of November to the weekend.

And, consequently, Liberty Leagues.

The weather forecast going into Saturday sucked. Rain, low temps, and tough competition. We squeaked out a win on Saturday to put us in the championship Sunday. Don't know how we did it, but we did.

It was my first Liberty League tournament. Last year saw me as a sort of flux player between JV and varsity, practicing with both teams in almost equal measure. Sasha was the veteran, and as we stood on the sideline for the national anthem, I squeezed the hell out of her hand and felt Gilly's nervous energy on my right. My family was here - mom, dad, Izzy, El, Dean - and parked on the hill not far from them were my boys: Dev, Liam, Colby, and Murph. Tanya, who said hi to me every time we crossed paths, spread out a blanket on the ground to sit between Colby and Noah.

Dear God, I was going to throw up. All over the sideline and my Puma cleats.

There was a moment, after stepping onto the field and before kickoff, when I looked around, took in the crowd, and temporarily forgot that I knew how to play soccer. Just completely blanked out.

When the ref blew the whistle, it was all muscle memory after that.

We stood poised on the sideline, silent and tense, squeezing the blood out of each other's fingers as we watched Ally place the ball on the penalty stripe. If she made this, we were champions. If she didn't, we went another round of penalty kicks.

Don't think my nerves could handle another round.

It was drizzling. Ally stood at the top of the box, waiting for the whistle. Cozzens Field was eerily silent, so much so that the whistle seemed extra loud when it went. Ally took a deep breath, got her approach, and the entire sideline seemed to stop breathing. We started running before the ball hit the net.

The hill went nuts; we screamed and dog-piled Ally and Gilly and for the first time in my life I was going to the NCAA Women's College Soccer Tournament as a player, not a spectator.

Holy shit. We we were on the road to Greensboro. Granted, we needed to win more than a few to order the charter bus, but damn. It was a start.

File 404 (Among Other Things)

2011-06-03T15:54:00.004-04:00

It's been a bit of a long week. Between working twenty hours as a waitress (which, I know, isn't that much) and substituting (I was a music teacher today, and no, I didn't sing - but I did have a flashback to my band geek days by conducting them this morning) and a soccer game tonight, it's been a little hectic. And kind of tiring. However, speaking of soccer games, I've got great news that makes me want to split my face with a grin every time I even think about it.

Heather, myself, and our mother will be attending the 2011 MLS All-Star game as they take on Manchester United, the reigning European champions next month in New York City!

So. Freakin'. Excited. If I didn't think it would completely screw up the rest of this post, I'd try to find a way to make that font bigger. Like, size of this screen bigger, as that's how flippin' excited we all are. Even mom. There are other plans around that date that are still up in the air, but we have tickets, I've put in for time off (which basically means I've written in the book that I'm not available that day - or three) and I think if I went squeeee as long and loud as I wanted, I'd frighten half the neighborhood.

Which isn't to say that the sight of my neighbor - my male neighbor - in uber-short shorts and cowboy boots cleaning his cement driveway off with a garden hose earlier this week didn't make me want to scrub my retinas. It did. Then I remembered what I wear when I mow the lawn and figured I shouldn't be that hypocritical, though my thighs are quite a bit bigger than his. Anyway....

So, when it comes to HTML coding other than the normal stuff, I'm a bit stupid. I'm thinking about changing up the look of the blog again, as I'm still trying to find something that makes it feel a little more like me. I like darker colors (I think they look a little classier) but people find it difficult to read. I'm kind of wondering what my 39 followers think - Should I scrap this whole borrowed layout thing I've currently got going on and start tweaking colors and whatnot, or do I keep looking for something that makes me go yes, this is what I want this representation of me to look like.

If anybody has any ideas or suggestions, drop me an email or a comment. Until then, I'll just amuse myself and see how many File 404 screens I can get to pop up while I do it. Or that long string of red HTML code that pops up with a Warning which basically means you fail.

But I'm a scientists - Naturally, I like experiments.

Missing

2011-06-01T12:34:00.002-04:00

For the most part I'm settled into my own skin. Even if it's currently sunburnt on my shoulders and tender enough that I've got no problems wearing a tube top bought years ago out in public. I've accepted the fact that I work during the summer. I pick up shifts here or there, and got three calls yesterday for sub jobs (one of which I denied because I needed to take my mom for a medical test - routine, nothing serious, and she's fine) and I have a waitressing shift - my primary job - tonight.

Possibly the only vacation I'm going to get is if we get tickets to see the MLS All-Star game against Manchester United. They're playing at Redbulls Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, and considering all the places we've driven mom's tan Buick, it really wouldn't be an issue to get down there.

Which makes me sort of wonder if I'm missing something.

I've had a bit of time to sit in my own headspace lately, which has provided a lot of introspection. It would help, on another level, if I started (kept up with) journaling on a regular basis. And some of the stuff I'm comfortable enough sharing with you fine folks.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm not missing out on something that makes summer....summer. Aren't there supposed to be fleeting, fling-y summer romances? Vacations and plane-rides (or, in our case, car rides as dad refuses to fly). Dates to be had with friends that haven't been seen in a while, including my best friend whom I haven't seen in a year, due to different semesters abroad (and dear sweet Baby J, I needed her last semester when shit hit the fan) and other stuff that girls are supposed to do when they're this age? Should I be spending some nights actually getting ready, dressed up, and going out to meet people?

Is the fact that I work so much the reason I haven't had a date in three years?

It's not that I don't like my job - I love it, actually. Even Monday nights when all I'm doing is playing babysitter to over a hundred teenagers, most of whom show more skin than I do in the summertime and it just, at times, doesn't seem fair. Still. I get in my car, get to work, do my job (do it well, too, considering what I make in tips that I then have to split) and drive home.

Maybe the payoff comes during the year. How I take the opportunities presented to me by the Colleges and do different things. Like going to Toronto and New York City for class sophomore year (which, kind of seems like ages ago even if it was just over two years) or going abroad for three months and getting stuck in London on the way back. Or going to Virginia and spending my Spring Break doing community service in a State Park down there. Which I'm planning to do again this year because it was so much fun. Or maybe it comes when I get to go to dinner or the movies with the girls, or buy my own groceries and spend the afternoon baking for my housemates. Maybe that's the summertime living I'm supposed to be doing that I'm transplanting into the school year.

Maybe that's the missing piece that's actually not so missing. I don't know. Even days like today, when I'm content, happy, and comfortable in my skin (and looking forward to going to work tonight because, in a way, it's fun) it still feels like something's a little...off. Like puzzle pieces that don't quite fit because one of them is warped.

Guess this is one of those things I'll figure out as I go. Kind of like if mom and I can make one of those layered cookie cakes that you buy in the store.

The Working Girl Returns

2011-05-30T23:11:00.003-04:00

I've been kind of absent lately. I know. There's a reason behind it. Three, actually.

Waitressing, subbing, and refereeing. Not necessarily in that order, either.

However, due to the amount of time I spend in either my car or my mother's (depends on which is in the driveway for me to drive wherever I need to go to get someplace to do one of those three previous things) I've had the chance to sort of preview this summer's music. I'm more of a country fan (I'm a country child, so it makes sense) and these are two songs that I've heard and I've, honestly, fallen quite a bit in love with.

So, in the hopes that I can fan my blogger spark into something larger again, I share with you Dirt Road Anthem by Jason Aldean and Barefoot Blue Jean Night by Jake Owen.

Murphy and Me XXXVII

2011-05-16T22:30:00.002-04:00

[Happy Tuesday, Heather Ann.]

It was the Tuesday after our Saturday rain game against Hamilton that I started to feel like shit. First it was the sniffles, followed by a cough that had me sounding more like a sick seal than a human. I fired off an email to my placement teaching telling her I was ill (and therefore not coming, no matter how many hours in the hole I was) and barely dragged my ass to my seminar. It was a one absence only seminar and therefore my ass needed to be there.

And being there physically? Sure as shit not the same as being present and accounted for mentally.

As my ass - and the rest of the body it was attached to - was having a difficult time staying upright, there was no way acting class was feasible. It was difficult to breathe through clogged nostrils standing still, let along acting as a squirrel. Yeah, our professor was a little out there.

After a conversation (or parts of it, as I tried to hack up a lung shortly after 'hello') with my coach, I was looking at a free Tuesday and was going to spend it passed out and snuggling in my lovely dorm bed. Preferably wrapped around Edgar.

Couldn't be wrapped around Murph as he didn't need to get sick. Didn't need to risk getting Dev, Liam, and Colby sick, either. But as Murph would want to check on me later - and he still flinched at the idea of my unlocked door on a trip to the bathroom - he would need my keys to actually get in the room.

Oblivious to the fact it was nine in the morning, I knocked on the door to the fishbowl. Dev didn't even crawl outta bed to answer it.

"Ollie?" he blinked sleepily at me.

I hacked up my kidney into the crook of my arm. We both flinched. "Can you get Murph?"

"How 'bout I get you a doctor first?" he mumbled, sliding off the bed. I held the door open with one hand, utterly miserable.

"Ol?" Murph was there in an instant, rubbing at his jaw. If my head hadn't been so damn fuzzy, the sight of my boyfriend with no shirt would have made me stare and drool. His hand touched my forehead and then recoiled. "Damn, you're hot."

"Such a sweet talker." I really needed to lay down. "Will you come check on me later?"

"Absolutely." He was offended I asked - like it was a given. "Leave your...Nope. I'll come with you now."

Barefoot and bare chested, Murph followed me up the stairs. Opened my door. Tucked me into bed after turning his back so I could change at a snail's pace.

Don't remember him leaving, but remember the sound of the lock going. A nap seemed like the right thing to shoot for.

Bushes lined the path. Green bushes. And all through the bushes little Amish people would pop up, almost like Whack-a-Mole.

Then there was clear blue sky above me as I lay on the August-warmed asphalt, having just walked into the side mirror of a truck.

Purple fireworks went off and everything started to spin, blending together.

Down and down fell the bed, the stamps, Amish hats, and side mirrors...

My feet were against something that moved every now and then and a warm, heavy weight on my calf. Opened my eyes, blinked a couple of times, and the wall came into focus. So did Edgar and what looked like Smokey. But what was Smokey doing up here?

I shifted, craning around to look at the other end of the bed and found Murph sitting with one elbow on the dresser and his nose in a European history textbook. He looked at me when I pushed my toes against his hard thigh.

"Hey," he said, laying the book down on his other leg. "How do you feel?"

Pulled the comforter up to my nose and blinked, trying to convince my stomach there was need to evacuate. Hopefully it would listen.

Murph squeezed my calf and then went back to rubbing it. "You want another blanket?"

Nope. Just...This was fine. I shook my head and rolled over. The trashcan was between the desk and the closet, like normal. Only it really needed to be by the bed as, while I only paid twenty bucks for my indoor/outdoor carpet, I didn't want to buy another one.

"I think Liam's coming up shortly," he said, hand now on my knee, thumb rubbing hypnotically over my kneecap. The bubbling in my gut settled marginally. "He's bringing some cold meds. Nothing with ibuprofen in it since your system doesn't like."

Well remembered from Lord knows when, Murph. Well remembered.

If Liam also had anything resembling food, things were going to go south in a hurry. Or was it north? Either way, it wasn't going to be pretty.

As my boyfriend is freakin' fabulous in general, I smiled at him, settling again.

Until Liam opened the door and the scent of soup wafted through the room.

I somehow stumbled out from under the covers without breaking myself, shoved past Liam and sprinted down the hall to the bathroom in bare feet. Normally I'd freak at that. As there were other important things - like puking - to worry about, I let it go and careened into the handicapped stall, barely making it to the bowl before heaving.

Couldn't remember the last time I'd upchucked but I did remember one very important thing - it sucked.

Murph barged into the stall seconds later, pushing a leg between mine and wrapping an arm around my clavicle to make sure I stayed upright while bringing up what felt like nineteen years worth of food, stomach included. The sound of the bathroom door closing seemed dim in comparison to the horrific sounds coming from the handicapped stall which made me realize Liam must have followed us in and was guarding the door.

Gasping for breath and swallowing frantically in hopes I wouldn't start dry heaving, the tiny part of my brain not focused on the immediate issue was screaming I'd wind up with some unnatural foot fungus from being barefoot so close to a communal toilet.

Which started another round of stomach spasms and dry heaves.

When it passed, Murph was kissing the top of my head and murmuring utter nonsense. Nonsense was good. Focusing on his voice was good. Relaxing was even better.

Liam must have entered the stall at some point as he was somewhere to my left and telling me to breathe. Which was useful information.

I stood, balanced mostly by over two hundred pounds of football player and wanting desperately to rinse. Liam, bless him, must have been a mind-reader in a past life and handed me a glass - one from my room - of water. I rinsed, spit, and leaned against Murph's broad chest, ready to sleep again.

"Sorry about that," Liam said quietly.

"Not your fault." It wasn't, either. He was trying to do something nice and it had sort of...backfired. Or maybe exploded grossly was more appropriate.

From the gurgle my belly just made, no more talk of exploding anything.

"You wanna rinse one more time?"

I shook my head mutely. Murph eased his leg out and then swung me up against his chest. I was so damn miserable I didn't protest to being carried like a child. Liam flushed and then held doors for us all the way back to my corner single. It was a little chilly - the window was open, presumably to get rid of the soup stench. Murph set me on the bed, practically force-fed me meds, and then tucked me back in. Liam, from the sound of it, had settled into my moon chair, grumbling at the wireless, or lack thereof. Murph repositioned the trashcan, shucked his shoes and crawled up with me. My body made room for him automatically and practically melted when he started rubbing my back.

"Dev doesn't even puke that much when he's drunk," Murph said conversationally after a few minutes.

"I'm special," I muttered, settling back against him when he wrapped an arm around me and my covers.

"Not a party trick I'd share at the President's house," Liam chimed in, typing away.

Thank you, peanut gallery.

"Least she has one."

Missed Liam's retort by getting sucked into that void of exhaustion, medication, and utter relaxation. Hope the dreams were better this go 'round.

Well, this was different. One moment I was in Jackson and the next I was on my old back porch next to Ronon Dex from Stargate: Atlantis. At least the sky was blue.

"What are we doing?"

"There's Wraith in the trees."

Which seemed perfectly normal when he said it like that. Until life-sucking space vampires came hurtling down from the treeline. I yelped like an idiot and all but fell off the porch, sprinting toward my own house.

And almost got hit by a classic Cadillac driven by a man in a leather kilt - who looked a lot like Colby - halfway across the road. Hands on the hood, I stared.

"Get in."

"What?"

"Get in."

"I don't know who the hell you are!" Might look like Colby but probably wasn't. Could be Evil Colby.

In the end, the horde of space vampires tramping through the backyard made the choice fairly straightforward. I was in the passenger seat before really thinking about it and the Colby-Not Colby gunned it down the road.

"Might wanna sleep," he said, flipping on the radio. "It's a fairly long drive."

Which was code for close eyes for what felt like five minutes and open them somewhere completely different. A big different. A clearing, horses, and a Murph who looked like an extra from an episode of Xena: Warrior Princess kind of different. Sword and leather shirt included, free of charge. I stared openly.

"We must ride," he said, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward a horse the size of a small shed. The Cadillac was nowhere in sight.

"But you don't know how to ride - "

Murph was already hoisting me up into the saddle. For a boy who didn't like heights, he was about to be surprised. He swung easily into the saddle and away we went, me protesting - loudly - that neither of us knew what the hell we were doing.

The tree branch came from nowhere.

I jerked awake, ramming my elbow back into something warm and relatively soft. Whatever it was gave a grunt and poked me hard in the ribcage. Murph. Only my boyfriend would poke me after first elbowing him in the diaphragm.

Meant to say "What time is it?" but something must have not totally computed because it came out a garbled mess that didn't resemble anything close to English.

There was some rooting around under the pillow, followed by a sigh. "One-thirty.

Really? Felt like I'd been down for the count for days. "Oh."

"How's your belly?"

No longer wanting to throw up everything it had ever ingested. "Better."

"Do you think it's up for some food?"

I shrugged, turning over and burying my nose in the warm juncture of Murph's neck and shoulder. Could so go back to sleep like this. The boy was a freaking furnace on legs, no doubt about that. He slung his arm around my waist, rubbing a broad hand up and down my spine.

