August 27, 2004

I Am Quite Safe

After waking up at 6:30 this morning to leave (after less than 5 hours of sleep) and driving the manual-with-no-cruise-control pickup for another 5 hours (with Ashley in the passenger seat, trying not to pass the people ahead of me in our convoy of four) and eating at Taco Bueno for lunch for the second day in a row (after the one in Lubbock made me sick enough to throw up in Barnes & Noble yesterday afternoon . . . don't worry, no books were harmed in any way) and spending 3 hours riding with Ashley in her car while we discussed The Issues and listened to a strange mix of music . . .

After all of that, I arrived safely back on the LeTourneau campus at approximately 4:00. As soon as the car had stopped moving in the Trinity parking lot, I was out and booking it in the general direction of my apartment. I saw Sharptiano, but didn't have time to greet him . . . I had been given dire warnings about what would happened if I failed to arrive in "the middle of the afternoon" as promised (2:00-4:00 = middle of afternoon according to Scholl).

I plunged into the dreaded ice cave and was greeted by a very welcome sight: Scholl, Wilson, Randy, and . . . BRYAN DURKIN! Bryan Durkin was my first roommate and a good friend during my freshman year. He is now a returning student after a year-long sabbatical from the college scene.

Scholl immediately brought out The Judge and attempted to administer a beating . . . After all of the above-mentioned efforts at getting back to campus and into the apartment as quickly as I possibly could . . . Well, let's just say that I was extremely ungrateful and utterly displeased.

Members of the family arrived soon afterwards, as did the Sharon-Moore, and there was much jollity. A large gang made up of myself and friends got all of Audra's things and dumped them in her room on Thomas 3 . . . her roommate was totally bemused by the procession of male . . . ummm . . . "bearers" arriving well ahead of Audra herself.

Moving down to the apartments, Ashley received the same generous assistance and all of her worldly goods were dumped without further ado. Then I spent awhile enjoying the company of various personages, punctuated by frequent phone calls pushing my parents in the general direction of getting some supper. If we hadn't come up with a plan and walked them through each step they still wouldn't know what's going on for dinner . . .

We ate at Joe's . . . it was good, but weird. I have spent the last two years living with one foot in each of two completely different worlds (well, okay . . . more like one foot and four toes in one world, my left pinky toe in the other . . . sometimes) and tonight I saw those worlds sit down across a table from each other and eat dinner together. On one side: Bryan, Wilson, Ardith, Anna, Scholl and myself. On the other side: Micah, Brendon, Ashley, Mom, Dad, Ian. It felt so wrong . . . I would have felt perfectly comfortable with either half, but the two together threw me . . . a lot.

Nevertheless, it was fun . . . after talking for awhile back in our living room, people slowly started trickling out. Eventually we gathered the survivors and crashed Uncle Doug's room for a good long chat. And then we laughed over "Cmplt Wrks Shkspr (abridged)" back in the living room for another long while.

Long story short . . . it's late, I'm tired, I actually have to get up tomorrow to do . . . this and that, and the main purpose of this post is entirely summarized in the title. Good night.

Posted by Jared at August 27, 2004 02:25 AM | TrackBack