Really?

In my dorm there is a wall across from the elevator that is for the RA's or anyone really to post fliers for their organization or event. Today, while I was waiting for the elevator, I was reading some of the new fliers on this wall, to pass the time. The two girls next to me apparently had the same idea, because I heard one of them ask, "Would you call 911?" to her friend.

Confused, I looked to see which flier they were reading. It was a picture of two cartoon ducks, one of which was slumped down on the ground, eyes closed, obviously unwell. The other duck was standing with his arm (wing?) around his friend and a phone pressed to his ear (?). In bold letters above the ducks, the flier read, "Would you call 911 for a friend?" Below the ducks the message continued: "Be a friend; make the call." And there was more, tinier print below that which went into detail about the consequences of not making a 911 call if you suspect someone to suffering from alcohol poisoning.

"Would you call 911?" the girl asked her friend.

He friend gave a disdainful snort. "No, I would take care of them myself." She tossed her hair over her shoulder (no, I'm not making that up. She did.).

The first girl nodded and agreed. "Duh." (People still say that?)

Then I had to step into the elevator with these girls and try not to look at them like they were the stupidest humans I had ever encountered. Really? You're not going to call 911 because you are going to take care of your possibly fatally inebriated friend. Because you know better than a medical professional what the signs of alcohol poisoning are and how to treat it. Really? You're so worried about getting in trouble for being an underage drinker that you would risk your friend's life to save your own ass. To save their ass. Because you "got their back". Really?

This has been "Really?" with Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler. Now, back to Weekend Update.

No, but seriously though. That was her thought process. That's terrifying. You know what the best part is? FSU has a policy that goes a little something like this: "In the case of alcohol related medical emergencies, no disciplinary action will be taken against the student requiring medical assistance or the student calling 911." That's what the tiny print at the bottom of the flier was talking about, but no one bothers to read the tiny print.

I tried to be angry about it, but I was mostly just sad. Even if FSU didn't have that policy, first time offenders often aren't disciplined very strictly at all. Isn't a slap on the wrist and a mandatory alcohol abuse class better than a dead friend?

Ziploc Baggies, Hippies and Night Trolls

So, I've been in Tallahassee for almost two weeks now, and things are normal: the weather's hotter than hell, my teacher's are assigning moderate to heavy amounts of homework and I'm learning the ropes of shopping for one person. I'm not very good at it yet (Number of sandwiches I have stored in Ziploc bags this semester: zero; number of half used produce items I have stored in Ziploc bags this semester: innumerable).

Let's see, what else... well, I'm pretty sure that my room mates think I'm a hippie, because I take yoga classes at seven in the morning, I buy my produce from the farmer's market, I filter my water (now that's just smart living), I use solar powered lights in my bedroom and I occasionally wear ankle-length, floral print wrap skirts. I am not, in fact, a hippie. You should see the amount of paper recyclables that are just sitting in my bedroom trashcan. It's terrible. 

Another thing that's terrible this time of year is the heat. It is unbearably warm for September. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth even going to class at all. Maybe I should just drop out and actually be a hippie. I'm sure there's a commune somewhere in Tallahassee. Hopefully a commune with air conditioning, or at least some shade. What makes walking to class in the heat so much worse is that three of my five classes are at the top of the tallest hill on campus. These three classes all fall on the same day. I make that trip three times. I believe a little illustration is necessary so that you truly understand how this impacts my day. 

How everyone else looks arriving in class on a hot day: 

How I look arriving in class on a hot day:

It doesn't help that I'm the fair skinned descendant of what must have been every single Irish, Scottish and Welsh immigrant to seek the shores of America. I overheat easily, then my face turns bright pink and I feel like my head is going to explode. Meanwhile, everyone else on campus is a plastic Barbie she-devil that doesn't sweat or even flush under the blistering pressure of 95 degrees worth of UV rays. The comparison is just pathetic. 

Also note how everyone who isn't me is inherently bustier than I. How you can carry around that much weight on your chest alone and not break a sweat is beyond me. So, since I can never join the Barbies, I just grimace accommodatingly, like the night troll they mistake me for, as they ogle and titter behind their manicured, plastic fingers. 

Unfortunate Truths about Flying

There are a few things that I like less than flying, for example shutting my head in a heavy car door, sitting through a middle school choir concert, or finally cleaning out the other refrigerator, you know, the one that sits in the garage and accumulates a diverse array of leftovers in various stages decay. Of course, if people ask how I feel about flying, I stoically tell them that I am actually quite a fan, I just drop off to sleep and it's the easiest thing in the world. I am lying when I say this.

Now that we have some perspective, let me explain why I do not care for flying. While it is often bone-numbingly boring to sit in a crowded tin box, hurtling through the air for five to six hours while crossing the Continental U.S., there is also the fact that so much about how the flight progresses is beyond your control.