"Liam left the soup."

Oh. God. Liam. Liam who had brought me the soup trying to be nice and had wound up in the handicapped stall with me and his twin when I did my drunk freshman impersonation. He wasn't a sympathy puker, thankfully, but it wasn't very nice of me. Would be the equivalent of me bring him a sandwich or something and Liam running for the nearest toilet.

Though....Maybe these were extenuating circumstances....

"And he understands you weren't feeling well earlier." Murph eased himself into a sitting position and slowly brought me with him while I tried to figure out if my boyfriend had recently developed ESP.

"Microwave's at the other end of the hallway." I leaned against the wall, blinking owlishly as Murph slid off the bed and knelt to open the mini fridge. Someone must have stuck the soup in there after my disappearance. "Is he offended?"

He sat up, cracking his head on the underside of the bed frame, soup container in hand. "What? No. No, Liam's not offended." He stood. "He's not offended that you blew chunks over the smell of food."

Well then. That settles that.

He tucked the comforter around my hips better, kissed me on the forehead, and went to reheat lunch. Smokey sat next to Edgar and eyed me. There was a very big significance in the fact that Smokey was out of the fishbowl. The only conclusion that came to mind was that I had the sweetest boyfriend not only in the known universe, but in all the ones unknown, too.

Murph came back in looking toward the shelf with my stolen Saga-ware, found a spoon, and gave the contents a stir. Handed it to me and climbed up next to me again. "It's chicken noodle but we'd figured you just wouldn't eat the noodles 'cause they're not wheat." His thigh was warm against mine, even through all the layers separating us.

"I have weird dreams when I'm sick," I said after a while and dear God, had I been gnawing on gravel in my sleep?

"How weird?"

"Amish and Stargate: Atlantis weird." Pause. "With some Xena thrown in for good measure."

He slipped an arm behind me, pulling me close. "Weird. I don't dream when I'm sick."

"Lucky duck." Sick dreams were either hysterical or terrifying. So far, I was two for two in the hysterical category. "Do you have class today?"

"At three." He held up his book from the dresser. How he'd found space to put it there to begin with was beyond me. "Brought my reading with me."

Today was a day where Ollie wasn't going to be productive at all. Also a day to refer to myself in the third person, too. Incidentally, it was probably also time for another nap.

I slid out of bed onto wooden legs to take care of my empty soup container, needing to get up and around the small room. Murph shifted, curling up behind me when I crawled back under the covers and got situated. Rolled over and stuffed myself against him. Something unknotted in my chest; my throat tightened for a different reason and I sniffed, covering it up with the fact that I already had a stuffy nose.

This, this right here, was new to me. New, exciting and so damn sweet it made my heart just to beat. Holding me while I hurled, staying with me, bringing me soup and meds and just caring...This made my eyes burn.

Because Bobby had never done this for me. Not. One. Time.

[Insert Expletive Here]

2011-05-16T16:06:00.002-04:00

Some things, no matter how many times you force them to the back of your mind and tell yourself you've dealt with them, don't actually ever leave you alone.

I was out walking with my mom the other night - because we wanted to walk - and my exboyfriend doesn't live very far down the road from me. We had stopped at my grandmother's to talk to my aunt and uncle (who were using their trunk to remove grass and throw it down over the bank, yes my family is like that at times) when I looked up the road and saw a very familiar figure. And wanted to start swearing immediately. It was one of those times that, even though you know deep inside you're glad that things worked out the way they did, that life is funny like that and doesn't give you more than you can handle (though, it really seems like that) it just makes you remember.

You realize then it's quite another to be alright when the subject isn't around, but it's quite another to actually be alright when confronted face to face. Or rather, road to driveway.

Ultimately, it makes me wonder when exactly I'm going to find a Murphy of my own. I've got great friends, an amazing family, and a winding road ahead of me, but in a way, I'm still kind of lonely.

Patience in this aspect is not one of my virtues.

The other thing that's sort of eating at me and has me kind of freaking out is that my aunt's cancer came back. After losing a teammate in March to a lung infection because fighting leukemia for the second time hadn't left her with much left in the tank, this was just a bit much. My aunt will do what she needs to do to fight it, but...It's still cancer.

It's. Still. Cancer.

Like everything else life decides to chuck my way, I'll find a way to get through it. Hopefully intact.

Murphy and Me XXXVI

2011-05-13T22:00:00.002-04:00

"You can borrow them, if you want."

I stood up and nearly whacked my head into the underside of Sasha's closet shelf. "Really? I mean - "

She chuckled. "You can borrow my hooker boots. Really." Her smile turned sly. "I think Murph will appreciate 'em." She outright grinned. "I'm just sayin'...He likes it when his girl looks good."

"And hooker boots make me look good?" Yeah, there was some skepticism there.

"Well, he likes you anyway, even when you wear those damn things - " she pointed to my ugly-as-hell plain black sneakers, my work shoes. " - so I think you could go barefoot and he'd be okay."

Which was true, too. "Okay." The boots moved from the closet to hear my backpack. Wouldn't look odd at all for me to be walkin' 'cross campus with those. Not. At. All.

I sat on the half of the pushed together dorm beds that was Sasha's. "Where's Cara?"

"Class." Sasha crawled onto the desk chair and nearly fell out of it. "Then she has some other meeting and then the choreographers meeting."

"I don't know any reason why they wouldn't let you two dance together." Was the truth, too. Cara, from what I'd heard, was a great choreographer.

"Oh, I know." She fiddled with one of the photos taped to the study carrel. "Anyway - How's Ford man?"

"Murphy's fine." My phone somehow appeared in my hand. Open. Shut. "He had a nice time Sunday." Open. Shut. "Elizabeth loves him."

"Which is code for everyone, am I right?" Sasha chuckled.

Silence stretched between us.

"Cara and I almost had sex last night."

That came out of left field.

"Oh." And...Yeah. No idea what to say to that. None whatsoever. "Uh...Things are going then, yeah?"

She bit her lip. "Yes and no. I think we're in some sort of odd transition state and, while it didn't feel weird last night it wasn't...I mean, we've been there before but this had a different feel to it."

"Good different or bad different?" Still trying to process that last bombshell.

"Just...Different."

Which, in an odd way, made both perfect sense and none at all. "What happened after?"

Sasha shrugged. "We kissed some more, then she held me and sometime later we drifted off." She looked at her fingernails. "The only thing that you could call different was that I was the spoonee and not the spooner."

Spooning was the Visa of cuddling - generally accepted everywhere. And it wasn't just for hetero couples.

Technically, I think Murph and I had yet to spoon. Technically speaking.

Also just realized my best friend slept either naked or mostly naked. However, not my business.

"Did she say anything during spooning?"

She shrugged again. At this rate she was going to strain a back muscle.

"Just that she missed me."

Which could mean more than one thing. Murph murmured "missed you" into my clavicle when we shared a bed on the weekend and he hadn't seen me since Wednesday.

Or, in this case, it could mean missing what Sasha and Cara had had. I think part of their simplicity was gone and it was going to screw with them for a while.

Then I asked a question that would normally not see the light of day. "How was the almost sex?"

Sasha smiled slowly. "Brilliant. She did this, this thing with her tongue and..." She blushed faintly. "Anyway. It was good."

Any almost sex she had was better than the slim chance or sex that was my life.

And the fact that I was terrified of my own body had nothing to do with it. Nothing at all. Let's factor in the fact that I was downright terrified to let Murph even think about glimpsing me naked. Considering he was male and my boyfriend, he had probably thought of me naked. Multiple times.

Which was a train of thought that needed to go away. Immediately.

"So that was normal?"

Sasha nodded. "Maybe...Maybe we've got past whatever we needed to get past."

Maybe. Or maybe it was the calm before the proverbial storm. Who knew - the weather was supposed to be shit all week.

"That would be a good thing." A very good thing as I could stop worrying that my best friend was heading for a breakdown of monumental proportions - and tequila.

"Very," she said quietly. "You and Murphy have plans for Halloween?"

I let the sudden change in topic slide, grateful to talk about something less awkward. "Yup. Costume party and...That's probably it." We hadn't thought much beyond Colby's costume party. We'd probably just come back and crash. Depending on what Dev was doing would determine my place or Murphy's. "You got plans?"

"Maybe order in, watch some slasher films and cuddle."

Cuddling was nice. Slasher films? Not so much. Chinese or pizza would be the deal breaker.

"That sounds fun." It did - I'd just pick a different movie. "How's classes going?" Breath. "How's Koshare?"

"Classes are classes." She picked up a pen from the holder on her desk and began turning it over in her hands. "No big emergencies or panics there. And Koshare...It's interesting to have your girlfriend as your choreographer. It's not a collaborative process, more like following her vision. It's a great vision, don't get me wrong, but it's a little awkward at times." She fumbled the pen. "Especially if you're not seeing eye to eye."

Dance move to dance move might have been more appropriate but I kept my mouth shut. However, couldn't resist in the end. "Artistic differences?"

Sasha snorted. "Understatement." She nearly dropped a second pen to the floor. "I mean, it's great but...There are some parts that would look better if I did them because they're..."

"Not her concentration."

Sasha nodded. "But it's all good. We keep the studio in the studio as best we can."

Which was probably not an easy thing to do. Maybe it was a good thing Murph and I didn't have a common extracurricular activity.

"How's your week look?"

It was my turn to shrug. "Same as usual. I'm kind of sucking at getting my teaching hours so far, but it's hard between lab, practice, games and...breathing." Looked at my hands, unsure if I wanted to drop this bombshell. Oh, what the hell. Live in the moment and all that. "I'm not sure I want to do this anymore."

She stared, pen thumping softly to the carpet. "What?" She reached for number three.

I slipped my Chuck Taylor's off and drew my legs up. "I just...I don't know. It's a lot of effort on top of everything else and I'm not really liking it as much as I thought I would. It kinda sucks." My socks were mismatched - one gold toe, one blue. El would approve. "I'm only doing it as a back up plan and not as that thing that I really want to do with my life. I mean, look at Murph. Murphy wants to be a history teacher. He's pumped about it. Wants to stay and do the MAT program. Me? Right now it's just another thing to worry about."

Between physics, keeping track of time, and soccer, I had enough to keep me occupied. And I hadn't mentioned orgo, yet.

"So why did you sign up?" Sasha moved her computer back a bit to put her rear on the actual desk. "Why apply in the first place?"

"Because it was a back up plan." Not the only reason, but definitely the simplest. "And I like to work with kids." Again, slightly more complicated than that. Why be black and white when you could operate in shades of gray?

"But you're not sure it's what you really want."

That right there summed it up quite nicely. "Yup."

And really, that's all there was to it. What it came down to was that I didn't know what I wanted, now much less wanted as a back up plan. Hell, maybe waitressing would just be my back up plan. It'd worked like a charm so far.

Considering I turned into a workaholic when I was home for the summer, it didn't really surprise me.

I looked at the time on my phone - it was nearly eight. "I gotta go - I'm having dinner with Murph."

"It's late for dinner, isn't it?" Sasha squinted at Cara's clock on her desk.

"Not when you're having a sort of date with your boyfriend." I uncurled and started to put my Converse back on. "I guess it's not really a sort of date, it is a date. Dinner and a movie." Dinner being ordered-in Chinese and the movie being from the boys' DVD collection. Depending on what mood we were in it might be an action film or something hopelessly romantic.

Hope we were more inclined toward action, truthfully. While I loved my best friend and the fact that she was in an exclusive, loving relationship with someone as great as Cara, it was sometimes a little hard to swallow. Maybe it was because my relationship with Murph was so new, that I was still trying to get past that infamous four month mark.

That damn four month mark I tried really hard not to think about since it made my blood pressure skyrocket.

Sasha stumbled off her perch to give me a hug. "Have fun on your date."

I nodded, turning serious while picking up the boots she was lending me. "You ever need me - to talk or listen or anything - just call. My phone's always on." It was. For her it always would be.

"Thanks." She hugged me again.

With footwear that made absolutely no sense being within fifty feet of me in hand, I headed out of the building and down the hill. And back to my original train of thought about those damn four months.

Bobby and I had been off and on all through high school - usually in periods of about four months. We'd be good as gold for a while and then things just sort of...went downhill. So we'd take a break for a little while and then after a couple weeks - maybe a month - we'd get back together for about another four months. Rinse. Lather. Repeat.

Considering Bobby was my one previous decent relationship - though hindsight is twenty-twenty - I had to base things off of, I was honestly expecting Murph and I to follow that same pattern or a variation of it. Not what I wanted, but more or less what I was expecting.

Which, if Murph found that out, he'd probably have me committed. At least.

This was one of those times where I hated being in my own head.

A couple of Smithies nearly whacked me between the eyes with the front door of Jackson while I fumbled for my keys. Snark in check, the stairs to the second floor seemed a little longer than normal and I dropped the boots - and my Chucks - on the new, and, honestly, forty-year-old-homemaker welcome mat and knocked on the door of the fishbowl.

A breathless, wet-haired Murph answered. "Yeah - Oh. Hey."

I stuffed my hands in my pockets. "Hi." He was wearing his good jeans and a nice button down with a long-sleeved white shirt. Murph always looked good to me but right now? Hot. Damn.

Which had me worried I was under dressed. "Am I...?" Not the most eloquent question I've ever asked, I'll admit.

"No," he said quickly, "you look fine. Great."

He was a little nervous. Clearly. "I'm in jeans and a t-shirt."

Murph gave me that smile, the one that threatened to break his face. "Do I really have to say it?"

"Nope." His hand found the small of my back once through the door and the room smelled of Chinese take out. Lunch now seemed very far away.

As far as impromptu Thursday night dates went, this was quite excellent. And it technically hadn't even started yet. Sure dinner was ready but the movie hadn't been picked out and Murph seemed more on edge than he ever was. Especially around me.

There was another blanket down on top of the comforter, an older one, and while eating a Nutri-Grain bar was one thing, sesame chicken was quite another. Smokey sat proudly atop Murph's pillows and I settled on the bed, leaving Murph plenty of room. He handed me both plates to get himself up there and I handed the beef and broccoli back.

"We're away this weekend," I said, mixing the rice with the sauce. "So, I have no idea when I'll be back."

He swallowed what might have been a broccoli spear whole. "Do...Do you want me to leave the door unlocked?"

It was tempting. The only problem was that I was probably going to reek and didn't want to accidentally wake Dev. And where would my bag go? That didn't need to stink up the whole damn room at some beastly hour.

And him leaving the door unlocked was the equivalent of him giving me a key. Which threatened to make my head explode.

It was easier to look at my plate, pushing rice around. "I don't want to disturb anybody."

"It would be a Saturday, right? No idea what Dev's gonna be doing but I have a paper to write, so I'll be here." He moved an onion out of his way. "I mean, if you don't want to, that's fine - "

I looked at him. "I need to shower, at least, because I don't wanna crawl into bed - yours, at least - sweating and smelling like...sweat." Ate some chicken. "I'll let you know when I get back and shower and then I'll come down." Because chillin' with Murph on a Saturday night? Damn fine plan.

"If you don't - "

"I do." I did. "I just don't want to freak you out by how bad I smell."

"Oh." He blinked. "You don't have to worry about that."

"Call it a girl thing."

He popped a piece of beef in his mouth and nodded.

"What's your paper on?"

"It's our history midterm paper. Four to six pages."

Which reminded me I need to not only make flash cards for T-S Britain, but also needed to study them, too. "Fun."

We talked about classes, about flu season (and this year's flavor was swine, not bird) and ate our way through our respective Chinese containers. Murph deposited the empty containers in the hall trash and flipped one row of lights off on his way back to the bed.

"So," he said, easing to the floor and burying his upper body under the bed. "I have two potential movies."

I flopped ungracefully forward, feet against the wall, palms against the bed frame to steady myself and looked down at Murph's broad back. His movie collection must be under his bed. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." He grunted. "Do you have your phone handy?" He stretched a hand back; I shimmied the phone out of my pocket and dropped it into his palm. "Thanks."

"No problem."

He thunked his head on the way out and stayed on his knees, resting his forearms on the mattress on either side of my head. Up close and personal, and he dove in for a kiss. "I have Robin Hood: Men in Tights and Stardust."

