I finished my exams for this blitzkrieg round of summer school and am on to the next one on Thursday. Ahh . . .what joy! The paintball blast ice cream took the brunt of it.

Anyway, I came home and took a nap. It was wonderful. And then I woke up and took Emmy outside and there was this young man standing outside talking on the phone by his shiny red hatchback. I squinted in the sunlight. Then I hobbled back inside with my dog and felt a lot more like the Hunchback of Notre Dame that I would have liked.

(in all honesty, I wish I had boots like that.)

It isn’t so much that I was adandoned in a church as a baby or only befriended by a jerkface clergyman or that I have a thing for gypsy girls named Esmeralda. The real issue is the slightness of my excursions from home of late. Studying is to blame of course, so I suppose it’s only the old thing of The End of something. My exams went well, my time was well spent in preparation, but . . . there is much more time today than I’m used to.

Sometimes I think that it would be good to move away, really. Just any old Somewhere Else. This place has already been scribbled on too many times. Case in point: Today I was late for my exam so I had to make it up at a coffee shop across from UC while my professor graded papers. I don’t know if you know this, but a few years ago this particular shop used to be called the Buzz?  It’s called Taza these days. The entrance is met by two flights of stairs, one to the order counter and the other to the seating area. Anyway, the one and only time I have ever been to the Buzz was with Mark the First, my affair du jour in something like 2002. Not expecting the plethora of stairs, I promptly fell down all of them in what can only be described as one of those long cinematic type scenes where everything slows down and my body bounces horribly from one cement slab to the next, legs flailing, patrons looking up sharply and over their shoulders with alarm. The tinkling of ceramic coffee mugs, the chatter of college kids, and the faint drone of indy-pop music are all silenced as everyone waits, in slow motion, for me to stop falling. Finally, when I reach the last step, time speeds to normal, sound resumes, the waitress rushes over to ask if I’m alright and Mark, leaning over to help me, says, “I’m not going to lie to you, Marianne: a lot of people saw that.”

It was distracting being there. And all over the city it’s like that. I drive home and pass by the Walgreens where Mark the Second and I used to go to buy sodas and cigarettes and talk about his life in the Drug Years. I go to work at the shelter and am reminded of when my clothes used to strain over my belly where it held my sweet little Natalie, before she had a name, when she was still the Biscuit. I go up to Field’s Ertel and think of the snowy evening when Simon carried me so my feet wouldn’t get cold. I drive down Creek Road, I go in the house, and the curtains are all still there, and its overwhelming how tactile the remembrance of my mother is, like she’s still there. In all my usual places, I think of the grief dinners and grief breakfasts Stephanie and I had.

Are memories such a bad thing? Of course not. The real trouble is that many of them are unpleasant ones. Not unpleasant in and of themselves, but in situations and with people that turned out unfortunately, either through my own action or inaction or through that of who I was with. I don’t think of myself as someone who’s been prone to disaster, and in fact, there are so many blessings that God has bestowed on me that I shouldn’t ever be able to complain, about anything, ever again. And it isn’t as though I always remember these things. I can be mindless and free of them. But their propensity to come to me unbidden is unsettling.

Maybe I’ve done what I was here to do. Maybe it’s time to be moving on.

Not to be a “woman” here, but after a lot of spastic emotional trouble yesterday, I’ve decided to re-persue my Comparative Governments class. Which is actually really great because I can’t get my money back now if I drop it. I am so thankful for the goodness and comfort of good counsel and encouragement. Way to be, y’all. Way to be.

And I’m really grateful that this morning when I called One Stop at UC (the registrar’s office or something-what a hip cool name!) and found out there’s a procedure for un-dropping a class! Huzzah! Even my professor seemed pretty cool about trying to get it all sorted back to the way it was before. And, wonder of all wonders (or should I say, Grace of all graces?), the class lobbied for a push back of the midterm until Monday instead of tomorrow, so I can actually study and get some sleep tonight.

God. Is. Good.

Not that He wouldn’t have been just as good if I had had to keep my class dropped, or if my exam really had been tomorrow, or even if I hadn’t gotten counsel and encouragement. And I would like to think that I would be grateful to Him regardless of circumstances. He seemed to impress on me last night in prayer that no matter what happened today, He would be sovriegn over it and I should be grateful. And I should. Because there’s always something to be grateful for. I don’t even just mean the important and oft forgot things like the fact that I live in a safe place, that I have my needs provided for, that I’m blessed with compatriots and freedoms inherent to my country, that Natalie is, that my mother was part of the body of Christ and is therefore enjoying the joys of being reunited with her creator as are others I’ve known who are no more in physical form. All these are wonderful things to be thankful for, and more besides. But there is something to be thankful for even when things go so terribly wrong in my estimation. If those things are because of my actions, I can be grateful for the lesson. If those things are things I have no part in, there is an opportunity to be grateful for learning about the sovriegnty and sustainence of God.

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As a disclaimer, I would like to say this, vicariously, through a little Voki lady.

Get a Voki now!

Moving along, here’s the scoop. So I’ve dropped my Comparative Government class, and before you say anything, check yo’self ‘cuz I went over it with Arend and he already said it was okay. So THERE. :::sticks tongue out like a three year old::::

It isn’t as if I don’t want to learn this stuff. I do! That’s why I dropped it. I got my book late, I have a three week class term, and I am nowhere near prepared to take my midterm on Thursday. The real trouble is that I found out that taking the same class in the autumn quarter, which I was so totally prepared to do, is impossible. Apparently it’s “full” or some such nonsense. I suppose I’ll just have to cross my fingers that it’s offered in winter quarter and pounce on it as soon as it perks its unsuspecting little head up over the long grasses on the Savanna.