You cannot control., for instance, how full the flight is going to be. In fact, sometimes the crew will tell you, "This is going to be a full flight, if you're one of our pecuniarily challenged passengers and will be boarding last, we will perform a courtesy bag-check for you now, so that we can proceed to packing you all into this sardine tin as quickly as possible." While they say this, it might not be entirely true, and you will enter the plane to find more than enough overhead space. I usually don't mind this, in fact I secretly hope for a full flight on the first leg of my journey so that I don't have to drag a huge duffel around the airport with me. Unfortunately sometimes this is not the situation that you find yourself in. The crew says nothing about how full the flight is until you get onto the plane and realize there isn't enough room to blow your nose let alone store a bag. I always conduct myself with the utmost grace in these situations, relying on my sweet face to persuade people to let me stick my bag over their seat. Not everyone is as naturally graceful as I, and that is why you will sometimes find yourself watching the following drama play out:

A very sunburnt woman with about five children sidles down the narrow aisle until she reaches her seat (right across the aisle from you, so you have the best seat for viewing the approaching calamity). Her shoulders are so sunburnt that you can see pieces of peeling skin fluttering in the unnatural breeze produced by the plane's A.C. unit. Realizing there is no room immediately over her seat (partly because your pink, black and white duffel is taking up the valuable overhead real estate), she turns upon  the nearest flight attendant, not so much asking for help as snarling why there isn't any room. The flight attendant, a 50-something Midwestern type with a bronzy complexion, politely asks how many bags she needs space for. "Four of these rolling suitcases" says Leprosy Shoulders. The flight attendant, let's call her Bronzy, says in a weary way, "You should have checked them at the gate, we really don't have a lot of room or time to play Tetris. We need to get off the ground before it starts raining." Leprosy Shoulders goes red in the face and nearly screams, "Like, we tried but they said there would be room and wouldn't check them for us!" Bronzy gives her a stern look and says, "Don't talk to me like that, please." in the way that your grandmother might say it, that sort of no-nonsense tone that brooks no dispute. Leprosy Shoulders clearly never talked to your grandmother, because she then said, "Like, really? Ugh. What are we supposed to do with these bags, there's no room!" She gestures wildly at the clearly full compartment over her seats. Suddenly Leprosy Shoulders' husband, a beleaguered man with a baby on one hip and two backpacks on the other shoulder, cuts in, saying very mildly, "Danny" (I suppose that's Leprosy Shoulders' real name), "Danny, just stop. Sit down." Leprosy Shoulders continues to mutter, occasionally raising her voice loud enough to make the rest of you passengers uncomfortable, but now Bronzy is ignoring her in a practiced and professional manner, directing the put-upon husband to a few empty spaces for his remaining bags. Unsurprisingly, their children were horribly behaved the whole flight.

The above story is an example of another thing you have no control over during a flight, and that is the conduct of other passengers. Cranky fellow sardines is at the very least a minor headache and at the worst infuriating. Then of course there are the sardines whose bodies recognize that they were never meant to fly, resulting in air sickness. I have the unusual luck of almost always sitting beside or behind whoever gets airsick on any given flight. Call it a gift.

You cannot control how long it will take the plane to get into the air or, once in the air, that it will stay in the air. If you weren't already worried about that, at the beginning of every flight, the flight attendants say "Please power down and store all electronic devices, return your tray tables and seats to their full upright positions. We will let you know when you can use your electronic devices again." They never explain why you cannot use your devices, but it is all very important and mysterious. I shan't pretend to understand how an airplane even stays aloft, much less navigates through miles of empty sky, however it has been drilled into my brain that any electronic devices on during take off or landing will cause the plane to drop out of the sky. This being said, I have a particularly unique situation and that is this: my phone, unbidden by me, will often turn on and off of it's own accord. I cannot control this when it happens and often do not even know it is happening. Because of my phone's rather independent manner of conduct, I live in constant fear that my phone will turn on during take of  or touch down and doom us all. I know for a fact that I have pulled it out of my pocket midflight to find it on when I turned it off at the beginning of the flight. It is all very stressful. I am actually writing this from somewhere above the Midwest, so if you are reading it, that means that I am paranoid without cause and that my defective phone did not cause a huge plane crash.

On a less dramatic scale, you also cannot control the flight attendant. When are they coming around with drinks? When will they return with a garbage bag or those little bags of roasted peanuts? Who knows. They keep to a secret schedule that they have sworn to share with no one. I was asleep during the first round of drinks and I have no idea when another one will happen, so I sit here with my dry mouth in the ridiculously dry air, wondering how long it will take me to shrivel into a human raisin. To her credit, a kind brunette flight attendant did stop by earlier and ask if I wanted anything since I was asleep during their first round. I croaked that I would appreciate a water and she nodded, smiling. That was thirty minutes ago. I have not had any water.

These are the things I am talking about. Some of them are petty, some of them are pretty big, but all together they accumulate into a long trip in which everything depends on other people. I don't know why that wouldn't make me uncomfortable.

Narrow Road

Look, kid. I recognize those shoes.

I've walked in them before.

Actually, those shoes were mine once.

They're hand-me-downs, gently used.

I'm walking this road, too,

But I'm a little further down.

If you squint, you can probably see me

Next to the yield sign on the left.

What I'm trying to say is

That you're not doing this alone.

I promise to always be within reach.

You know my cell phone

Number.

I can't stand right there with you,

Underneath the busted light post

That's swinging precariously

Like something recently dead,

But I've left some footprints

In the dusty road

And hope that you use them

To guide you on ahead.
Just know that I'm always here
If there's ever a great wind that
Blows the dust up into your eyes
So that you can't see my footprints.
 

I've made mistakes all along this road.

Try to see them and give them a wide berth,

But if you can't,

Know that I won't say anything.

I'll keep your confidences.
There are also tear stains
That have left tracks in the dirt.
I know they're not pretty.
They're not supposed to be.
Sometimes this road hurts.
Don't be afraid to add to them;
This road wouldn't be ours
Without them.