Good choices. Very good choices. Not what I was expecting, though that was fine by me.

"Stardust, if you're okay with that." He kissed me again and stood, firing up the DVD player and setting the TV on the right channel. I rolled upright and leaned against the wall. Murph tossed the DVD remote on the comforter and turn off the rest of the lights.

There was some jostling as we tried to find some comfortable position and still clearly see screen on the dresser across the room. In the end, Murph's back was to the wall with me tucked into his side, one arm around the small of his back and the other resting on his thigh, our fingers laced together. With my left shin across both of his, this could possibly be utter contentment.

Could? Let's rephrase: Is.

Ian McKellen's voice came from the TV speakers and I relaxed further into Murph, ear close enough to hear his heart.

However, while I was trying to melt into a puddle of goo, Murph was wound about as tight as a friggin' eight day clock. I dug the fingers of the arm behind him into his opposite hip.

Murph jumped spectacularly.

Yeah. Tighter than a clock.

"What's up?"

"Nothin'."

"I call bullshit." My fingertips creeped under his button down to rub his side through his layering shirt, mindful he was a tad bit ticklish.

He rubbed his thumb over my knuckles where our hands were joined. Took a deep breath. Nuzzled the top of my head. "Is this alright with you?"

That happy little phrase could pertain to a whole lot of things. My heart kicked it double time, sesame chicken churning in my stomach. "This being movie and dinner?"

Murph shifted a little. "Yeah. I mean - Dinner ordered in..."

It suddenly clicked.

Murph was afraid this date - dinner and a movie in - wasn't good enough. He was worried I wouldn't be happy enough with what he'd be able to give me. The boy wanted to bring me the moon and was worried I wouldn't be happy with the simple star he'd brought back.

He didn't need to take me anywhere fancy or to an eight dollar movie to make he happy. This, sitting here with him, stuffed with Chinese and watching a movie in the fishbowl, was more than enough for me.

Hell, just having this opportunity was enough for me.

"Murphy," I said, sitting up and effectively cutting him off mid ramble. "I don't need a nice restaurant or a movie in a theater. This right here is perfect for me." Just to make my point, I cupped his face and kissed him. Hard.

His hazel eyes searched mine in the darkness and he must have found what he was looking for because he all but melted as he relaxed.

"Wanna watch the extras?" he asked as we settled back in.

"Definitely."

Tristran tackled Yvaine and this impromptu middle of the week date was something I could definitely get used to.

Planning. Sort Of.

2011-05-13T13:48:00.002-04:00

First of all, I have somehow managed to gather and corrupt forty followers. I consider this quite the accomplishment, considering that I'm just a college kid blogging about what it's like to go through this stage of life and occasionally getting sidetracked by other stuff along the way. Or getting lost. Those two are kind of interchangeable in my world.

To my forty bright and shiny followers - Thank. You.

This is the second full day that I have been home for the summer. The mountain of laundry I brought home with me has been done, and it was a nice way to invite in the summer because I got to hang out most of it yesterday to suck in the country air. Makes everything smell so good and when you take a big whiff the only thing that really permeates my braincells is home.

I have not, however, woken up in the morning with eighteen pounds of cat on my chest or fifty pounds of dog on my ankles. However, I have had my ears cleaned a number of times already.

Now that junior year is done (which, by default, makes me a senior and scares the hell out of me) and it's summer, it's more or less time to look ahead (or try to, at least) to what the upcoming three months will bring. Considering I picked up two work shirts while I was in town today, I think it just comes down to how busy I'll be when the full season rolls around. I go back to work on Wednesday. I'm quite alright with that, truthfully. Been waiting for it for almost two weeks now.

Which more or less means I'm going to be a sort of workaholic in the summer. All while spending as much time with the family - including the small child who's not quite so small anymore and still growing like a weed - and writing. I've got a book to try to finish (actually, if you think about, roughly three, really) and if anything else wants to come my way, well, that'll be welcome, too.

No big plans. Just tryin' to live day to day and sometimes that can be more of a task than planning something huge in the middle of the summer heat.

And, of course, I'll spend some of my summer just doing what I do best - Wandering.

If anybody's got any big summer plans and wants to share, go for it. Here's to the coming good weather and whatever it may bring.

SuperWomen

2011-05-04T14:56:00.004-04:00

I know we have a few more days until Mother's Day, but that's right smack in the middle of finals and there's no guarantee that I'm going to remember to do this when I've already had my intro geo final and a Shakespearean performance to do in the afternoon, followed by more preparing for my hardest exam - physical chemisty II (quantum mechanics) - bright and way too freakin' early the next morning.

So, before my life gets a little nutzo and my brain decides to take holidays in its downtime while my Focus runs rampant through the dirty clothes all over the inside of my closet, I wanted to make sure I paid my homage to the mom's in my life.

The first mom in my life is my mother - Mama - and she is a fantastic lady. She has gone to numerous soccer games in various locations - up to nearly three hours away from our house, in some cases - and has gotten me through 4H projects, school presentations, growing pains and changes, multiple surgery recoveries, me living for three months in a foreign country over 3,000 miles away and then getting stuck there for 5 extra days, moving me into multiple dorm rooms (one more to move out of and one more to move into for undergrad) and just being a presence in my life (along with my dad, we'll get to him on Father's Day). She is my mother. The infamous non-existent temper (but really, we do have it, and it rears its ugly head on occasion) comes from my mother's side, as does my sense of responsibility and of doing what's right even if it downright sucks. My Mama is awesome.

The other mother in my life is my sister, Heather. She's a mother to a brilliant three-year-old, and she is amazing at it. The love that she has for that little girl, and the want to see her child happy and healthy and smiling....I can see that it's going to be projects and activities and learning and....she's a soccer mom now. M started soccer last week and now she's a soccer mom. Things haven't always been easy, but even through everything, I am so damn proud of my sister and what she has done and what she has become. So proud. Especially when it comes to her and that little girl and all that she has done. Makes me very proud to firstly be related to her and doubly proud to have her as my sister.

These are the super women in my life. Two Superwomen. They don't have to save the world at the large, or protect it, but they protect and defend their world.

Here's to them and to every Superwoman out there this Sunday, Mother's Day.

(I seem to be having issues with emedding the video that I want, so I'll just link it, instead. Superwoman by Alicia Keys.)

Things to Know XXI

2011-05-02T10:51:00.003-04:00

- If I can hear your music through your headphones like you weren't wearing them at all, your music is too loud.

- When the above happens, it makes me want to growl.

- If I'm growling at something, that's not a very productive start to my day.

- My fellow classmate - Do not patronize me about what I did or did not do in response to a slightly irate email by one of our other classmates, and then proceed to make it look like you're "winning" what's actually not a competition, and please remember I was here until 1:45 in the morning, like you were, only I'd started at 9:00 instead.

- Today is not a day to mess with me, thanks so much.

- But, in all seriousness, turn the damn music down or I'll put on YouTube and blast country through my speakers!

- I can't seem to find my Focus.

- Saga coffee is downright disturbing - and one hell of a jolt.

- This is the point in my junior year where I just get sick of dealing with people.

- Luckily, when I was in high school, I phased out of beating up the jackasses when I hit this stage.

- Which, honestly, I really only did that in middle school.

- And, again honestly, I never actually punched anyone.

- Yup. I am going to go YouTube it up.

- My philosophy on that last one is that if you've got your headphones in to the degree in which I can hear lyrics clearly, you can obviously not hear a damn thing coming from my direction and therefore won't mind at all.

- And if you do mind, well, frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

- I have over 3,000 messages in the deleted folder in my webmail.

- I find that rather interesting.

- No idea what's going to happen in terms of the labs that I have no idea how to do for chemistry.

- They might be a lost cause.

- At this point in my life, I'm okay with that.

- I have eight lesson plans, a written assessment plan, and to tweak my introduction all by 7:30 tomorrow morning.

- Thank [Insert Diety/Whatever You Worship (if anything) Here] that tomorrow is my last education class because it's been driving me up the effing wall all semester.

- I have no phone service in the basement. Which kind of sucks.

- Right. Time to dig out my microscope now that I'm more or less done ranting (for the moment) and get something accomplished so I can feel a bit better about myself.

- At least the screamo song to my left is done.

Two Sweet, Two Fabulous Two Years

2011-04-24T21:58:00.002-04:00

I'm currently sitting on my bed - finished watching Cutting Edge: Going for Gold - and I realized that April was the first month I started blogging in two years ago. A little detective work (because there are some dates I just can't remember) and, turns out, I almost missed it.

Today is my two year blogiversary.

It's been two years since I started blogging about life, college, and everything in between. There's been high points and low points, triumphs, fails (epic fails, in some cases) and three months that were spent on the other side of the Atlantic. Two years ago I was wetting my feet in the blogging world, not really knowing what I was doing, not really sure where I was going (which, honestly, I still don't know and frankly I'm okay with that), and just more or less wandering around randomly poking things. Proverbially, of course.

Two years later there's still plenty of wandering, some poking, a 53,000+ word novel (yeah, that's how many words Murphy and Me has), and a series of asshattery best described as Things to Know. There's also a heaping dose of reality and, always, too much coffee for one wandering Sagittarius.

Raise your glass - or your coffee cup, you know I'm not picky - and we'll just say here's to two years down, and as many more to go as we can handle. Cheers!

Murphy and Me XXXV

2011-04-22T23:15:00.002-04:00

[College. That is all I have to say.]

I trotted across the road while Murph relocated to the backyard. Pretty sure he was more nervous than when he had to meet Peter. In an odd way he should be - Elizabeth might be more difficult to win over than the previous adults.

Though if he pushed her on the swing he might have a chance.

She and Izzy were waiting on the porch. El - With no shoes on, of course - came immediately to give me a hug and say, "Carry me?"

"Of course." I swung her easily onto my hip, waved to my sister, and started back toward my side of the double yellow line. Once on the grass she took off for the backyard and her sudden reappearance as I was drawing level with dad's truck told me she'd found Murph and was confused. "It's okay."

"Pick me up?"

With a twenty-something pound child on my hip, we headed 'round to the playset, Murph standin' between the house and the swing looking sufficiently lost.

"Elizabeth, this is Murphy." She looked from me to what probably seemed like a giant and back again. "He's one of my good friends." Understatement much?

"Morephy? Like my Morephy?" she asked, squirming to get down.

"Yup."

She walked over to him and looked up. "Push me?"

"Sure," he said, unsure what to do.

"Ask her what swing," I fake-whispered, toeing off my shoes and then stuffing my socks in them. He looked at me like I was crazy and then asked the small child, who pointed to the baby swing. Murph picked her up like she was made of glass and she conned him into letting her snap the shoulder straps.

One of the most striking images I will ever remember whether or not Murphy and I stay together is him pushing my two-year-old niece on the swing set. A six foot one football boy and a small child.

The two loves of my life, right there together.

I sat on the regular swing next to El and put blades of grass between my toes, listening to Murph and El have a conversation...Well, as much of a conversation as a college student and a toddler can have. It consisted mostly of "Hear that?" "What?" "Plane!" And two heads looking upward trying to find the plane when it was a motorcycle on the road out front.

Not that it mattered, but, damn, it was both priceless and absolutely adorable.

Even better was when she got out of the swing and demanded - by cajoling of course - that he take off his shoes and socks. How could he deny a blue-eyed Karizslowski descendant? He couldn't. Which brought me to the conclusions that I'd never before seen him in bare feet.

He looked at me shyly. "I'm a little...Not a big fan of my own feet."

Toes are toes. Mine are...Okay, they're not roses but there's no fungus on 'em. With one eye on El, I shuffled through the grass and lined my big toes up with Murph's. It was then I realized I'd lost my left big toenail through some combination of practice, games, and a culminating hot shower. Oops.

"I could probably give you the best lookin' toenails on the football team. If you want me to."

He smiled. "Probably not."

El came from the right, grabbed one of my hands, took one of Murph's and planted a bony foot each on one of ours, pink toenails on display.

"Your toes are pretty," he said.

She grinned at him. "My mommy does them."

So, contrary to Murph's first impression, he and the small child got along like a house afire. Especially when she cracked open the sandbox. He sat on the FisherPrice crab's leg, knees around his ears, and let El bury his feet up to his ankles.

Dinner was a less than interesting affair. My brother-in-law Dean sized up my boyfriend upon entrance into the kitchen, but other than that and El's apparent potato strike, it was pretty tame. Goodbyes were eventually made, and with a bag of monster cookies and one last comment about how El likes "Ollie's Morephy" we were in the car and headed back toward the other end of the lake.

By way of Dunkin Donuts, of course.

"Do you want anything?"

"A kiss?"

I snorted and leaned over for a quick one before ordering a medium iced coffee and two vanilla frosted donuts (because Murph really likes them, as I'd just found out) and a couple donut holes were thrown in for good measure by the night staff. They were good like that, sometimes.

"Your family is awesome," he said once the lights had faded into the rearview. "And El...She's absolutely adorable."

"They like you." They did, too. Izzy had sent me multiple texts to this effect.

"I could tell." He shifted in the seat. "I like them, too." He shifted again, enough to stretch across the back of my seat again and rub the nape of my neck. His other hand turned on the radio and Brad Paisley crooned through the speakers. "I'm not sure how we'll do at Liberties."

Which was a polite way of saying his season was going to come to an end and mine...Well, mine might go on for a bit. Possibly to mid-December. Or maybe no. Depended on how we did during the opening rounds of the tournament, which depended on how well we did at Liberty Leagues.

And that would be determined by how we did the rest of the season.

Which would make life interesting.

"What are you doing on Halloween?"

I slowed my bucket of bolts down - sixty instead of sixty-five was much better. "I dunno. I'll probably wait and see what my boyfriend does." We were most likely going out, which is why my pirate costume was on the bottom of the pile of clean clothes in the backseat.

"Your boyfriend's thinking of taking his girlfriend to Colby's costume party."

Which sounded much better than going to a frat.

"I can handle that." Then had another thought. "Murph?"

"Yeah?"

"What year is Colby?"

"Sophomore, same as us. Colby was a transfer from the University of Albany. When he got here this summer, they didn't have a place to put him, so he was temporarily housed in the mini quad. Then some of the senior football boys needed another housemate after one of them bailed. So he took that."

Which reconfirmed that dealing with Res Ed was anything but pleasant. "Oh."

"He can't live off campus senior year because he's already doing so." And our school only allowed off campus housing to happen one year out of your four.

"How's this week lookin' for you?" he asked.

I'm not much for planning, but this week might take some actual writing down. "Kinda rough." Any week with physics was automatically difficult. Considering it was a MWF class, well, life was grand. "It'll be okay, though."

Because in five days it would be Friday again.

Wowee

2011-04-21T22:14:00.002-04:00

Peeks out from around the bushes.

Hi. Yeah, I know it's been a while. College has been....college. It's winding down which means it's actually doing the opposite, in terms of workload, and that makes life a little interesting. On the bright side, housing for next year isn't an issue and someone, somewhere, decided that I was Orientation Mentor material and now I'm all set up to work with the incoming class of 2015.

Things come full circle, don't they?

I have re-discovered my love of the TV show Numb3rs. It also helps that, considering how many classes I've now taken (one of which I'm currently in is more applied mathematics than anything else) I can actually understand some of Charlie's math a little more. There was a blackboard in the background in one of the episodes, and it was labeled Legendre's Polynomials - I know that. We talked about that in my quantum mechanics class. It's kind of familiar.

Familiar in a way that you've seen it, mentioned it, worked with it once (written it down) and then more or less forgotten about it.

I was at my EiC's house after one of our weekly meetings a couple weeks ago - tired out of my mind - and wearing sweatpants. It was the beginnings of hell week, I think, for the show, and I'm standing there, tired and wearing more make-up than I have in three years, and idly wondering if there was, by any chance, evidence of where I had spilled my beer on my sweatpants. My EiC turns to me, looks me square in the face, and says, "You are so damn comfortable with yourself."

There have been some moments, the past couple of weeks, when I haven't been so damn comfortable with myself. And one of my best guy friends just looked at me and goes, "Be nice to yourself. You deserve it."

Anyway. I guess the point of that is that even those of us who are comfortable with ourselves still have our moments when we're not nice to each other.