Sigh. I wanna go to Africa.

And that’s where all this is going. I thought I was doing all this schooling because 1) I think my mother would have liked it and I’m able to afford it because of her, and 2) because afterwards I wanted to go to Bible school and then whisk myself off on an African evangelism adventure! But now I can’t afford to go to Bible school afterwards, and I wonder suddenly, What am I aiming for?

This is the constant confusion of People My Age. I’m not too worried about it. Not too worried about the wondering, that is. It’s typical, it’s appropriate. But getting to the answer, ahhh, yes, that is something.

Get a Voki now!
(actual question posed in class)

What I hate about midterms! They really know how to da-a-a-a-ance!

Wait, I think I got distracted by an eighties tune there. It happens from time to time, or, really, more like constantly. Blame the Sound Disease I have. Anyway, as I was going to begin, and should probably be getting on to by now, is, What I hate about midterms is this One Eternal Question: Do we have to know . . . ?

I think probably that all my students would hate my guts if I were a professor. I mean, of course I would win their hearts with my loveable charm and personable layman’s explanations of deeply complex concepts. But when it came test time, their burgeoning devotion would boil within them, forming a thin but crisp layer of hatred. Sort of like an emotional creme brulee. And the reason for this culinary delight of abhorrance is simply this: If asked the One Eternal Question? I would always say, Yes.

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The atrium of my apartment building smells like bologna. Don’t ask me why. It’s one of those unanswerable questions, like why would a junior high school boy put deodorant on his face? Unfathomable. Nevertheless, smell of bologna it does, and that isn’t the worst problem.

The worst problem is something that I think I’ve mentioned before. Now, I’m no crazed hermit without furniture except for sixteen computers, wearing an aluminum foil hat so that aliens can’t read my mind or anything. I’m no enfeebled old woman with thirty seven cats to her name mewing around her efficiency apartment. I’m not even a begrudging middle aged redneck who won’t shut up about the Good Old Days, nevermind that he never saw them in the first place and that they weren’t really all that great besides. I mention this disclaimer because what I’m about to say next may make it seem that I am one of these types of people. So here’s the truth: I hate people hanging out outside my apartment.

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And so, it ends.

There’s a lightness that accompanies the end of something, and I can’t stand it. This purpose that has wrapped itself around the whole of you, that has caused you late nights and moments of worry, that you’ve worked for, that you’ve accomplished, has suddenly evaporated. It’s the same feeling I used to have after closing night of high school plays, when I walked up to the theatre from the dressing rooms, trudging up the stairs, running my hand along the back of the rows of chairs. It was quiet. Completely still. There was this overwhelming sense of . . . nothing.

And I knew then that whatever had happened would be all that had ever happened. It would never be better or worse or other than what it was. It would stand. The forgotten lines, the missed marks, the wardrobe malfunctions.  No do-overs. It was.

Of course, if all this is coming from feeling like I have nothing to do now, I’m kidding myself. My summer classes start on Monday morning bright and early and let me tell you, they’re going to hurt. Suddenly it occurs to me that I should have bought my books by now. Also, probably should have figured out how and where and if I’m going to be able to park anywhere down on campus. Those would have been good things to investigate. I suppose there’s always the beloved standby of Making It Up As I Go Along. I’m an old pro at that.

Anyway, here’s hoping I didn’t bomb my final.

Me, circa 1960(according to my sister)

I’ve been without cable TV since Thursay, and I don’t miss it at all. And that statement, while true, is probably one of the most misleading that I could come up with. The real truth is that my handy-dandy, fancy-shmancy computer has become my new distraction of choice. Also, I’m watching TV on it.

I know, I know. What can I say? I’m a bad lady. But YOU try turning down a japanese version of YouTube with the entire second season of Mad Men ready and rearing to go and then we’ll talk (preferably about how h-o-t-t Betty is as a character). Nevermind how I came across it! Incidentally, have I told you lately that I love you, Google?

Anyhow, I still managed to eek out a little school work in this den of period piece drama. Not enough, mind you, but some. All in all, I have to say I’m proud of myself, but mostly that’s because I’m a little weenie who will be a big cry baby if I say what I really think of me. By the way, if anyone else is afflicted with this same Mad Men addiction, you can get your next fix here.

Enjoy!

So, guess what? Delightfully  I got my french textbook finally. The joy of this most recent conquest almost caused me to pirouette as I bent down and picked it up from my doorstep. Giggling, I peeled back the tape on the package and looked inside. I drew out the mass of pages and opened it to the number for my assigned homework, and-

And-?

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I just got out of my three hour French class, and it was divine. I think I’m in love. All those “c’est”s and “voudrais”s. Heaven!

And as I was walking down the stairs and out into a cool spring evening, it struck me suddenly that I knew these stairs. What is it about a college campus? The way the air smells, the non-skid strips on the linoleum steps, the weight of books carried over the shoulder. It’s like being in a Meijer: once you’re inside, they’re all the same place. And it was a good familiar feeling strolling down the overwide sidewalks basked in dim street lights. L’amour, my friends, l’amour!

In other news, I still haven’t heard from Simon, so I thought I’d do a poll. YOU vote! Yes! You! Can!

Here are your choices. Simon hasn’t talked to me in three months because: (more…)

Today is the day. Or, if you will: Du jour est le jour. At any rate, today is the day when I head on back to school.

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