There's no right way or wrong way

To navigate this road we share,

But see each foot print like an open hand,

Extending across the space between us.

This road ties us together,

Even though we seem far apart.

So we'll travel this road through this strange land;

I'll scout on ahead

While we walk, hand in hand.

Dorm Room Apple Cobbler

As a student living on campus, there isn't much room for creativity when it comes to cooking, unless you live in the apartment style dorms and have your own kitchen. I do not have my own kitchen, a means for getting to and from the grocery store, or even much storage room. This is fine, because I have a meal plan and can eat all the mediocre food I want with a swipe of my ID card. Unfortunately, even those of us with meal plans still occasionally have a need for cooking/baking. My need happens to come in the form of my boyfriend and his imminent birthday. How will I overcome the undesirable circumstances of dorm life in order to make him the most delicious birthday treat of his young life? By creating the recipe for Dorm Room Apple Cobbler, of course!

Note: This recipe is based off of what I personally have in my dorm room. Some of these ingredients will need to be bought if you, unlike me, do not own them already.

Dorm Room Apple Cobbler  
Equipment-

•  one deep baking dish, preferably 9 in.
•  a sharp knife 
•  one medium bowl for mixing; ask the nice people at the front desk
•  one wooden spoon, for mixing, ladling and licking when you are finished. Again, see front desk.
• measuring cups, teaspoons and tablespoons. As a college student living in a dorm, I'm sure you don't have these. Either eyeball it (let's be honest, it's cobbler. You're basically just throwing a bunch of delicious ingredients together and calling it baking) or ask the people at the front desk and pray you get lucky.
• one oven mitt or heavy towel for taking the pan out of the oven.
• friends to share the finished product with. If you don't have friends, you can substitute with the gym after you have eaten the whole cobbler by yourself.

Ingredients-    

    Apple Filling:

• about 5-7 apples, which you can steal from Suwannee/Fresh. Try to get the green ones.
• 3/4 cup sugar. If you don't have enough sugar to accommodate both the filling and the topping, try substituting with brown sugar. It pears nicely with the apples. (See what I did there?)
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• dash of nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup water (Use bottled if you can, but if you use tap, filter it first. Tallahassee water is some nasty sh*t)
• 1 tablespoon butter. Don't have room in your fridge or your wallet to buy four whole sticks of butter at Publix? Use Suwannee/Fresh for that, too.

        Topping:

• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup sugar (real sugar for this one)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder. Do NOT use baking soda. For both our sakes.
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 egg

            OR (if you don't have eggs and don't feel like buying a whole carton for one recipe)

• 1 1/2 tablespoon water
• 1 1/2 tablespoon oil
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

Apparently this mixture mimics the texture that the egg was going to give the batter. Plus, you don't have 11 unused eggs in your tiny little dorm fridge now.

Directions-

      Prep:

• Walk down to the kitchen on your floor of the dorm. If it is in use, proceed to closest floor and try to use their kitchen. If the people occupying the kitchen are using it as a study room, use the oven and counter space anyways while giving them pointed, dirty looks. 
• Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. 
• While the oven is preheating, wash, peel and slice the apples. Don't worry about getting all the peel off, nobody cares about that. 
• Lightly butter your 9in. dish. If your hands are clean, which they are since you just washed those apples, your fingers will work fine for the buttering process. 
• In medium bowl, combine the thinly sliced apples, sugar, flour, cinnamon, salt, vanilla, and water in the quantities given. Put this mixture into your buttered dish.
• Dot the apples with the remaining 1 tablespoon of butter and set aside for the moment.
• Using the medium bowl once again, combine all of the ingredients for the topping and beat until smooth using that wooden spoon. 
• Drop the batter over the filling, evenly spacing it. The batter will spread as it bakes, so don't worry if it doesn't seem like there's enough. 

      Baking:

• The oven should be heated by now, so open it, making sure to blast those studiers with searingly hot air (seriously, there are plenty of study rooms that aren't kitchens, get out!), and put your little dish of appley goodness inside. 
• Bake for 30-40 minutes or until the apples are tender and the crust is golden brown. 
• Using the heavy towel or oven mitt, remove the cobbler from the oven, let cool for a moment and then serve.

Serves 6-8 (or one very lonely, hungry college student)

I have a feeling that I am going to be adapting many recipes like this for next semester. Anyways, have fun and enjoy!

Don't Blink

Sometimes, I feel like Lucy from Fifty First Dates. Not because I have short-term memory loss or because I relive the same day over and over, but because like Lucy at the end of the movie, sometimes I wake up and have no idea where I am.

Don't worry. This isn't an entry about how I drink too much and then black out and wake up in some stranger's house. I just feel like the story of my life unfolds so quickly that I forget where I left my bookmark the night before when I went to sleep.

Of course, when I open my eyes in the morning, I am happy with where I am. This place that I find myself in, this momentary blip on my lifeline, is a good place. But still, it is unsettling to know that life passes by so quickly.

I feel like the last time I blinked, I was a little girl playing outside with my sister, and the next time I blink, I will be in my thirties watching two of my own children play outside.

The only protection against the raging current of life, which seeks to sweep us off our feet and carry us away at breakneck speed is to find an anchor. That anchor is living in the moment. This moment that we have right now, we can never have it again. We can visit it, in memory, but we cannot swim back upstream to that exact spot once we have left it behind. Cherish the moment and the people who inhabit it with you.