Generally speaking, my weeks have consisted of doing college work - six hours yesterday saw the last set of mineral unknowns now in index card form; I have my side of a scene memorized for my Shakespeare class; the book I have on black holes and the general secrets of the universe is quite helpful; my problem set for Geo was done spectacularly early this week.

I'm almost in the mood to start actually writing again. I was going good for a while, working on The Crossing and then, well, academia caught up with me again. What I'd really like is to get some more done on Murphy and Me. Maybe during reading days. Maybe.

Anyway, that's the long and short of what's been going on with me. Hope your end of things has been less hectic.

Roads to Take

2011-04-09T16:18:00.002-04:00

Or not to take, as the case may be.

It was a really difficult decision, one that I really didn't think about otherwise I would have waffled back and forth for, well, days, and in the end, it's really for the best, hard as it is to see that now.

On the subject of whether to apply for the writing class to be held by our sort of writer in residence, I've decided not to. Even apply, that is.

Writing is something that is so ingrained in me, it's really hard to separate the two. It's not like acting, where there's the actor me or with playing soccer, where there's this person on the field that has my body, but does things with it that, if I were probably thinking about them in any other context, I'm not sure I'd do. Things like slide-tackling a girl from behind in my own penalty box, or going head to head (almost literally) with an attacking player. This isn't like that. The Louise and writing are two very intricate, almost completely combined things.

The reason I'm not even going to apply is because I don't think I have the strength to be accepted and not actually rearrange things and take the class. I don't think I'm strong enough to just take the fact that I was accepted and go with that. For me, right now, it's better to not even apply and wonder whether I would have made it or not, rather than apply, get accepted, and force myself do not do anything about it.

This was not an easy decision, but one of those that you make and then, maybe a few years later, think...what if?

Lifetimes

2011-04-04T20:04:00.013-04:00

Sometimes it feels like I've had more than one life in twenty-one years. Like, if you were to track me through the tail end of high school up until now, you could easily see where one part of me left off and the other started. It's a little harder to see what brought me here, the stuff that's on the inside and doesn't see the light of day except in extreme circumstances. It's hard to see the bad stuff because there doesn't seem to be a camera present when it all goes down the tubes. Why? Mostly because it's not a pretty picture. No pun intended.

Maybe it's because I realized this morning was the last morning I was going to register for fall undergraduate courses, and, well, that's got me more than a little freaked out and tooling through a bit of memory lane. The stages of me, not the pieces, because the important pieces don't fall off anymore. They chip - sometimes really easily - but they don't actually come off anymore.

I might have learned how to bend a little easier, instead of outright fracturing. Or I might have just morphed into stronger stuff. I don't know. And if I don't know, you people must not have a clue.

What I do know is that I can see the journey - the part of the journey - I've taken. I can the see the ways I've changed, both physically and in the ways that aren't so obvious.

Looking back might be a way to look ahead, too. I don't know where I'm goin', but I know where I come from, and I'm just fine with knowing only that. As for the rest of it? Well, I'll deal with it as it comes. One day at a time.

Tomorrows

2011-04-04T16:50:00.002-04:00

It's the first full week in April. This morning was registration and I don't think there has ever been, in my three years here, a registration that went as smoothly as that.

When you sit at the top of the stack it makes things a little easier.

As of this morning I was content with my schedule. I'm still content with it, as there's not much moving around that I can do with four classes and three labs. Not much moving around that I really wanted to do, truthfully. Fall semester is going to be a tad bit difficult as it is.

And this was before I found out about the workshop from our "writer in residence" type of person where it's an apply and get chosen type of thing. Apparently he's a very good fiction writer. As I've spent the past six years of my life working on a novel, and without becoming egotistical, I think I'm pretty decent fiction writer. This would be a very good thing for me to do. It would be a small class - only fifteen students or so - and the guy teaching would be picking a smaller number of students from that class to continue to work with him in the spring semester.

I don't know what to do. This would be a fifth official class, not to mention that I would have my last education seminar in the fall, and it would also be the first time with me at the helm of martini.

This is one of those occasions when my own sanity comes into conflict with the philosophy of maybe twenty years down the line regretting doing, instead of not doing.

What really scares me? I'm running out of tomorrows. Tomorrows and second chances and starting to put an end date, a number, on my days. And when you realize that, it becomes almost overwhelmingly terrifying.

I can either rearrange my labs (it's possible) and leave my Tuesday afternoons free for this writing class, or I can not apply to it, not take it, and leave everything as is. I don't know what to do and I'm scared of the doing the wrong thing.

Just...tell me I'm not the only one in this position. That would make me feel a tad bit better about the whole damn thing.

Things to Know XX

2011-03-30T15:02:00.003-04:00

- A 2 am bed time is only advisable once a week.

- The crater holes where I had my wisdom teeth removed are still incredibly sore.

- This was evidenced when I got knocked in the jaw last night at rehearsal - nobody's fault - and made everything hurt.

- Geo lab tomorrow takes place more or less in my backyard.

- I sat through a class and a half feeling like my head wasn't functioning.

- Spent four hours (roughly) with no contacts or glasses due to a contact lens malfunction and knowing that wearing only one would produce a hell of a headache within twenty minutes.

- Watching DVD's of Law and Order: UK off of Netflix helps me pretend I'm still in the UK.

- I have a place to live next year - in a house - and get to pick my room on Tuesday.

- There's a project that's going to allow me to look at the quantum mechanics of a black hole.

- There may be a way to tie that back to either Star Trek 2009 or Stargate, of which I'm practically salivating over.

- There's a chance my mom, sister, and I will be able to make a sort of round trip to NYC to see the MLS All Stars take on Manchester United and then see RENT on Broadway.

- If we see RENT it will remind me of the last time we all went to see a musical together, which was The Lion King when I was still in elementary school.

- Sadly, though it would be really fun and a great experience, it's not going to be possible to do the Geo field course this summer (two weeks in Colorado) because it doesn't help for my major, and I would have to petition quite a few people to be able to take only three courses my senior Spring.

- I'm having mixed feelings about the fact that the theater department doesn't want me to take Intro to Dramatic Literature as an independent study (which would mean only three courses [all of them chem, with labs] in the fall) and want me to wait instead for next Spring and another dramatic lit course.

- I still have my ethics goal to fulfill.

- My adviser is quite happy that we're not struggling to fulfill the fine arts goal.

- I don't think I drink enough water in the day.

- I should make a cup of tea and get cozy on my bed doing homework.

- I have a card I'm going to send to my best friend in Rome.

- Speaking of said best friend, she'll be living across the street from me next year.

- One of these days, when it gets a little warmer, I'm going to lay on the grass, look at the sky, breathe, and simply be.

Virginia Company

2011-03-21T18:00:00.006-04:00

It's sometimes fun to start at the end. This is what we did last week.

While I try and get my head around the asshattery that was the first Monday back after Spring Break - complete with more moments of brilliance in one day than the last month and a half - I'd figure I'd clue everyone in on where I've been for the past week.

I mentioned this a little earlier (sometime a couple weeks ago, I think) that I was spending my Spring Break doing community service in Virginia instead of becoming a couch potato at my own house.

It was pretty cool, truthfully. We accomplished a lot. I'm still kind of covered in latex paint and primer, got bit by a tick, cut up the backs of my hands a little on nails through surfaces as I was trying to paint, and, if you followed my twitter, you'd have probably seen that I was trying not to swear like a sailor and commit bodily harm to people I was with over downright damned annoying little things.

Either way I survived the week, did good service, and there were some pretty impressive, and interesting photos that more or less cropped out of it.

I am the headless "moonsuit" (used for painting, to preserve your clothes) on the left.

Chippin' paint and lookin'....woodsy. Or grungy. Either one works.

Oneness

2011-03-06T17:32:00.004-05:00

This is the third time I've tried to write this post.

My varsity soccer coach my junior and senior year in high school told me those weren't the best days of my life, and not to let them be. That there were bigger and better things out there waiting for us to find them, experience them. He was right, for the most part, that high school wasn't the best days of my life.

What he wasn't right about was WAZA. A travel team I'd been playing on for four years. Those girls, since the first day, they were more than teammates, they were practically family. We were family, actually. After our first practice our coach had said, "Welcome to the WAZA family," and he never stopped saying it. It was drilled into us that if our sister was against the boards, you go help her. You give her support.

Those girls were one of the best things that have ever happened to me. One of the best groups of people that I have ever come to know.

Friday afternoon we lost a sister. She'd fought leukemia not once, but twice - and won - only to lose to a lung infection.

It's been four years since we last stepped on or off a soccer field together. Four years, but with this we've come back to the family we were once. And still are.

That is how we'll grieve. We'll grieve with our blood family, and the family we chose.

We'll grieve for our sister.

Almost Normal

2011-03-02T17:13:00.005-05:00

This is a sort of Wordless Wednesday post in disguise.

It's been five days since I had all four wisdom teeth removed.

This was me Sunday afternoon.

Chubby Chubby Chipmunk, anyone?

And this is me five days later.

Still a chipmunk, but not now I don't look like I'm putting away food for winter.

I'm also beginning to turn pretty colors as the swelling goes down. I keep waiting for someone to ask me who hit me. And the looks at Wegman's while J and I had frozen coffee drinks and I ate mine with a spoon? Priceless.

Shaken, Not Stirred

2011-02-27T23:15:00.002-05:00

I'm writing this while more or less waiting for my pain pill to kick in and take me off to la-la land for the night as four classes tomorrow, plus lab, is probably going to be pushing it for a full day back after having oral surgery.

Anyway. I've got very good news.

All of my collective 37 followers and whoever else stumbles upon this happy collection of ramblings knows that I write for the Colleges' alternative student newspaper, martini. Since I don't go to school with most of you - or, rather, we're not even in the same geographical location (not even remotely, in some cases) I - and the email list usually only covers our alums, I've got really good news.

martini is now online. Including most of our paper archives, too. You can actually go all the way back to our first volume, issues 5, 7, and 8. (Note, though, that there some articles missing in some of our issues...this might be because the pre-printed copy is the one loaded, and we'll definitely try to get that fixed.)

However, for now, have at it and tell us what you think. Newest issues are at the top, and enjoy a crisp, clean, hard hitting martini with your morning coffee.

Alright

2011-02-27T12:21:00.004-05:00

Kanye West wrote and sang a song titled Through the Wire because, well, his jaw was wired shut due to something that had happened to him to cause such a thing. Not only is my jaw not wired shut, I also can't sing for shit and my mouth won't open too far because it's so swollen.

I resemble a chipmunk who's been stuffing nuts in its mouth to prepare for winter. Only, it's the end of February, I'm a twenty-one-year-old human, and I've recently (Friday) had my wisdom teeth removed. After spending the first night in my college house with my Mama because the roads were too bad to get home, I've spent yesterday and today at my own house - most of today knocked on my ass due to Vicodin - and now that I'm actually with it this afternoon, I'm looking at eating more pudding for lunch, scarfing so ibuprofen, and cranking out this lab report that's due tomorrow. My calculations might not be correct, but I'm kind of okay with that. And it's only the first draft due, so I can go see him about what to add and what not to add, and what needs to be fixed. Same about the problem set.

What I'm actually kind of jumping for joy about is my theater class. We don't have class on Tuesday. At all. Because our professor is in Florida interviewing at a big university. Which, while we love him to death, his position at our institution isn't secure, and while he's interviewing here, he's also looking elsewhere. It's the nature of these things.

Anyway, I mostly wanted to let you guys know that I'm alright. Well, alright as anyone can be while on painkillers, eating non-solid foods, and looking like a furry woodland creature. Other than that, I'm still the same Wandering Sagittarius.

Short Form To-Do List

2011-02-23T14:14:00.003-05:00

I need to get back in the habit of making my legit to-do list because it really helps me focus on what I need to get done, what I've gotten done, and what I have left to do.

So, while I get caught up on my missed Monday night TV (I don't watch much live TV, just about four shows, all in the beginning of the week, mostly on Monday) - The Chicago Code and Harry's Law - it's given me a little more time to think about what's coming up in a couple of days.

The wisdom teeth are being evicted Friday morning. I'll be in quantum for a little bit on that morning, then high-tailing it back to the house to meet my parents (or just one, I'm not sure if they're both coming) and then heading over to the oral surgeon and then the fun begins.

It is, however, not my first surgery that involves general anesthesia. I know the deal with that - they give you something and you go to sleep. What feels like five minutes later (but it's really not) you wake up, and the last time I was under completely I woke up, didn't even open my eyes, had someone doing something very interesting around the surgical area, and then, after mumbling in agreement that I was indeed feeling like I was going to throw up, gave me something that pretty much sent me back to sleep.

The moral of this story is that the more I sleep, the less I feel crummy. Considering I'm going to be on some pretty happy drugs post-surgery, sleeping is even better and probably all that I'm going to do for the rest of my Friday.

Until Friday morning, though, there's some things that need to be done. A draft of a formal lab report, a geoscience problem set, some research (to debunk an experiment) for mineralogy, putting my newest Shakespeare monologue on my mp3 player to listen to and help memorize, writing my piece for the open mic for National Eating Disorder Awareness Week, and remembering in all of that to attend lab, go to Wegman's so I can bake for the house tomorrow, and, you know, finding time to eat and whatnot. Maybe even knit.

And yes, I know you fine people are lacking a photograph of my first complete knitting project, I'll try to get one of those as soon as possible, as well as a photograph of the one that I've started because I'd like to give scarves - maybe hats, too - this year for Christmas to my college friends. Mama has already said she'll help me, and, I like to knit (I find it incredibly relaxing, too) so it's going to give me something to do throughout the summer in my downtime.

Also coming up is Spring Break. There will be lots of Tweets and photos - both on my Facebook, the blog, and PhotoBucket - because I'm going to be spending it in Virginia building bridges and doing maintenance in the Pocahontas State Park. I'm really excited. God only knows what I'm going to look like (I might still resemble a chipmunk and unable to eat a lot of solid food) but I'm really excited. I haven't gone on a road trip in a while (by road trip I mean in a car/van and somewhere in the continental United States) and this is just going to be a lot of fun. Hard work, but fun.

So, I've got a little more of The Chicago Code to watch, followed by Harry's Law and in the process I'll make my to-do list. Then I'll go about doing it because I've hit the point where if I'm not as productive as I like to be it bugs me.

Suddenly, with this prospect, I feel that this venti-sized Verona blend from Starbucks isn't going to be enough to accomplish what I need to. Then again, that's why there's a coffee pot in my kitchen.

Thank BLEEP!

2011-02-18T18:08:00.003-05:00

Thank [Insert Appropriate Word Here] it's the freakin' weekend.

If you couldn't tell, it's been a long week in my neck of the woods. It really didn't start...well, yes, okay, maybe it did. Maybe it started to get long on Monday afternoon when our chemistry professor had to go get his son from daycare in the middle of the afternoon - twenty minutes into our lab time - and we got to hang out with an eighteen-month-old gnawing on a graham cracker while trying to get scientific data on dye. (The situation was totally understandable as the daycare provider had an emergency in her family, and therefore, the professor's small child needed to be picked up - we understood this, he asked for flexibility [providing some, too] and we were more than happy to try and get the Little One to smile, giggle, or actually speak to us, as he suddenly turned very shy.) Or maybe it got a little longer on Tuesday when I realized I'm going to have to fight tooth and nail to align whatever I decide to do for my curriculum project with the clusterfuck that is the New York State Education Standards for Physical Science Chemistry, followed by learning that afternoon that my performance of my Shakespeare monologue was on Thursday. Could possibly have happened on Wednesday, too, when, after my usual three classes and one-third lab (because my professor is awesome and broke up the lab into three pieces to follow class time on MWF) my Mama came up and we went to my wisdom teeth consultation. We both like the surgeon, looking at X-rays is always a twisted sort of fun, and we scheduled surgery for next Friday. All four. With a combination of pain, painkillers, and general whatnot - not to mention I think I've gotten steadily paler as the week has gone by - we decided to forgo dinner, and I was in bed and passed out before 11:30. Or maybe it was Thursday with the performance of the monologues after two and a half hours of intro geoscience lab that dealt with volcanic hazards.