A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes

So, let me preface this with a little anecdote about my morning. Yesterday, my laptop decided that it basically hated me and every time I turned it on, it sounded like a low-powered lawnmower. Unfortunately, it didn't cut grass, so this new feature was useless and pretty annoying. After listening to it for a while, I surmised that the sound was coming from the fan, so even though the computer itself was still functioning, if the fan wasn't working properly, it would quickly overheat and that leads to even more exciting problems.

When I discovered all of this, it was already 4:45 and the IT Service people were about to close up shop for the day, so I had to wait until this morning to bring my little baby down to their building. When I brought it in, they gave me a bunch of papers with a lot of words on them that basically say "We maintain the right to charge you lots of money for this repair and to take our own sweet time doing it." What was I supposed to do? I handed over the laptop and said a tearful goodbye, knowing that we would not be reunited for "at least five business days". As today is Friday, that meant an entire week of regular days.

After leaving my laptop in the capable hands of those more computer-savvy than I, I walked back to my dorm and decided I needed a nap. About thirty minutes after I had fallen asleep, the IT guy called me and said that the laptop was ready for me to pickup, it turns out there was just a little bit of dust in the fan so they cleaned it up for me free of charge. I never knew that a few specks of dust could sound like a handful of sizable pebbles. Anyways, I was thrilled, because I didn't have to pay any money and now my computer runs smoothly and quietly. If I close my eyes, it's as if I am sitting at a Mac.

So that story had a happy ending, but what I really want to talk about though, is the dream I had after I got of the phone with IT (because yes, I wanted to finish my nap).

In the dream, my mom and my stepdad were sending my little brother to college. Now, my baby brother is bright, but mind you, he's only thirteen. Besides, he already gets into enough trouble just in middle school, so why would they send him off to college where they can't keep an eye on him? Ah, that's where I come in. Instead of sending Jakob to UC Davis so that he could still live at home, under their noses for the majority of his day, they decided to send him to FSU. It's logical, because they could just set him up in the same dorm as his big sister and bam! built in babysitter.

Of course, none of this makes any sense, but it was a dream, so bear with me. Jakob is pretty upset by the whole situation. He's just a kid and he doesn't want to live so far away from his family and friends. In an effort to cheer him up, I tell him that I will help him unpack and settle in. While I am helping him carry his bags up the stairs, I tell him that whenever he feels lonely or homesick, he can always come see me, because I will be right down the hall. He said, "But Meghan, boys aren't allowed in the girls rooms, are they?" I thought for a moment. "That's not really true. There are some foggy, 'cohabitation' rules that no one really follows, but don't worry. You're my brother, so it won't even be a problem. If you're feeling sad or just want to hang out with someone other than your room mate, just come over and we'll lay out some sleeping bags and pillows and blankets on the floor and have a sleepover."

Maybe I shouldn't have used the word cohabitation in front of my little brother, but this was just a dream. Anyways, we finally get to his room and there's a little white board hung on the door that has his name and his room mate's name on it, but Jakob's name is spelled wrong, so I let him rewrite it before opening the door. This is the best part of the dream: the room was all the way at the end of the hall, kind of in a corner, and it was huge! It looked like someone had converted a three or four person suite into a double. Not only was there a bunch of space, but there was also two bathroom sinks and a long counter in front of a wall of mirrors, there was a kitchen sink, complete with garbage disposal, a bunch of cupboards and storage space, a stove, an oven, a private bathroom with a tub and this weird machine set into the wall that peeled, diced, or shaped  fruit into fancy shapes (I want that machine to be real).

Clearly this room was being wasted on boys. Why didn't this magical room exist for girls? It looked like a studio apartment, except nicer. I ran out into the hallway and looked at the room number. "Okay, I told myself. I am going to remember this room number so that I can change my room assignment for next semester."

Of course, on waking up I realized that no such room exists at FSU, or anywhere. A dream is a wish your heart makes, a horrible, unresolvable wish that will only lead to heartbreak.

That fruit machine was the sh*t. Seriously. I want one.

Favorite Food

          So, there is something you should know about me if you are going to read my blog: I have an obsession with delicious food. In the past I have promised that this is not a food blog and I still swear by that. In fact, I'm not really sure what kind of blog this is anymore, it's something of a grab bag. I ought to change the description of the blog, since it doesn't really hold true anymore. Anyways, my obsession with delicious food encompasses dishes from nearly every culture. If I were to ask you what my favorite food is, you might answer with baklava, butter mochi, Vietnamese vermicelli noodles, or bibimbop. This are all fairly good guesses, because I do indeed love these foods. But my true favorite food, the one thing that I could eat every day and of which I would never grow tired, is not a fancy foreign dish or even something that you have to prepare at all. No, the food that I love the most is best in the pure, unadulterated form in which God gave it to us, and that food is the strawberry.

          I love strawberries so darn much. In fact, I recently bought three baskets at Publix because they were on sale, three for $5. I didn't need three boxes of strawberries, but when you live in the world of apples and bananas that is the FSU meal plan, the lure of having fresh strawberries for an entire week is too strong to resist. Besides, it was five dollars. Of course,this cannot compare to the huge flats of strawberries that I remember buying in my hometown of Merced. These delicious strawberries were as big as my tiny, seven year old fist, and they were sold by the Hmong families that tended enormous fields of strawberries and watermelons, selling their produce out of plywood fruit stands set up near the roads. These stands easily sold strawberries that boasted ten times the flavor of their anemic grocery store cousins at a quarter of their price.