The capstone on the week that was steadily going downhill had to be Friday. Four classes (we're counting that one-third lab as a class because, well, it pretty much is), followed by the first group session (Sheila recommended I try group, and, well, it's actually really nice - which I'll talk a little bit more on later), followed by me generally freaking out about my chemistry problem set, the professor understanding everyone has those weeks, followed by my first mineralogy oral exam.

And now, finally, a few hours later in the very, very quiet library, things have finally settled.

In retrospect, it's been a hell of a week. And this is with all four wisdom teeth in the mouth causing general mayhem. Well, what ones like to cause mayhem, at any rate.

The point is, it's been a long week. A really long week. And next week probably is going to be a bit better, but a bit not, as it's a different set of stuff to go wrong. Well, not go wrong, but not exactly go right, either.

Anyway. Right now, however, it's the weekend. All the way until Monday morning. Best make the most of it, eh?

Things to Know XIX

2011-02-17T12:18:00.002-05:00

[This is the first Things to Know post since I've returned from abroad. Just thought you should know that.]

- The president of HSG considers me the spawn of Satan over my article in the last issue.

- Mostly because he hasn't learned to separate the professional from the personal, but that's more his problem, not mine.

- I'm not really the spawn of Satan. I just write things that might not be all that popular for people in government to have talked about.

- I get all four wisdom teeth removed next Friday.

- Which is a good thing because I'm more of a druggy now than previously, and even then, the Tylenol isn't working sometimes.

- martini has a faculty adviser.

- She's meeting with us today, feeding us pizza, and talking to us.

- Mostly about whether or not we can really publish things anonymously.

- Which, well, that might change what we get and what we print. There are some things on this campus that you just don't want to put your name to out of fear of what people will say to you or try to do to you.

- Usually over athletics.

- Today is our performance for my Shakespeare class. I'm a bit nervous about that, truthfully.

- I broke my curse about getting a role in a HWS production - I landed the role of the Warder in our upcoming production.

- There's not much dialogue to learn there, thankfully, which is pretty cool.

- I get to be the villain with this role.

- When trying to decide what to make today for the house, I settled on chocolate whoopie pies with either cream cheese or buttercream frosting.

- I like variety.

- Henry the House Plant went home with Mama yesterday because she didn't like his color - he hasn't been feeling well, and we decided he should get some TLC at home.

- Hopefully the cat doesn't take this as invitation to gnaw on him.

- Tomorrow is Friday. Hallelujah.

- Have a Happy Thursday everyone.

Care to Elaborate?

2011-02-14T18:19:00.002-05:00

Well, at this moment, no, no really. What I will say is that I have, for this most romantic of nights, a crate full of movies to choose from and Ben and Jerry's cookie dough ice cream in the freezer.

And here's to us, the single ladies, this fine holiday evening.

Now put ya hands up!

Pretty

2011-02-11T21:59:00.006-05:00

I feel pretty.

Such a simple statement, but one I don't say as often as I probably should. The question of why I don't say it that often isn't something I really want to look at right now, so I'll just look at what prompted this simple, yet powerful statement.

It shouldn't be the way I'm dressed right now. Plaid pajama bottoms that sit low on the hips I'm starting to fall in love with; white tank top that might be a size too big, complete with bra straps and my tattoo hangin' out; my hair is down.

My curly, slightly tangled, getting-longer-by-the-day-if-really-slowly hair is down around my shoulders. Mostly for this reason do I feel pretty. Pretty enough to have it sort of pervade everything at the moment, make me slightly unreasonably happy (happy enough to look up music from roughly 10-15 years ago, and sing with it) and not give a damn who hears. That kind of happy.

It's been a bit of a rough week - academically and I, for the first time in my rather short journalistic career, had some backlash from an article of mine - and I'm not planning on really going out this weekend. Instead, right here right now, I feel happy. And pretty.

And I can't figure out, for me, which is the better of the two to be feeling.

Starbucks...Knitting...What more could a girl ask for?

Integrity

2011-02-11T20:57:00.003-05:00

I write for the alternative student newspaper at my campus. That's no secret. I'm also layout editor for it, and a general ear when someone needs to vent in a way that we can't necessarily print. That and I keep my editor from going completely batshit on our publishing weeks, and she returns the favor.

Believe it or not, I bring a lot of who I am as a person to that role. I can't not, in a way.

I am an honest (blunt, at times) person who strives to do the right thing, even if it hurts and thinks that people should know the truth, even if it's the unpopular opinion. For someone to call into question my abilities as a writer - as a journalist - though it's my chosen field, calling me out on my fact-checking, and denoting a lack of "interviewing and investigation" and flat-out accusing me of lies? You right there are not only criticizing my ability as a writer, but you're criticizing my integrity as a person.

I have not, did not, and never will print anything that is not the truth. Information can come from different sources, and the source I used, while it might not have been the one some people would have liked, it was reliable information and, as far as I can (I haven't sat down and run my number's against our fellow newspaper's), the damn information that was printed there.

If we had felt the source of the information was sketchy, we would have done more "digging." But we didn't. We trust our source, and I stand by the information I printed to be true. To have the audacity to call into question my integrity as a person - albeit indirectly through this - it's the same as walking up to me, and saying, "Molly Louise, you're a liar."

That my friends does not fly with me.

I'm not infallible. I know there are things in my article that were ambiguous. There were details about minor things I did not put in there, and I'm woman enough to know I'll eat my words next issue with a follow-up article. It happens. However, the main point of this weeks' article - asinine concerts, asking for a ridiculous amount of moment for said concerts when they have, in the past, not even broken even, and instead caused a significant deficit - will remain unchanged.

As with all of my writing, I'm not going to give you flowery bullshit. I'm going to tell you the point, and I'm going to be blunt about it. If people have any questions, they're more than welcome to actually come to me and talk about it. Talk about what they didn't like. A student government hoping to set standards on journalism? Well hell, why don't you just attempt to censor us.

I will not apologize for something that needed to be said. For something that was said. For information from a valid, reliable source that was used, and my decision to keep my integrity and allow that person, who came to me in confidence, to remain anonymous like he requested.

Questioning my writing questions my integrity. This is not something to take lightly. While some may choose to take the low road, sling a little mud and get a little dirty, I will remain classy. Again, you might not like the result, but you poke me like this, there's a good chance I'll punch ya. That you must always expect.

Sundown Rundown

2011-02-09T17:03:00.002-05:00

Hi.

I know - Where have I been? I've been a little busy, truthfully. Nothing overly complicated, just the usual four classes, three labs, one seminar, and a student newspaper to print every two weeks. A student newspaper that kicked ass this issue - 24 pages, instead of our usual 20 - and our editor had a hard time defining which article would be the one to set campus on fire, as it was that packed. There's stuff in there on the Sexual Grievances Council (which I didn't even know existed); an article on how the excess fund has gone way down; how the Republicans tried to redefine rape (can they not figure out that no means no, and it really is as simple as that), as well as staff personal ads because Monday is Valentine's Day.

Which, by the way, I'm not looking forward to. We suggest slasher films, but I'm more of an action/adventure type of movie person, not to mention I have four classes and, technically speaking, two labs and while I'll be hoping the guys that have been eying me are going to actually do something about it, I'm not holding my breath. Otherwise I'd pass out and we'd have to call campus EMS.

On that note, I probably need more coffee and, as I ate lunch in our campus center today, I'll most likely be gnawing on a bagel and leftover mac and cheese for dinner tonight in my little room under the stairs.

Which leads me to the conclusion that if I'm here tomorrow when housekeeping comes through, I'm politely going to ask them if they could take it a little easy on the stairs as I can hear the little bits of ceiling and whatnot falling on the floor when they do whatever it is that they do. Also, a general note to my second-floor housemates might not be a bad idea because, while you don't think you're making too much noise in your boots, I beg to differ.

Pardon me now while I go start the coffee pot.

And since I've returned from starting said coffee pot, this sentence is the first I've written in about twenty minutes of sitting back down. I'm good, aren't I?

I'm not sure where to go with this, so I'll start at the top and work my way down.

Quantum Mechanics - It's an interesting concept with an even more interesting professor taught and a very interesting time in the morning (9:05-10:00) and directly follows the physics side of the same topic. We're interested in the chem side. We're interested in the stuff that's cool, but kind of wacky. Like, how one moment someone can be standing on one side of my doorway, and the next moment, they're in my room, and at no time in between have they ever actually gone through the door. (Only, do this with an electron in a vacuum, but I figured if I tried to explain that, I'd lose half my followers out of sheer boredom.) I see my professor in his office hours, I do my reading on a nightly basis, and it's all under control.

Solid Earth - Let me just say my professor painted his toenail today so that we can see (roughly) how long it takes tectonic plates to shift apart a year.

Mineralogy - A whole lotta complicated. Pretty to look at, but kind of complicated.

Shakespearean Performance - Well, when you piss off the professor, that's grounds for him to temporarily treat your THTR 386 course like THTR 178 and, it's been eighteen days, therefore you should have eighteen lines of your monologue memorized. Pick a number, number one now get up there and recite your monologue. Talk about a kick in the ass. (Me? I'm sitting at sixteen lines with a clear understanding of the reasoning behind my monologue because this English stuff? Fascinating.)

Curriculum and Instruction - Is going to drive me crazy. And that's all there is to it.

And, like usual, between moments of clarity, there are moments of a downright spastic nature. These usually involve martini, boys, hair days (good or bad, take your pick), and trying to keep my Adventuring Focus more or less on track. On rare occasions (okay, maybe not so rare), I talk to Henry, the giant spider plant. It's not so much communing with nature, but more like talking to the plant that's been with me since the Academic Opening dinner first year. I'm a bit worried, though, because he's got a lot of brown tips, and I think that's because his water basin isn't big enough for the pot he's now in. Which might require a trip to Wal-Mart.

What I'm going to do over Spring Break just became a valid question.

HWS is really cool in that they offer something called Alternative Spring Break - community service both in and outside of Geneva. We send a group to Tennessee, Virginia, North Carolina, and Nicaragua, respectively, and this year, because I don't need to worry about racking up teaching hours this semester, I applied for and was accepted into the Virginia program. My Spring Break will now consist of doing community service for a week in Pocahontas State Park in Virginia. I'm really excited because I like to volunteer, and I like to travel. This gives me both. I'm now going to have to figure out something to do with Henry for the week.

Then again, in true Louise fashion, I just might figure that out when I get there.

In terms of upcoming events and such - Monday is Valentine's Day and, like I said earlier, I'm not holding my breath that something will happen. I'm shit at reading signs (if the signs are even there at all) and, honestly, I'm not overly optimistic about this (which, if you know me, I'm an optimist to my core). What happens happens, that much I know and can't change.

Also coming up? The spring blood drive in which I can actually give, since it's been over a year since my touch ups. I'm very excited.

And I think that's all the rundown you guys needed to catch up on this slightly crazy, always Wandering Sagittarius.

Murphy and Me XXXIV

2011-02-02T22:12:00.002-05:00

[Happy Almost Friday.]

Four days, three practices, and one game later, it was finally Sunday and I was double-checking that, according to my planner, multiple syllabi and whatnot, that I was indeed ahead for once, instead of perpetually catching up.

Which proves miracles can - and sometimes do - happen.

There wasn't anything that needed to come with me, other than Murph, and we needed to get moving. It was roughly a fifty minute drive if I didn't cut over the hills and through the hollow. Going through town was a bit nicer, scenery wise, as it followed the lake from one end to the other, but it added about ten minutes.

Then again, driving no less than sixty got me home - through town - in forty-five minutes. And if my mom needed to get up here quick? She could tackle the distance in half an hour.

Keys in hand, I trotted down the back stairs and pushed open the door to the third floor. There was a cacophony of voices from the lounge, occasionally drowned out by a TV sports announcer. Sounded like Syracuse playin' someone. Murph was leaning against the lounge window, turning his head every now and then to see the screen.

Syracuse scored a touchdown and there were a few "damn it" and "oh, shit" grumbles amidst the cheering.

I twined my fingers with Murph's and watched the replay. A one-handed grab under double cornerback coverage. That was bound to makes SportsCenter later. "Nice."

Murph shrugged. "Everyone has a SportsCenter moment, D-one or D-three."

We were NCAA Division III in all of our sports except for lacrosse (which was Division I) but if you watched any game, meet, or competition, we went at it like every move was covered by ESPN. It doesn't matter what it's not, we still go hard.

He looked at me, oblivious of our audience - half the lounge was watching the TV, and other the half us. "We goin'?"

"Yup." We waved to the boys - Dev among them - and started for the other stairs. Once in the parking lot, standing by the driver side and looking at my boyfriend over the roof of my beat-up Oldsmobile, it hit me what we were about to do.

Murphy was going to meet my parents. The last boy to do this, three years ago, was Bobby.

"Ollie?"

Bless that boy. "Yeah, Murph?"

"You okay?"

And was that a loaded question or what? "Yup. Just...thinking." Unlocked the car, ignoring the slight shake in my hands, and hoped Fred started first try.

Hallelujah. Two miracles in one day.

Five minutes later we were going fifty-five down the state route with the lake on our left. Murph turned the radio on, navigating the seek button to find something between country and screamo. He found an easy listening station and I relaxed marginally, trying not to think about specifics or what was going to happen in roughly half an hour.

"There's a lot of vineyards out here," he said, looking out the window.

"Yup. There's twenty-eight wineries from one end of the lake to the other on this side." I'd been incredibly bored and tired on the drive one time and had counted. It'd kept me awake.

He looked at me, incredulous. "No."

"Yes." Grinned.

"You've counted?"

"Boredom and falling asleep at the wheel."

Murph chuckled. "You know, I don't think I've been this far south before." He held up his hands. "Before you flay me for that, I've been to New York City and further south, south, but not down into this part of New York."

"So you haven't been to the southern tip of the Finger Lakes?"

"No - And how do these people use metal wheels to farm?"

Central and Western New York - known also as the Finger Lakes Region - was wine country. The hillsides of the glacier-made lakes were lined with vineyards and dotted with farmland. Grapes and corn. In Yates and Ontario counties there were a number - quite a lot, actually - of Amish and Mennonite farms. There were more on the east side of the lake and the way to figure it out? Look at the wheels on the tractor.

"If the machinery has metal wheels, it's an Amish farm. Rubber wheels are Mennonites. If we're lucky, we'll pass a horse and buggy." Counted those one time, too. Eight of 'em.

Murphy was positively bug-eyed; this was normal for me.

"What's that out there?" He pointed to the lake.

"Naval station." Apparently Murph hadn't gotten out much. "Research station. The lake, at its deepest part, is about six hundred and eighty-five feet deep, which makes it a good place to do submarine research." I tapped the brakes, eyes on the car to the right at the blinking yellow light. "You can't get within five hundred feet of it without them wanting to know who you are and what you're doing. Or they threaten to shoot you." I grinned. "Looks like a pirate ship comin' from the other way after dark."

He snorted. Darius Rucker's Alright filled the lack of conversation. I 'bout jumped through the roof when he slid his big palm under the hand currently resting on the armrest between us. Yeah, I'm a bad person and don't drive at ten and two unless it's snowing or my niece is riding with me, so it's usually only the left hand on the bottom of the steering wheel.

Nobody really gives a shit about how your hands are after your test, anyway.

His thumb stroked up the side of mine, coaxing my blood pressure out of the stratosphere.

Darius made way for Rascal Flatts and Fred rolled on through the miles, the lake sometimes disappearing from view and other times a dark, shimmering blue between two hills awash with reds, golds, and oranges. I waited five miles for a passing zone to get around a Chevy driven by a senior citizen on a leaf-gazing, forty mile-per-hour Sunday drive coming up on the last major hill and the final, if curvy, stretch of road before we'd drop down into the village.

Yes, village. Not a town. A village. Population of three thousand. Except for my family because we live six miles in the country.

We hit the four lane on the way into Watkins and he took everything from the motels and bed and breakfasts to the Elks Club building and the old iron works building on the last curve and then onto main street. There were still a ton of tourists around - especially at the State Park - and once past that traffic thinned and we went through the skewed intersection and up the hill across from Pizza Hut.

"Hilly," Murph remarked.

"You've no idea," I grinned.

"I'm a suburbs kid, I guess," he said, slightly wide-eyed at the open farmland and the view across the hills. Sasha had called them "mountains" when she'd come with me for Easter last year. "Wow."