         It was these strawberries, so abundant and delicious, overflowing their green plastic baskets, nestled side by side in the huge cardboard flat, that sparked my original love for the fruit. Strawberries symbolized summer and childhood and the simple joy that relied solely on the pleasure of the moment that your teeth cut through the firm flesh of the strawberry so that juice floods your mouth.

         Publix cannot rival these strawberries, particularly because they are romanticized by the generous veil of memory. However, as I am no longer in Merced, I have to make do with strawberries from Publix, and as far as grocery store fruit goes, these strawberries are pretty damn good. I am fastidious in choosing my fruit, so I picked three near perfect baskets, all full of ripe but not overripe, fruit, no spots of mold, no tiny green strawberries hiding amid their larger, redder brothers. In order to put things into perspective for you, I bought these baskets on Sunday, two days ago. With the help of one Chris Mougey (friend, boyfriend and all-around great guy), I now only have one and a half baskets of strawberries in my fridge.


         What I really need here at college is a good, easily accessible farmer's market. With a farmer's market, I can get my strawberry fix for cheap as well as find a variety of different locally grown, healthful foods. Sigh. All of the plans...

Cousins

I've been thinking recently and I have come to the conclusion that I miss my cousins.

At the risk of stepping on several toes, I must clarify that I am referring to my two older cousins in this instance. Of course, I do love my multitude of younger cousins, but I have a different kind of relationship with Sam and Alex.

In addition to my sister, they were my first friends when I was little. During the earliest years of my life, I spent more time with my sister and my cousins than I did with nearly anyone else. We have countless hours of blackmail worthy footage of our childhood and even though we've all seen it more times that we could say, there's nothing more fun than sitting down together and rediscovering what weird kids we were. It's a reminder of how simple life used to be.

We used to split off into little pairs: Kali and Alex would trundle off, speaking their own made up language that comprised mostly of words slurred around the pacifiers hanging from their mouths, while Sammy and I would play with the dolls or dress-up or whatever other girly things took our fancy. I cannot even tell you all of the inside jokes and hilarious stories I have, mostly because revealing those things on the internet would bring down on my head the murderous anger of those wonderful persons mentioned previously.

The simple fact is this: my cousins are my friends but they are also my family, which means they understand exactly how crazy everything is. When I make new friends, I have to explain, "My mom lives in California, but I live here in Florida because blahblahblah." My cousins don't need an explanation, they know.

We were so close when we were little, and even as we grew older, whenever we got together, things were just great. At every family gathering, they were the ones my sister and I would gravitate to because we wanted to escape from the adults and the little kids.

But now we all have our own lives and we're spread out across the globe. I miss the days when things were simple and easy and we could sit on our grandmother's couch eating red vines and watching movies until two in the morning. Laughing at old family videos just isn't the same when everyone isn't there. How can we laugh at that video of Alex falling on his face when he is miles and miles away with the Marines?

Yes, we're all separated now. When I go to family gatherings, I have no one, because even my sister is 3,000 miles away from me. It's lonely; I'm too old to hang out with my younger siblings and cousins, but apparently not old enough to join in adult conversation. So this being said, I miss my cousins (and my sister, but that's a different story).

The River

Editor's Note: I know I haven't written any real blog material, but I have been busy slash bored with my life, so here, read this instead. 

Come stand in the river,

Let it wash over your feet, your calves; you're thinking

Is the water rising, or are you sinking?

Does it matter?

Let it wash over you, rushing in a direction unknown,

Pulling at you, your feet slipping over the smooth stones.

The river is clean; the river is kind.

It doesn't ask for you to please wipe your feet

Before you come in, because the river doesn't mind

A little dirt; that's how it stays clean.

The river is older than you can imagine

But it doesn't feel old.

It feels young and vibrant, refreshing and cold

As the last snow before the spring.

The river is deep; it is full of hidden things.

The river will keep your secrets. It is

Wise enough to know that a secret should be kept.

It will gather your tears and hold you while they're swept

Downstream, to be forgotten, just another drop

Of water in the river.

So why shouldn't you come stand in the river?

It is kinder than the land

Which reminds you with a footprint where you stand

And approximately how much you weigh.

The river doesn't judge you. It doesn't say

With a groan that you're heavier than you used to be

Because the river is made of water, weightless and free.

And the river has been places. It knows

About the salty ocean shore and the mountains where it snows.

The river always remembers a name.

It has seen many people, and it remembers all of them,

Not one of them the same.

Did no one ever tell you how much the river loves you?

It only wants to hug your ankles on a summer day

And kiss your thighs and pull your cares away.

Although the river has many loves,

It doesn't love you any less.

It is just the river's nature, and you cannot think on it

Unkindly. If the river were to only caress

You and leave the rest of us baking on the shore

Then we wouldn't want to come stand in the river anymore

And when you left, the river would be lonely.

It would be selfish of you to ask that of the river.

The river doesn't love for itself, it is a giver

Of love.

The river is also a mirror, it cannot show you

Anything untrue.

If you do not like what you see in the river,

Don't be angry with the river, it still likes you.

The river loves your bare toes, and the spray

Of freckles on your nose; it loves the way

The tiny hairs on the top of your feet

Move with the water; it loves the quickened beat

Of your heart when you feel how cold the river is.

If you think that you might have made the river angry,

By throwing stones at it, or muddying the water

By scuffing up the bottom, don't worry.

The river is gentle and quick to forgive.

So just come stand in the river.

Stand there and live.

Mary Returns to My Blog

 Editor's Note: I don't think I'd very much like to continue with online installments of Mary's adventures, as it is a work in progress and I both adore and fear criticisms. If they are good criticisms, such as "Meghan, my god, how have you never been published before, you brilliant genius, you!" I am obviously a fan. If you say something along the lines of, "Well, if you used less commas and smaller words and perhaps didn't write like a stuffy old English professor, I might find it more enjoyable" then I'm liable to do one of two things: reject your criticism as bunk and possibly defriend you, or, and this is the more likely option, never post again because I realize that I am a failure. SO. As that stands, please do not be disappointed if I stop posting about Mary if I take long breaks in between. Also know that this is a blog for my life experiences, not for my writing experiments, so if I do end up continuing this little project, I'll probably set up a separate blog. Which would be a hassle. Anyways, read and enjoy!

When the bell signaled the end of class, Mary wondered how she was still standing. Her best guess was that it had something to do with her incredibly sensible shoes. Engaging these children was like pulling teeth of her own mouth.

"Tell me your name and three things about yourself" she'd asked of them, generously giving an example, in case the straightforward instructions had confused anyone. She was worried in particular about the sleepy-looking youth who sat near the door; he looked none too bright. "My name is Mary Bridges, feel free to call me Mrs. Bridges; either that or Your Majesty, Highness, Gloriousness or any variation thereof." A stifled sound which might have been a sympathetic snort had come from the quiet girl in the last row. Tough crowd. "As for the interesting facts, I have my degree in criminal psychology, I own two and a half cats and have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to four things: bullying, willful stupidity, faulty grammar and bad haircuts."

The girl with that shock of thick blonde hair had looked at her curiously, as if wondering how on earth she could own half of a cat, or perhaps thinking it impossible for Mary to have an "no bad haircuts" policy when her own bangs were in such need of trimming, but she had not raised her hand, re-reading instead, for the third time, the lengthy and apparently self-addressed letter which she thought she was successfully hiding. Mary had self-consciously adjusted her bangs and, after a painful silence, admitted that her half a cat was actually a kitten. There had been a few appreciative smiles, but the air in the room still felt like lead. It was with a happy heart that she had called on a student to introduce themselves, thereby diverting the attention away from her own poorly received jokes.

As was the usual case, nearly everyone knew each other, making the getting-to-know you process something in which only she had any interest. Quiet-girl, with the pale skin and downcast eyes, was from out of state and had made no real eye contact or even a very audible assertion of anything, mumbling out a quick "I like strawberries, my favorite color is green and I like to sing" as her interesting facts. Mary had noticed that she used a purple pen, though, when signing the attendance roster. Of course, one of her classroom rules being black and blue ink only, she had corrected this out of habit. The poor child's face had gone completely pink, the tips of her ears burning visibly underneath her hair and Mary had immediately regretted bringing the mistake to the class's attention.

The only other thing of note that had happened between the beginning of the name game and the tiresome but necessary reviewing of the syllabus was that the boy with the bad dye-job had nearly gotten in a fist fight with the eccentrically dressed vegetarian girl in the row across from him (her interesting facts had been "I'm a vegetarian, I have died my hair twenty-two times, not counting the current color, and I believe that an animal's life is just as important as a human baby's."). Mary wasn't quite sure how the argument had started, but the blonde boy had mentioned something about a hunting trip and suddenly half of the room was howling like a pack of rabid wolves while the PETA advocate was shouting "why don't you just shoot a baby?!?".

It had been a little too much to take in, so Mary Bridges had taken the flare gun she kept for such occasions out of her trench coat and fired it at the ceiling. "That was a warning shot." she'd said calmly, the sturdy yet attractive heels of her fine leather boots clicking as she had paced between the rows of frightened faces.

A single pink slip had been laid on the desk of each offending student. "Really?" she'd asked, in a tired voice. "The first day of classes?" As she had returned to her podium, she'd noticed the dark-haired boy in the corner: he had not looked up, but his stern expression had been replaced by a slow smirk, an intensely satisfied look that bespoke no end of hatred for the perpetrators.

Thinking back on the events as she watched the students file out of class, Mary wondered if every day would be as exciting. She certainly hoped not. Perhaps this was why life continued to pass her by: because it knew, deep down, that she didn't really want to be dragged along for a bumpy ride. Her bones were older and more tired than they used to be and she didn't think they'd appreciate the constant jarring of such an excursion.

A little later to leave the classroom because of the awkward way in which he was obliged to carry his backpack, the boy who'd caused such a commotion at the door stopped by the podium on his way out.

"Have a good day, Mrs. Bridges." he said, not meeting her eye, his lisp making the s's in her name uncomfortable and wet.

I wonder what his name is, she thought, not unkindly but merely with the weariness of someone who's memory is no longer what it was. "Thank you."

Resolving to study the roster that night, Mary turned from the door to her desk and the hour of rest that awaited her before the true terror began: Sophomore English. The last straggling students were still shoving their books into their bags, and scurrying away as Mary tried to match their names to their faces without much success.

It seemed strange to Mary that she had chosen to finally settle down as a high school teacher. She had always hated high school; it had been the worst four years of her life. I suppose I'm here to help those students like me, she thought, the ones who really can't bear it here and need something encouraging in their day. Students like him. 