The closer and closer we got to my own driveway, the more and more butterflies began beating at my ribcage.

It occurred to me then I should've asked Murph if he was allergic to animals.

"Murphy?"

"Hm?"

"Are you allergic to cats or dogs?"

"Nope."

"Oh, and just to warn you, Dex is a little...hyper."

He looked at me briefly before returning to presumably try to figure out which of the houses coming up was mine. "Dog?"

"Yeah." Pureblood, registered, long-legged border collie. He loved to wash ears, too.

There was a curious feeling in my belly as I flipped on the turn signal and backed into the driveway. It - well, when compared to other things, it wasn't much. An almost square house with white siding and a two-seat wooden glider by the door on the concrete pad. Murph squeezed my fingers and I had to really think about it to get my hand to release its death grip.

"This is it." Slid out of the driver's seat to stand on wooden legs.

"It's nice," he said. "Is that a store door?"

"Yeah. We're in the process of remodeling the downstairs from an old store into livable space. So it looks a little rough."

If I didn't get a handle soon it wasn't going to be pretty. Namely, most likely one of my mother's hanging flower pots would get a little extra fertilizer. Then I'd catch hell.

I led the way through the door and into what was starting to look like the mud room it was going to be. It wasn't in use yet, and we had to weeble through the downstairs to the kitchen door. There were voices behind the door and still feeling like I should be praying to the porcelain god, I opened the door and decided to just go with it.

Decent philosophy in theory, hell on the system in practice.

Mom was clipping coupons from the paper at the table, and she looked up when the door opened.

"Hi." She put down her scissors and hugged me halfway between the door and the tile-top table. Mama's a couple inches shorter than me, so when Murph stepped off the rug in his blue argyle socks, he dwarfed her.

"Mom, this is Murphy. Murphy, my mom, Anne." They shook hands; Dex pounded down the stairs and nearly ran into the side of the stove. He took the long way around the table and leaned his front paws into my midsection, trying to lick my ears.

Until he saw Murph, decided that was someone he didn't know, identified as friend, and attacked my boyfriend. In a friendly way, of course.

"Dexter!" Mom snapped, reaching for the neon green collar.

"Oh, he's fine," Murph said, laughing as the dog ravished his left ear. Dex eventually wandered away, back end wagging furiously.

I reached around Murph to hang my keys and Vera on my hook under the phone and then...didn't know what to do with myself. And the fact my boyfriend was in my kitchen.

Which apparently blew my mind.

"Where's Dad?"

"Store," she said, sitting down to clip coupons again.

Murph wandered further into the kitchen, taking in the light green walls and carpeted stairs. He followed me up to the pale yellow living room - complete with no curtains because, well, we just didn't. Not yet. He didn't say anything and it was turning the still-present butterflies to lead. From the plum-colored chairs to the right, the small, blue-plaid couch, and the pictures of Izzy and I on the wall behind the bigger couch Dex had claimed as his, he took in everything. Especially my senior photo on the wall.

"Your hair's shorter," he said.

"Yeah. I'm sort of growing it out again." And was almost there. "The bathroom's this way." It was on the right, before the closed door of my parents room and the left turn to the short hallway to my room, back guest room, and open computer room.

"Your room down there?"

Our eyes met, my heart thumping uncomfortably loud, and from the tightness in my chest those damned butterflies might have broken a rib. Maybe punctured a lung.

And so I showed him something of me Bobby had never seen - everything from my cluttered dresser-with-mirror to my five CD changer stereo to the stars painted on the ceiling.

"Did you paint those?"

"No. They were here when I moved in." The black cat curled on the bed lifted her head and stared at us with yellow eyes. "That's Pepper. She's a bit temperamental." Meaning, poke her belly and lose a finger. Possibly the whole hand.

We wandered back into the living room; my ass buzzed and the little black flip phone made an appearance. Text from my sister.

u guys here?

'Yeah.' "My sister." Motioned behind me. "She lives across the road."

Murph shoved his hands in his pockets, shuffling his feet a little. "And I'm gonna get to meet her later?"

Phone buzzed. made monster cookies. bring the boy.

I grinned. "Right now, if you want to. And she made cookies."

He shrugged. "Okay."

Back down the stairs, shoes, then out through the door and across the front yard to the mailbox. Nothin' comin', across the road and up the driveway to the back porch.

"We built this."

He looked at his feet. "The porch?"

"Ripped the old one to shreds and built this one as a family." It was warn enough out - and she'd been baking, too - that the back door was open behind the screen one. I caught the black and gray kitten as it dove for the door, cradling him against my chest until I heard the latch.

Murph pointed to the kitten. "Who is that little guy?"

Grinning, I put the kitten in his palm and he gently rubbed its tiny head. It purred. Loudly, for such a small thing.

"Wow," he murmured. "Talk about a V8."

Izzy was leaning against the doorway, inspecting the guy taller than her fridge.

"Murphy, meet Murphy."

His face was priceless.

"He's so ugly he's cute, isn't it?" Izzy grinned.

Murphy the human looked between two sets of green eyes and a nose that was probably eerily similar. "Are we talkin' about me or the cat?"

Resolutely not looking at my boyfriend found me wandering to the counter with a, "Ooh, cookies." Picked two off the plate and handed one to Murph. "You're cuter than the furball."

"Was a little worried for a sec," he mumbled, taking the treat, the kitten balanced against his chest.

"Are you allergic to oatmeal or peanut butter?" Izzy asked.

Murph shook his head, took a bite, and more or less blissed out. Monster cookies. Always good.

"Murphy, this is my sister, Izzy. Izzy, Murphy."

An orange tiger kitten padded in. Izzy pointed. "Morris."

"Like on the cat food commercial?" Murph still had his furry namesake.

Izzy grinned. "He's good."

He shrugged. "Used to have a cat."

Izzy took the kitten Murph handed to her. "She knows you're home. I told her you'd come get her after she got up from her nap and take her over to play." She rubbed Murphy the Kitten's fur the wrong way.

"Send me a text."

Murph tentatively raised a hand. "Can I have another cookie?"

"Of course you can have another arsenic cookie," she said sweetly, and again, Murph's face - cookie hanging out of his mouth - was priceless.

"She's kidding," I said, practically shoving him out the door. "Just kidding."

Dad's little black truck was in my driveway as we crossed the road and weebled back through the downstairs. Murph tensed at the kitchen door. "What if he doesn't like me?"

"Why wouldn't he?"

He shrugged. "He hasn't met me and I'm his daughter's boyfriend."

"He hasn't met you." I reached for the door handle. "And besides, it's not hunting season yet."

"Yeah," he snorted, "because that makes me feel so much better."

Kissing his cheek required standing on tip-toes. "You'll be fine. He doesn't bit." Which was true, but holy shit the man could bark.

Once on the other side of the door, Dex wandered over and Dad set a newly made pitcher of iced tea on the table.

And this is when I officially stopped breathing like a normal human being.

"Murph, my dad, Peter. Dad, this is Murphy."

That was, quite simply, all there was to it. Watching them shake hands, Dad offered him a glass of tea, Mom asked if he was hungry, and the next thing that happens is Mom and I are watching Dad and Murph talk football over roast beef sandwiches.

It was, simply put, frighteningly easy and incredibly normal. Which brought back those damned butterflies.

Dex sat staring at Murph until Mom physically pushed him away.

"What are you studying, Murphy?" she asked.

"History." He reached for the tea jug. "I want to teach."

"That's what Ollie's doing, too."

"Back up, plan," I protested. "Don't have a plan but I have a back up plan." Which was par on course for me, truthfully.

Conversation was the typical "boy-meets-parents" stuff and quite relaxing, to be honest. Even when the cat came waddling down the stairs resembling a pot-bellied pig more than a feline (she pulls her belly fur out, we have yet to figure out why) and began bellowing at Murph in an attempt to get him to share his chips.

Yes, cat eats potato chips and yes, sharing is required.

Time became one of those things that slipped easily away and before I could really fathom it, my phone was buzzing.

she's waiting for you.

I grinned.

"What?" Mom asked.

"Elizabeth. I told Izzy I'd get her and bring her over to swing."

Murph looked briefly terrified at the prospect of being left alone - temporarily - with my parents. He was a big boy, he could handle it. And if Murph could handle this, then he stood a chance of handling what was coming next.

Planning

2011-02-01T23:28:00.003-05:00

My train's a little late tonight, it's only now rumbling its way past the house. (Those of you who don't know, on the other side of the street I live on, down over the bank [and by bank, I mean sheer drop off] there's a set of train tracks that are active - namely, there's a train that goes by every night. Sometimes more than one a night, and it makes the house shake a little. Oh, and you can definitely hear it.)

You guys know me (or if you don't, just act like you do, and that'll be fine, too) and you know how much I avoid the word plan. And the word goal, too. I don't like them. They give me this feeling of structure, and while I'll freely admit that I like (and probably need) a healthy dose of structure in my life, I also really enjoy my flexibility in just going where my wandering feet happen to take me. I like that bit of spontaneity in my life. Not to mention I have a really difficult time planning next week in advance, never mind next month and possibly the next five years of my life.

With that being said, it's time for me to admit that, despite my ill will toward the words plan and goal, not only do I now have one, I actually have both.

This, right here, is where the universe implodes.

What's really interesting is during the first two years of my college career, I kept putting after-graduation plans to the back of my head with the idea that it wasn't time for me to think about that stuff yet. Two years later, I'm at the beginning of my junior spring, and now it's time for me to more or less think about what I've been trying to put off thinking about for two years. I won't get into the turn-around that I've gone through (though I will mention I get between seven and eight hours of sleep per night, no matter the day of the week [so if that doesn't tell you how much I've currently got my shit together, I don't know what will]) but I will say that Louise is now capable of looking at the forest and not getting lost in the trees.

That's a macro versus micro type of analogy, but basically says that there is not only a bigger picture, but Louise is actually seeing it. In technicolor, too.

One of the first things to come out of this is that I've realized I'm just as good as everyone else. And if I'm not, at the moment, then there's no reason why I shouldn't be. There's no reason that says I'm not capable of being as good as everybody else. There's nothing that says I need to stick with the system that half-assed worked for two years and let that continue to be me.

No, thank you, we'll give this a whirl, and considering that I actually sleep at night now, I'm thinkin' it's workin' pretty damn well.

The second thing to happen is that, and irony of irony for me, things don't always go according to their first plan. When you factor in the only luck I have is bad luck (Murphy loves me, and I don't care which Murphy you pick, in this case) it's no surprise that the tentative idea of going to grad school somewhere (tentatively John Jay in NYC) the fall following graduation has kind of shifted.

Grad school is still the idea, it's just been put off to the spring following graduation, or the fall a year from graduation.

Namely because I don't have an entire free semester in which to do my student teaching before I graduate. Not if I want to graduate with a degree. So what the Colleges allow you to do is take a ninth semester and use that as your student teaching semester. You graduate, then find someplace to live (though my education adviser and I are going to see what we can swing, and we'll probably get a pretty good deal in the process) and do your student teaching.

At this moment, that's the plan. How I went from having no plan to having one that's cementing itself more and more each day is beyond me. I still can't believe it, and I'm the one actually living it.

Damn terrifying, truthfully.

The bottom line is that, when you start to figure out what you want to do, you start to plan things. You start to absently set goals that become a little more concrete the closer you get to them, and while I enjoy flying by the seat of my pants just as much as the next wandering Sagittarius, the idea that there's a bigger picture? It's a really nice motivator.

When I say, right now, that life is good? I mean it. I really, honestly, mean life is good.

And if you wanna bring up the fact that it took me roughly three years to figure out, well, to that I say better late than never.

P.S. - For those of you currently living in the path of the snowstorm - whether you're beginning to get the mass amount we're supposed to get - be careful. We're not invincible. Maybe tomorrow is the day to stay in, make some hot chocolate (or coffee) and curl up with a good book. If you need one to borrow, I have everything from quantum mechanics to Terry Pratchett. But please, honestly do remember to travel safely if you absolutely need to, and if you're curled up somewhere with a good book, all nice and toasty, remember me slogging through the snow on the way to class because HWS hasn't quite heard of the concept of a "snow day" yet. Oh well. There's always next winter.

Is It Friday, Yet?

2011-01-28T21:49:00.002-05:00

It's a good week if I'm asking myself that on Wednesday or Thursday. It's a bad week when it's not even halfway through Monday and I"m begging the universe to somehow make it Friday.

This week, the first full week back to school, was a good one. I'm completely and utterly exhausted, and I feel like a social failure for it being only roughly ten o'clock and I'm ready to crash and burn, but I could care less. I adore my dorm bed-nest-thing, love sleep, and need to see what the weather's doing in the morning to decide if I'm making the forty-five minute drive home to hang with the family and get the oil changed in my lovely Oldsmobile.

The highlight of my week - for the most part - came on Tuesday when I had no less than four people cramming themselves into my tiny, under-the-stairs single as the Fire Marshal returned to see if I could actually live in the room. He took measurements, snubbed any and all questions I had, treated me like I was five and his job was incredibly difficult and required absolute quiet and concentration (which pissed me off beyond belief), and then left after saying that this was a conversation I wasn't allowed in on.

Before that, though, a very wonderful person in our Campus Safety department (they're lovely people, as people, and very willing to help anybody) took me around to the rooms they were thinking of moving me into, and let me see them. What do I do on the way back to the car? I slip on the snow, get airborne, land on my damn hip, and spill a little of my Starbucks peppermint mocha. I sat on my hat during class the next day, and my ass is still bruised.

Anyway, they'd all left and the next thing I know, while I'm knitting, Buildings and Grounds comes knocking on my door, saying they need to look at my headboard. So, I heard from them before I heard from Residential Education that they were allowing me to remain in my room for the remainder of the semester. Fine by me. As a result, they sawed off the cross-pieces of my headboard in order to not impede my progress to the window.

Fine by me, I just wanna stay in the damn room.

Side note: People have issues walking up and down the stairs in heels. I know this because I can hear them very clearly, and they sound like elephants.

Another side note: One of the frat houses is having a Jersey Shore party. As I've never seen an episode (and don't want to) I'm quite alright with staying in my little room, finishing this blog post, checkin' out Facebook updates, and then crawling into bed and sleeping for roughly ten hours. That sounds like a fantastic plan.

I feel kind of bad, though, in the mornings, because we have a little coffee pot (only four cups) and, well, what I consider a cup of coffee is actually probably two, maybe two and a half to anyone using a mug that might have come from your mother's cupboard. It's kind of like I'm making coffee for myself, as I seem to be the only person in the house drinking it on a regular basis. Or, more like dumping it into the travel mug right before I head out the door to my first class. But that works, too.

Then again, maybe I make up for the monopolizing of the coffee pot by baking every Thursday. Last week it was vanilla whoopie pies, and yesterday it was molasses cookies. Next week might have peanut butter, as I don't have any food allergies to work around.

I didn't realize there were more than one Sherlock Holmes movies recently produced, and therefore had Netflix deliver the wrong one. Takes a special kind of person to pull that off.

Side Note: Elephants. That's really all I have to say.

Knitting is a wonderful stress relief. Just throwin' that out there.

And on that note, I'm going to crawl into bed and not crawl out for another ten hours.

Shape

2011-01-25T10:06:00.004-05:00

Not only does this tell me there are people out there who have it worse, but, no matter what shape we're in, we're doin' all right. The sun will always come up in the morning.

The Shape I'm In - Joe Nichols - Joe Nichols Videos

An Unhealthy Combination of FUBAR and SNAFU

2011-01-25T09:59:00.002-05:00

[Kind of exciting news, especially if you're actually on campus with me - the first issue of martini and this article will be in there. I know it's rehashing something I've probably hashed to death, but, I wanted you to read what the rest of campus is going to read, because, well....it's a little more general and not so biased. Sort of. Anyway, until I hear whether or not I'm actually going to be moving, this is probably the last of this whole damn thing you'll be reading.

I wanted to share this with you. Then I'll find something fun to share with you, too.]

I’d like to think it takes a lot for me to get sufficiently and significantly pissed off. That being said, under no circumstances do I allow someone to walk all over me, but I’m not going to flip at the smallest thing, either. I’m pretty even-keeled. And over the course of my three years at this institution, I really haven’t much to say regarding how things are run, or even the policies. Ironic, considering I wrote for martini, the most opinionated publication on campus, and probably within a thirty-mile radius, too. I don’t normally, in a lot of cases, openly criticize our campus, either. Only when they’ve made a fairly big oopsie, do I really feel the need to say something.

At this time, it is entirely appropriate for me to say, to Res Ed, of all places, you need to get your shit together when dealing with students.

The first thing to keep in mind, whether dealing with someone who’s recently returned from being abroad or whether they’ve no plans to live anywhere but sunny Geneva for four years, is to remember that they are, first and foremost, a person. A living, breathing human who deserves to be treated as such, and not simply as a building name and a room number. I understand that we’re considered “residents” but, I do have a name, and I do have feelings.

Right now, I’m feeling incredibly frustrated and, honestly, disgusted.

Namely because you’ve given me a room, allowed me to move into it, and then, for some unknown reason, our buddy the fire marshal has deemed the space unlivable. Now, I’m not an idiot – I get there are certain regulations and codes the fire marshal has to follow, but what I don’t understand, and what nobody’s really answered for me yet, is why the room I’m currently occupying (writing this article, to be honest) was used regularly only a couple of years ago, used a bit last semester, previously okayed by the fire marshal, and suddenly, with only a change of tenant, has become a big freakin’ issue.

I’d be a little more understanding of this whole clusterfuck, if someone could actually tell me what was wrong with room and, maybe, how we could fix it. Like if someone in JPR has an extension cord, they simply remove the cord. Someone in Odell’s has curtains, they remove the curtains. These are violations that have a set rule to follow. This? This is pure asshattery on someone’s part because I’ve no idea why in hell I’ve got to move from a place that was offered to me by Res Ed (once cleared through the fire marshal to be active as a room again), which I took, moved in, and have been living here since last Tuesday, and in that time, nobody’s given me a damn answer.

Hell, Res Ed’s gung ho to move me outta here without telling me why I need to move, other than repeating over and over “the fire marshal.”

The fire marshal is a man who looks for infractions in the regulations and rules set down by the fire code. The regulation can tell me there’s something to fix; the man has to tell me the regulation I’m breaking.

So far, communication sucks.

Then again, that seems to be a growing trait on this campus.

What really frustrates me is that when you have an issue in your housing, Res Ed encourages you to go to your RA or to your Area Coordinator, or to their office because they want to help you. They want to provide you with an environment in which you can study and achieve what you want to achieve. They want to look to help you in small ways, to start at the bottom of the action ladder and work their way up; to avoid drastic action for as long as possible because they want you to see if you can stick it out with your roommate and make things work. If you have roommate issues, you’re going to through this whole process before they’ll commit to moving you to a different location. It’s almost like you have to fight to move from a situation that you’re not benefitting from, that’s hurting you.

In this case, we’re bypassing the whole damn ladder and starting right in with the drastic action that should, usually, be avoided. The truly frightening thing about this whole mess? Well, let me put it this way. When the fire marshal does his first rounds at the beginning of each semester, if you have something that infringes on the rules – say, an extension cord – you get a letter on your desk or your bed that informs you of your violation and then gives you a certain amount of days to make it go away. That or he just takes your extension cord. If you don’t remove the infraction, or fix it, in the certain number of days, you get fined and then, well, you’d damn well better get rid of whatever’s upset him. Or, rather, upset the regulation.

There wasn’t a paper on my desk or my bed, and there was nothing in my email, either, about any infraction that the room – including how it was laid out – or the stuff in it, was in violation of any fire code. Or any part of the fire code, as the thing is quite massive. Again, that’s a massive breakdown of communication right there. I’m living in a space suddenly deemed unlivable, but with no idea why it’s unlivable. I haven’t got ESP, I don’t have a direct link to the fire marshal’s brain, and I can’t tell what the hell goes on in the administration on a daily basis, and, quite frankly, I don’t want to. I have enough to deal with being a student.

And you don’t need a degree to realize you can’t fix something when you don’t know or understand how it’s broken to begin with.

Moving someone is a last resort, not a first option, no matter who they are, what grade level, and whether they live in the little room under the stairs or a forced triple in Jackson. And that, by the way, is just absolutely insane.

So, if Res Ed really has my well-being as a student and as a resident – and maybe as a person, too, as that’s also important – at the forefront of their actions, they’ll leave me the hell alone in the room they offered to me and let me continue to function as I’m currently functioning both socially and academically. That would be in my best interests.

Round Two

2011-01-24T22:24:00.003-05:00

One of the good things about writing and doing layout for the campus's alternative publication is that, well, other than controlling what goes on the front page and maybe doing the horoscopes on the back, is that you have the opportunity to inform the campus. How else can you get semi-important to important (and stuff that's by no stretch of the imagination important at all) to nearly everyone on campus, staff and faculty included? We have a lot of readership on the campus (more than The Herald) and, well, a lot of the time we come jam-packed with a sense of humor, even if it's slightly cynical.

Which is why I'm very happy I took the time and figured out how to write a semi-neutral article detailing the issues and lack of communication between the students and some of the departments on campus. My own battle at the moment? Still with Residential Education. The fire marshal makes round two to my room tomorrow, along with a person from campus security, and someone else on behalf of Student Activities.

If this wasn't important, I'd be a little worried about fitting all those people in this small but lovable room. As it is, we'll be crammed in here and, honestly, if there's a violation, I can't fix it if I don't know about it.

Namely, don't just tell me I can't live here, give me the concrete reasons why. Give me a legitimate reason that you're going to uproot my social and academic center of stability and attempt to move me - possibly into someplace smaller - because this whole we don't have to give you a reason for why we say you have to do something stopped being a valid form of communication with me past the age of eight. As a legal adult who can not only buy cigarettes (not that I smoke) and lottery tickets, as well as legally drink? You owe me a little bit more than it's unlivable.

As a full-time, living-on-campus student paying a near-ridiculous amount of money for this education, you damn well better have a legitimate reason for upsetting my apple cart.

It's a good thing I have a handle on everything else, otherwise I'd be more of a spaz than I already am on a regular basis. As it is, to get out of this place for a bit, I'm going to go sit in the living room with my knitting and just practice my Shakespeare lines. Then I'm going to go to bed and tomorrow, I'm going to do what I normally do and get up and go to class. Then come back here, be invaded by a bunch of people who don't know me, don't know my situation and background, and don't know that I've already gone through this frustration once in the past month. Heathrow, anyone? That was fighting to get home, and now I'm fighting to keep the home that I've made on campus.

There is something seriously wrong with this picture.

On the bright side, at least they respected my request to be present when the man comes back. It only took about four emails.

So. For right now, I still live where I live and do what I do. Right now, that's enough.

Irony. Oh, the Effing Irony

2011-01-21T16:45:00.002-05:00

Thank. God. It's. Friday.

That was my first thought after I turned on the coffee pot this morning before getting in the shower. Starbucks cinnamon coffee in a travel mug to warm my hands while walking to my first class of three? Absolutely amazing. The rest of my classes today - great. Even the one where physical chemistry II is a synonym for quantum mechanics was great, and my two geoscience courses? They're going to be a nice change of pace. I have my first line of my Shakespeare monologue memorized, and, as Hatch says, if you do a line a day, you'll have that thing memorized in no time.

Academically speaking, life is groovy. As I have a potential goal for after graduation, this, right now, puts me on a great track. I feel confident and I do the reading, and it makes sense - even the chemistry - and it just works.

What's not working so well right now is this complete and total asshattery that's between me and Residential Education. Which, incidentally, also involves the room I moved into upon arrival on campus three days ago.

Let me say, right now, for the record, and as I have said many times to many people of varying importance in the past day and a half, I absolutely love this little room. I was a little leery of it when I first saw it, but after I moved in, got settled, got unpacked, and made it my own - as I have this habit of making home wherever I go - I've made home in this little room in this wonderfully awesome old house.

The Fire Marshall, on the other hand, has deemed this room that was offered to me, that I have moved into, and that I have been living in since I arrived, unlivable.

There is so much wrong with that previous statement in terms of details and cases and things that happened last semester - including someone living in a room that's apparently unlivable - that it just blows my mind.

I feel a little like I'm living on borrowed time. That I'm going to settle further into my routine, into my campus and collegiate life where I'm at, and then they're going to, if they continue like this, uproot me and move me somewhere where I get to start the whole process over again. There are a few things that I've learned while trying to make nice with people, and trying to understand how one thing can work one day, and the next it simply can't function the way it should with nothing broke.

The only good news to come out of this - along with immediately helpfulness and a let's see what we can do to fix this, or make this less frustrating and painful for you attitude from Student Affairs - is that the Fire Marshall and someone else is going to come back on Monday and reevaluate the room. Sadly, I won't be here when they do. Which means, they won't be able to ask the student that lives, works, and generally lives in the space what she feels, how she likes it, and what options she has.

Reminds me of a bunch of aging men trying to decide in Congress what to do in regards to a young woman's body and her decision of what do with it. Last I checked, they didn't have the means to grow another human inside of them and continue to help the species flourish and have never had to have a gynecology appointment. Quack, quack, anyone?

That, however, is a matter for another time.

Ironically, my academics I'm fine with - I have a handle on those. The other side of the coin? Living and socialization? With the exception of this absolute clusterfuck, I'm good.

Maybe someone should ask the student living there what's best for her in terms of keeping her on an even keel so that she can continue to do her studies and achieve what she can hope to achieve. I am, after all, a full-time student paying full-time student fees. Work with me a little bit.

Wordless Wednesday

2011-01-19T22:13:00.003-05:00

The room under the stairs. (The picked-up, straightened, and tidy version.)

What you're not seeing is the "bathroom" in which you can sit on the toilet and whack your head on the sink when you sit.

Dichotomy

2011-01-19T21:31:00.004-05:00

I've wanted to do this post since I was staying in a hotel room in central London nearly exactly one month ago. Now I'm finally doing it.

dichotomy: division into two usu. contradictory parts or opinions

See the following:

Before

After

It's not a trick of the light. The shoes really, in this case, do say it all. Very eloquently, too.

Murphy and Me XXXIII

2011-01-11T23:25:00.003-05:00

[Happy Wednesday, Heather.]

"Was it awkward?"

I looked up from my miserable attempt at physics homework to see Murph turned around in his desk chair. It was a change of scenery for me, doing homework in the fishbowl as opposed to the lounge on the fourth floor. Dev was at a mandatory movie thing for Soc and Murph was workin' on something. Or flat-out Facebookin'. Not that it mattered.

Well, okay, maybe it did matter in the grand scheme but right now neither of us gave a shit.

"Was what awkward?" Call me clueless. It should have been my default setting.

Murph closed the lid on the laptop and turned to straddle the uncomfortable wooden chair the Colleges provided in every room. "Being at the game by yourself."

Oh. That. Ridiculously awkward, truthfully. "Not bad."

His eyebrows crawled for his hairline.

I ducked my head, cheeks burning. "Okay, it was awkward as hell." Put aside my papers and grinned in a slightly chagrined way. "I didn't know where to sit." Which had been the least of my problems that afternoon. Between that, wearing Murph's hat (the sweatshirt seemed a little much), and having no one to talk to between plays, it had been more of a nightmare, really. A semi-social nightmare I didn't want to repeat anytime soon.

"You didn't know who they were, did you?" There was only gentle amusement in his eyes. And a kind of understanding.

"Not a clue. And, I don't want you to feel bad, but I probably wouldn't have sat with them because it would have been the first time meeting them and I'd like to have you there for that."

The unspoken just like when you meet my parents hung between us, practically tangible.

Which, actually, led to my next question. When I worked up the courage to ask it.

"Yeah," he said. "I know what you mean."

Glad one of us did.

I twirled a curl between two fingers. I'd been leaving my hair down a lot more recently. Murph liked my curls and, well, it made me feel more feminine in contrast to slide-tackling an opposing player a couple times a week and generally channeling my more manly side. It was also one of those easy ways to make my boyfriend's hazel eyes soften without much effort. Not that I wouldn't make an effort, but sometimes the easy stuff was worth just as much as the stuff that required a ton of effort.

Murph, however, would always be well worth whatever I needed to give.

To a point. I wasn't a completely moron about some things.

"Murph." I looked at him fully, fighting the urge to fidget with Smokey. The stuffed dragon sat to my left, balanced upright by dark red pillows. "Look, you don't have to answer right away, and I won't mind if you say no, but I just wanted to ask you because it might be something you want to do. Or you might not want to because it might be too soon." Rambling much, Olivia? Holy shit.

Murph stood, crossing the three steps to the bed and planting his palms on the mattress on either side of my hips. He brushed his cheek against mine as he whispered in my ear, "Breathe. Slow down, and breathe." He backed up enough for me to look at without going cross-eyed. "What's up?"

"What are you doin' on Sunday?"

He shruggled. "Nothin'."

"Practice?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

Took a deep breath. Then another. "Do you want to come with me to my house for dinner?" Where I'd found the focus and courage to ask that much was a total freakin' mystery.

"You mean where you live when you don't live here?"

Maybe I wasn't the only one with...issues. "Yeah. With my parents, and my sister and niece, probably, too and if you don't want to I understand and it's fine, really - "

"Yes," he blurted, stopping me mid-ramble. I stared. "Yes. I want to come to dinner at your house. With your family."

Could I kiss him? Was that a good way to show relief? Either way, it was what I did, and I don't think he minded.

He touched his nose to mine, hands now close enough to rub the outside seam on my jeans with his thumbs. "Stay tonight?" he asked softly.

This was the first time - other than when that creeper had tried my door - that we were considering spending the night together during the week. It was usually only on the weekend - Friday and Saturday - and the other five nights I slept in my own bed with only Edgar to snuggle with. We hadn't talked about keeping it strictly to weekends. We hadn't talked about it at all.

Then again, with my tendency to over-think and subsequently freak out, maybe discussing things like that wasn't something we should do. Seemed to be doin' just fine on our own.

I was nodding before my brain had worked out I was saying yes. "Yeah, I'll stay tonight. The room's locked."

There had been a bit of time to kill once lab had gotten over with, and having the necessary books and things - in preparation of some time between that and practice - had meant spending a couple hours in the library had been a necessity. Which meant I hadn't been back to the room since leaving that morning.

"I've got stuff you can borrow." He pulled back, flushing. "If you want. If you'd be more comfortable in your own, I get that - "

Cue flaming cheeks. "I'm a little lazy right now, so if you've got anything you can spare, that'd be fine by me."

"I think I can find somethin'." He kissed my jaw. "How much do you have left?"

"Bit more physics and maybe some reading for T-S Britain." Which, considering he was a history major, why wasn't he in class with me? "Murph?"

"Yeah?" He retreated to the dresser. "Shorts, sweats, boxers?"

Care to add a stroke to that list with that last option? I'm not good with too many choices - picking a phone during my two-year upgrade? Takes hours. "Why aren't you in my class?"

"Well, you're a chem major, and in the science group for the teaching cert - " Forgot about that - "but for Kennessette's class, I've already taken it." He held up a pair of plaid boxers. Red plaid to match the comforter. Probably not intentionally. "These okay?"

I nodded. "How did you manage that?" There's a whole lot of information that comes through the newly made college email account in August - stuff about roommates, meal plans, and general information about campus - and there's also pre-made academic schedules that seem like they don't come with much wiggle room to change anything.

Then again, a science major has a pretty set, slightly unmovable path, anyway.

"I was supposed to take this four hour film course thing and that was not something I wanted to do." He held up the shirt I'd worn my first nap during pre-season. "So I took two of Kennessette's classes concurrently." He grinned. "Add-Drop forms are great."

That they were. "Oh." He tossed my new pajamas to my left while physics and I got reacquainted. And promptly decided this was a head-desk moment of epic proportions. Hate physics. With a passion. "Would that be why you get the Tudors and the Stuarts backward sometimes?"

"Like you flip the noble gases and the alkaline metals."

Touche. And why that happened was still a mystery to me.

Murph slid into his chair and opened the lid on the laptop; I went back to physics - half-assed using vectors - and more or less zoned out until he started chuckling.

"What?" Looking up at him was not required.

"Do you always swear like a sailor when you get frustrated with homework?"

That made me look up. He was straddling the chair again, smiling. "Was I talking to myself again?" Wouldn't be the first time. Or the last.