She watched the dark-haired silent boy who's name might have been Ian or maybe Ivan, she wasn't quite sure, as he dropped a well-worn, paper-back copy of The Great Gatsby in his haste to pack up his things. His skin was olive in tone, betraying his obvious Italian heritage, but his eyes were a light green and very, very sad. The fingernails he had been coloring with a fine-tipped Sharpie, although covered in scribbles, were long and fine with very deep beds; beautiful hands, like a musician's or a writer's. He joined the blonde girl who had been waiting by the door. They didn't say anything to each other, but he held out his hand and she, rolling her eyes, handed him the page she'd been mulling over, heavy with pink secrets.

An interesting pair of friends. The quiet girl followed at a safe distance, neither walking with Ian (or Ivan) and his blonde friend, nor walking with last of her classmates filing out.

Mary wondered about her students. She wondered about her fellow teachers and whether or not they wondered. She wondered if it were merely her degree which kept her wondering about people or if everyone did so on occasion. She wondered if there was enough cat food left for Lord Byron, Edgar and Mimsy and whether or not she ought to stop at the neighborhood Publix on the way home. She decided she ought and began writing a list for groceries, letting her thoughts leave her students behind, momentarily absorbed in the mundane but pleasant details of domestic life.

Just a Little Bit of Scribbling

Editor's Note: This is just the beginning of a something that I've been working on. I wanted a little bit of feedback before I began the project whole-heartedly. It's really not too much to go on, I know, but just give it a read. 

Mary Bridges, Private Eye, leaned against the doorframe, not drawing any attention. Her over-sized sunglasses obscured the upper half of her face, the up-turned collar of her beige trench coat the bottom.  She scrutinized each face that hurried by her, waiting to see which would be the first to try to move past into the empty room behind her. So far, no one had even glanced in her direction. With a frustrated sigh, she removed her shades and passed a hand over her eyes. While she was being discreet, she was hardly invisible!

She replaced her spectacles on her nose, brushing her bangs out of her eyes. Even though there were still three minutes to the tardy bell, she'd expected these AP Lit students to be punctual. The English teacher leaned further back against the open door, hardly noticeable in her brown and cream checked skirt, taupe sweater and sensible shoes. Life as Mary Bridges, Private Eye was far more glamorous and rewarding than her own pleasant but often tedious and thankless existence in the public school system. Sometimes she felt like the world was spinning past and she was running after it. As hard as she tried to flag it down, it continued hurtling through space, like a taxi driver passing her by because he thinks that maybe she can't tip as well as some other potential customer.

How does he know? she wondered. How does he know that I won't give him the best tip of his career? That was the problem with watching the world spin past: she never got the chance to show it why she was worth the stopping.

The constant stream of students had begun to thin by this point, which is why the sudden ruckus at the far end of the hall pulled Mary Bridges out of her spinning, hurtling thoughts and into reality. Leaning around the corner, she noticed several students waiting outside. A tall, strange looking boy was crouched on the ground, frantically shoving papers and notebooks back into his backpack which, apparently, had split down the side, vomiting forth the untidy mess to begin with. A few of the students who had been lucky enough to enter the building before the fiasco, stood around uncertainly before shrugging and making their way towards her classroom.

 Ah. she thought. These must be my students. Moving out into the hallway, she smiled at them, a smile which was returned with either blank stares or the aversion of eyes. Her mouth thinning in disapproval, Mary filed this into the back of her mind and strode to the double-paned glass doors to deal with the more immediate problem. She wished momentarily that she were wearing shapely leather boots or at least some shoe which made a more impressive sound than the apologetic squeaking of her own comfortable pair.

The ungainly boy with a mop of badly bleached hair had finally gathered all of his things. Mary spared a moment to question how his backpack had possibly ripped already and, perhaps more inexplicably, how he had accumulated so many papers on the first day of school. Disheveled and flustered, the paper-hoarder mumbled an apology, an unfortunate lisp apparent underneath the embarrassed gruffness, and shuffled quickly in the direction of the classroom. Somewhat thrown by the entire spectacle, Mary stood silent for a second too long and was consequently hit by the flood of remaining students who had been crowded outside the door. She had been planning on graciously opening the door wide and welcoming them into the hallway and also an exciting year of literature and writing. As was so often the case for Mary, her grand plans were swept away by the tide of life and she was left rather bedraggled and confused as to why there was sea water in her shoes.

Heaving a well-deserved sigh, she made her way back to the classroom, following at a safe distance from the new and vaguely frightening group of students. Mary was always a little frightened of the students that were shuffled into her classroom, although she had hoped this year would be better, finally having been given the AP class rather than stuck with Freshman and Sophomore English. She liked to call those mainstream English classes "Words for Cavemen." It's not that Mary honestly thought the students in those classes shared all of the characteristics of our early ancestors, she just could not help but notice the lack of anything representing interest, sentience or even life in the vacant stares of those "regular" students.

Determined not to let the masses see her unnerved, Mary Bridges brushed her bangs out of her face, straightened her stylish shades and strode into the classroom, asserting in her overall demeanor exactly how much authority she wielded over these young souls. The door closed with a resounding bang and the children were quiet, afraid of what would happen next.