"More like swearing at every physics-related thing under the sun." He grinned. "I think it's cute. Funny, but cute."

Only for Murph would my potty mouth be cute.

I bit my lip, ducking my head. "You are somethin' else, Murphy." Somethin' else which had completely stolen my heart.

Somethin' else to break me in a couple months when this invariably went south.

"You know what?"

He rested his elbows on the back of the chair, curling his ankles around the legs. It was really the only way to be comfortable in those godawful chairs. He gave me his hit me look.

"I'm thinkin' I'm done for the night." Seriously. Freakin' despise physics. Snuggling with Murph? So much better than vectors and shit I don't understand and therefore get frustrated with.

"I like that thought."

Really? No kidding. You like almost everything that involves me pressed against your chest. Which is fine by me, too.

It took a couple minutes for me to repack my bag - so as not to forget anything in the morning - and he was the one changing in the bathroom this time. The boxers had to be rolled, the t-shirt was...big (no other way to accurately describe it) and everything smelled almost overwhelmingly of Murph. Tonight it was my clothes piled in his desk chair, my wallet next to his on the desk. I leaned against the bed, barefoot and contemplating how much and how well we fit.

And how hard letting go would be.

If there was a way for me to not be so uncharacteristically pessimistic, that would be fabulous.

"Murphy?" That was Dev's voice out in the hall. "Lock yourself out again?"

"Funny." Murph this time. One good - and bad - thing about living in a the fishbowl is that someone could be sitting on the couch on the other side of the lounge and sound like they were standing at the foot of the bed. That was with the door closed. "Ollie's in there. Changing."

"She staying?"

Maybe this was not a conversation to be overhearing.

"Yeah. I - I asked her to. I know we usually do this on weekends - "

"Murphy. Not a big deal. S'not like you're attached at the hip. You guys have a better balance than you and Manda did last year."

That was heading into dangerous territory; could practically see Murph bristle through the blinds.

"Yeah. Ollie's not Manda. She's..."

"I know. I get it. So shut up before you embarrass yourself."

I grinned. Then padded across the room and opened the door, startling the boys so much Murph nearly dropped his jeans, Dev having found him waiting after he'd changed. "If you two are done having a bromantic moment, I'd like to steal my boyfriend and get around six hours of sleep."

Figured to catch hell from the bromance remark, but Dev slid right past that, pointed to my thighs, and asked, "Are you wearing pants?"

Murph did drop his jeans at that one - shirt, too - and punched Dev on the arm.

"What? It's a valid question," he squawked, rubbing his arm and gesturing in my direction. "It looks like you don't have any pants on."

I lifted the shirt hem, giving him a half-assed stink eye. "Pants." With that, I went back in the room, crawled in bed, curled around Smokey, and started slowly counting to ten. Murph and Dev were in the room by four, Murph in bed by nine, and thanking Dev for getting the lights shortly after he finished curling around me. He kissed the back of my neck.

"For the record," he murmured, "I don't have a bromance with my roommate. We're not the lacrosse team."

Oh, snap! I snorted. "Don't let them hear you say that."

He chuckled, one hand up under the shirt and flat on my belly. "They're good guys." He shrugged impossibly closer; Smokey was nearly strangled against my chest. Dev tapped quietly on his laptop, Beethoven barely audible in the quiet. Neither of us minded - it was almost like a lullaby.

WW What?

2011-01-06T19:36:00.002-05:00

I haven't actually made any New Year's Resolutions. Then again, you don't really have actually write that resolution that everybody tries - and sometimes succeeds - in taking part and actually doing each year.

Losing weight.

The idea is kind of always in the back of my mind. Shed a few pounds, maybe get back into some of the dresses I used to wear when I was transitioning into high school/those early high school years. Or, if you really want to put a point to it, when I was a three-sport athlete and running a schedule that nobody in their right mind should really run on for more than a couple weeks. Not to mention I have a 5K in the spring to run with my sister.

So, tonight, Louise finally did something definitive about losing weight. Nothing like stocking up on weight loss pills or ordering weight-loss food off the internet or anything, but, well, my mom's been a part of Weight Watcher's for a year (maybe, I think, I'm not too sure on the specifics) and I more or less inherited some of the stuff that she doesn't use anymore (and she's going to try and get me some of the newer stuff).

Yup. I've become an unofficial, on my own, member of Weight Watcher's. I've calculated my daily points - I get 26 - and I start the whole kit and kaboodle tomorrow. Which means that last bowl of Neapolitan ice cream I'm going to eat tonight isn't going to count for my points total.

I'm excited at this. This is something definitive. Something that is, with me sticking to it, going to help me lose some weight. Coupled with exercise that I'll have available on campus (walking to class, Zumba [if I can make it on those nights, and depending on my homework schedule]) this just might work.

So, in a way...I guess this means I can start a sort of series about keeping on track. Or, if I can get really cheesy, on point. Yeah, I know. This is a little new for me, too, and it's a little bit freaky.

I'm on the same weight loss program as my mother. If it worked for her, might just work for me, too. And she's done so well and lost a lot of weight.

In other news, I got a haircut. Which I completely and totally love. When I get a photo of it - namely when I find my camera somewhere in this house - I'll post one.

I think that's all I got for now.

Habit

2011-01-02T22:16:00.003-05:00

I've got no qualms about coming out and saying I'm a bad blogger.

How long as it been since I've last posted? How much upheaval have I gone through between then and now? Downright disgraceful on my part, truthfully. Never mind that I was running on about five hours of sleep that first official day back, still trying to reset my sleep schedule, and being bombarded with family and the fact that Christmas was only two days away. Excuses, excuses.

See what I mean?

Anyway, it's post the first of the year, so welcome to the first official post of 2011! Cue fireworks and singing of that damn song. Or, you know, you could just keep reading. That's cool too.

I thought about doing, before it hit New Year's Eve, a best of 2010 post to maybe reflect on what had happened, all the exciting - and not-so-exciting - and crazy, stupid, fearless, terrifying, etc stuff that I had done over the past year, reflecting on my three months (that feel like a dream, or that they happened to someone else and I watched) I spent in Wales, and whatever else happened that might have been newsworthy or just noted.

I didn't do one. Firstly because, like I've mentioned, I'm a bad blogger and secondly, I was just too damned tired to really focus and pull something like that together. I still have moments when it boggles me that I'm currently home and not still over on the other side of the Atlantic. Moments when I realize that I can walk down the hallway to my own bed, tripping over my own black cat, and not wander around the corner into the bathroom of some hotel in central London. Or wander to a public bathroom in an airport terminal.

So, things are adjusting. Or rather, Louise is adjusting to things.

But there are changes. If you were to sit on the back porch with me (proverbially, at the moment, as it's pretty damn cold here), with a cup of coffee, and just talk with me, you'll see changes. Little things, the way I'll go to say something and have to kind of think about whether that word means the thing I want it to or it means something different. The way my Facebook stream has a mix of both US and Welsh names in it, the way that one has subtly more or less switched itself to being sort of one top and the other a sort of background. Not that any of those people are to be considered background, but I'm hoping you're understanding what I'm having difficulty putting into words.

And that's partly why I haven't really reflected. For as good as I am with the English language, I'm struggling to put this experience into something that can be easily accessed, understood, and shared with the rest of the world. I don't know how to say what I'm feeling.

I don't know how to get what's going on in my head out onto paper or into a sequence of ones and zeroes that lets others read it, too.

Which, honestly, drives me up the wall to a point. We're used to me rambling, but this? For me to attempt to get this out would be crazier than what I normally post. Yeah. That's where I'm at.

But, hopefully - namely when I can find my camera in this post-holiday slow-down - I'll put up a couple pictures of those last couple days in the UK. Namely this post that's been in the back of my mind to do. Something about sneakers and a big, fancy word that I'm going to have to double check the definition of in a dictionary. Anyway. Hope everyone out there had a happy holiday season, a great New Year, and as for resolutions? That post (sort of) will come later.

Small Favors

2010-12-21T18:43:00.002-05:00

I'm not sure what exactly to write about that doesn't start with the phrase I'm on the edge and thinking too hard makes my already sinus-stuffed head feel like it's going to implode.

So I'll start this by saying I spent two and a half hours of my life with Sir Ian McKellen on the other side of the woman next to me at the play Deathtrap, which was quite good, too. The man nearly stepped on my toes when he got up for intermission. And no, I didn't ask for a photo or an autograph or anything, because the man was more or less just there to see a show with a friend, and I wasn't about to interrupt that. They have lives, too.

On that note, the others ran (almost literally) into Hugh Laurie on Monday. Apparently he lives around where our hotel is. Again, no photographs or autographs.

I'm sitting in a hotel room in central London, trying to find the words to adequately describe what exactly is going on this head of mine. Or, what feels like a swollen melon sitting on top of my shoulders, truthfully. Particularly my forehead and under my eyes. Oh well. It just needs to sit there a bit more.

There's what we want and then there's reality. Ultimately, we have to come to terms with the fact that sometimes they aren't going to match up. I'd like to be home for Christmas, but depending on the weather - something completely outside of my control - that might not happen. You have the optimist on one side, and the realist on the other, and they might not play nice. The saying is best laid plans of mice and men or something to that effect, and it's completely true. I'll recognize there's a big different being stuck in London and stuck someplace completely away from it all. Hell, I even know what it's like to be stuck in the airport for days on end, and I'll tell you, I was pretty damn ripe by the time I got to where I'm currently at on Monday.

Like I said previously, I know both sides now.

It's in no way what I want, but it's what I've got, and what I have to deal with.

A month and a half from now we'll look back at this, look at the pictures, sort through the recent Underground tickets, and we'll laugh. It'll make a great story, when it's not so raw. We'll laugh, we'll make Tom Hanks references, and we'll joke about it as best we know how. That's how, eventually, it will be seen. It's an experience. That much I can't deny. But it's not one that many people willingly choose, honestly.

I would like, very simply, to go home. That is all I ask.

Moving

2010-12-20T20:30:00.001-05:00

I told you I had an odd sense of humor. As in the title of this post, and the fact that I've now moved from Heathrow to a hotel not far from the Bond Street Underground station in the borough of Westminster.

And believe me, it's a nicer hotel than I would have chosen had I been the one to choose originally. Namely, this one would have been classified as a little out of my price range.

The last time you heard from me, I was sitting on the fun side of security at Heathrow, waiting to get on a flight to JFK. As I'm not posting the joys of being home, it's safe to assume that I'm still in London. That assumption would be correct.

It's been an interesting few days, to say the least. If you've been following me on Twitter, you'll see some of what I've been posting [including the one from the reporter at CNN who wants me to email him, and I still need to do that, too] and the responses.

Despite all the good thoughts, karma, prayers and whatnot, if it continues to snow - and stick - there is the possibility that we won't fly out on Wednesday and we'll be spending Christmas in London has an HWS family.

An HWS family in which they're happy to have me back.

I'd been "Tom Hanks-ing" it from Friday until late this afternoon, sleeping on the second floor of Virgin Atlantic departures since then. Except for Saturday night on the floor by some exchange bureau near check-in point F or G. I woke up during the night, mostly because I was really freaking cold, and sat up, looked around, and thought why are there so many people covered in tin foil? Then figured that if I was having that thought, oddly reminding me of when my sister was sleeping in the tent with the dog at the lake and saw my aunt in her nightdress, wandering around, I needed to lay back down and go to sleep. Which I did.

It was really difficult to keep track of days, because, eventually, they blended together. It didn't so much happen that first morning, but Sunday into Monday it really started to.

Saturday was the day I fought with the airline to get my bags back. I had checked my backpack - not only was it too large, apparently, to be in the cabin, but it was too heavy, too - and there was also my suitcase, too. The suitcase wasn't an issue. The backpack was the issue because it had my meds in it. Not the Align, the important one, but the other stuff that I needed to supplement it. And the longer I go without my meds, the more things get....interesting.

It took multiple trips to Arrivals (where the baggage was supposed to be, as it was still on the plane at the time) and upon the fourth trip downstairs to try and find out when my bags were coming off the plane, only then did the Virgin Atlantic representative actually ask if there was anything she could do for me, if there was anything she could get me. I told her no, I just needed my bags (because, yeah, making my own dosages with something that wasn't even close to being the UK equivalent was not going to happen) and she actually was the first one all day to take my bag information off from my passport, and also my mobile number in hopes that when she knew when the plane was being unloaded, she would let me know. I assumed this was going to be true.

Despite having my mobile number, they didn't call me. However, the moment I hit the departures floor, she immediately remembered me, pulled aside another rep, and sent me with her to Arrivals to fetch my bag. The suitcase was on a trolley, and the backpack was on top of that. First thing I did after returning to my spot in the second floor of Departures, was to crack open my bag, ingest my meds, and then check to make sure the breakable stuff I had wrapped in clothes and in the bottom hadn't broken. It was intact, but the entire right side of the bag was wet. Like it had been dropped in snow.

Not a big deal, but, well....makes things in there not smell great.

So, now it was Sunday and after some phoning home, we decided that it would be best for me to stay at the airport and maybe hope to get on a standby list. Then the news came in that there was a rescheduled flight that we had seats on for Wednesday. I have a printed e-ticket, and a guaranteed ticket on this flight. But we wanted to see if maybe there was a way for me to get something earlier.

Which, ultimately, didn't work. So I wound up spending another night on the floor of the airport.

And, as there is a mirror above the desk, I'm looking at the circles under my eyes that somehow keep growing. Not great.

Monday turned out to be a bust, and then information trickled in from the homefront that it was best for me to find the hotel everyone had been living at while I had been living at Heathrow, and it was made that I was to find that and check myself in.

Feeling like a bag lady, I trotted down the elevator and then out into the cold, slightly snowy London air and headed for Arrivals. That would take me down to the Heathrow Express - the train that gets you to London Paddington in fifteen minutes. And they weren't charging for it because of all the snow had done to travelers. From Paddington it was down to the Underground and then, one transfer later, I was at the corner of Bond Street and Oxford Street (I think) and wondering where exactly to go next. After a bit of wandering (which is more or less what I'm famous for, really) I found the hotel.

Not too long later I was in a room with an actual bed, a shower, and thinking that it was proverbial heaven, truthfully.

It's weird. I have internet access (free, too!), a bed to sleep in tonight as opposed to the floor, and I was able to take a shower and find some different clothes to wear. Though what I'm going to wear to bed tonight is a completely different story as most of the rest of my clothes are packed in space bags with the air sucked out. And unless someone wants me to give myself a slight hernia by sucking that much air through a straw, I'm not opening them.

The most important part of this is that I've seen both sides to this story. I've seen the I don't have anywhere to go, and the airport is now home until they figure out how to get me to where I need to go and I've also seen the I have the opportunity to get out of this place for a while, get a shower, sleep in a bed, and generally wander around London until we're supposed to fly. I know which side most would prefer - it's the side I'm currently on. But I've seen both. Done both. And that's been one of those experiences most people should really have.

It's truly how the other half lives.

I'm in London until Wednesday, at the earliest. I'm back with the rest of my student cohorts, and we're planning on seeing a show tomorrow night. Something to pass the time. To keep ourselves occupied and see some of London that we haven't seen before.

And I just found something to sleep in, which just made my night, really. It's the little things right now, like being connected to the internet and being able to call back home. It's things like that right now that make a difference. A big difference, really.

I understand that I'm lucky. I'm in a hotel when I could be spending another night at Heathrow under a blanket on a foam mat on the floor in some corner with my luggage. As it is, I'm going to crawl into a bed and sleep like I'm dead, probably, and hope the bags under my eyes don't get any larger or I'm going to be giving a raccoon a run for his money.

I would love to be home right now, layin' on the couch with the dog or curled up in my own icebox of a room (backside of the house, gets a little chilly in the winter) and wondering if I'm going to be making Christmas cookies with the Smidget, but I'm not. I'm in London - Borough of Westminster, to be exact - and if things go right-side up, I'm leaving on Wednesday to actually head home. If they go pear-shaped, then we're looking at spending Christmas on this side of the Atlantic with some of the alums that we can find in this country.

Bright side of life. Make the most of what you've got when you've got it. Right now, while this might not be ideal, it's better than what it had been, and better than what some still have. That's always a good thing to keep in mind.