Mary wondered if the bell had finally rung, as she could hear nothing over the din of twenty to thirty exuberant voices, discussing everything from the hideously unchanged cafeteria fare to the summer's last and, from the sound of it, wildest party. In all of the excitement and clamor, Mary noticed a quiet girl sitting near the back of the room, staring silently at her hands and looking very pale next to all of the Floridian end of summer tans; she noticed a dark-haired boy sitting in the corner desk, drawing on his fingernails and looking far too somber for anyone of that age; she noticed a brilliantly blonde head of hair bobbing up and down as the owner scribbled furiously on a sheet of lined paper, her neat handwriting spilling out of the pink pen she was gripping and onto the greedy white page. The sight of these three quiet children dissolved the bubbling, toxic high school hubbub around her and reminded her why she had decided to be a teacher in the first place. Imbued with new courage, Mary took her place behind her customized podium, standing on the surreptitious step she'd added to giver her an extra few inches of impressive height.

A firm believer in the practice of never shouting in the classroom, Mary simply stood there, very quiet and very still until, noticing her odd behavior, the students began to look up, falling into a remorseful silence. The tardy bell tolled at long last and Mary smiled out at the upturned faces before launching into her welcome speech and accompanying PowerPoint.

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is a word that means something is coming. Tomorrow is a word that means today will soon be gone, just another memory, another laughter line, another tear shed and forgotten. Tomorrow is a word that means promise and compromise and fear and excitement and today, tomorrow is a word that means six months.

As of tomorrow, it will have been six months since this world lost a wonderful man: a father, a teacher, an artist, a brother, a son, a husband, a friend. So many different words to describe one person, and unless you knew him, those words hardly describe him at all.

It might be hard to wake up tomorrow, knowing that it has been six months since I last heard his voice or saw his face or held his hand, and even longer since I heard his loud, clear voice, and saw his smiling, healthy face, and held his strong, warm hand. It might be hard to wake up tomorrow, but I will do it, and I will take a long shower and let the tears mingle with the warm water so that they wash away and leave behind no anger or pain. I will make my bed and write in my journal and go to class like it is a normal day, and the sun will be shining and I'll smile, like I always do. I will do all of these things because that's what we have to do.

Tomorrow I will also wish. I will wish that tomorrow wasn't a word that means six months. I will wish that I were at home with my family instead of alone in a new town with people that don't know what tomorrow means. I will wish that I could hold my sisters and brother until all of the pain leaks out and we can only laugh at our tear-stained faces. I will wish that he had bothered to set up a voice mail message so that if I were to call his cell phone I would hear it. I will wish that Hostess hadn't gone out of business so that I could walk down to a convenience store and buy some donettes. I will wish that I had at least one recent photo of he and I in which he wasn't sick. Tomorrow I will wish it wasn't tomorrow.

But then, tomorrow is a word that means wishing and hoping and dreaming. Tomorrow is a word that means, make your wish and let it go because wishes that don't come true will only make your heart heavy if you hold onto them. Tomorrow is a word that means keep moving forward.

Whatever it is that tomorrow means, whether it is all of these things or none of these things, tomorrow will be a day like any other day, and that means that I will be safe and happy and sound under the care of the best guardian angel. Really, I'm very lucky; that's what tomorrow means.

Brother Jed vs. Pope Bendict XVI

What is the difference between Brother Jed and Pope Benedict XVI?

Well, for starters, the Pope doesn't wear khaki shorts and a fishing hat, but that's merely superficial.

Who, you might be asking, is Brother Jed? If you don't know who Brother Jed is, that's probably because you've never set foot on FSU campus before. Brother Jed is an evangelist who takes time out of... whatever it is that he normally does, and comes to campus to spread the word of the Good Lord above. Unfortunately, while that might be Brother Jed's intention, it is certainly never what he ends up doing. For the most part, he just talks at the ever growing crowd of college students bent on heckling him as much as they can before their next class starts.

I have to say that I am of two minds about what goes down in the quad when Brother Jed comes to FSU and that is because I find the behavior of everyone absolutely appalling. Hardly a word falls from Brother Jed's mouth that isn't laden with sexism or bigotry and all anyone else in interested in is how many rude questions they can ask. It's an absolutely abysmal display on everyone's part. Brother Jed isn't doing anything but carving out a bad name for himself and Christians and these kids who are heckling him are just making themselves look callous and uncouth. If Brother Jed really wanted to spread Christianity, he'd talk about the love of Jesus and the forgiveness of God and that as Christians we shouldn't judge lest we ourselves be judged.

Now what does this have to do with Pope Benedict? Well, I recently started following him on Twitter. I know, I know. I have a Twitter, but it's for my Italian class, long story. Anyways, I knew that the Pope had himself a Twitter so I thought, how cool would it be... and I clicked follow.

And you know what the difference between Brother Jed and Pope Benedict is? The really, really important difference is not that the Pope has a nicer hat, or that the Pope wears white robes instead of khaki shorts, or that the Pope speaks primarily in Latin and Italian instead of with a Southern drawl. No. The really important difference is that every single tweet the Pope posts on his account (I cannot believe I just typed those words in that order) is uplifting and encouraging and exactly the sort of thing that a leader in the Christian (Catholic or not) community should be tweeting, er, talking about.

Now, the really sad thing is this: despite the uplifting content of the Pope's tweets, things like, "Join me in praying for Syria, so that constructive conversation will replace the horrendous violence" and "What are some childhood Christmas traditions that you remember and love?", despite the fact that he is attacking no one, saying nothing critical, even calling for us to promote freedom and respect for all, and just being a generally nice person, tweeting some nice things, there are still thousands of people who follow him with one intention: to troll him.

I'm not a Catholic, but I'm pretty sure that trolling the Pope is just bad for the soul. On every single tweet that the Pope makes, there is at least one comment that is just rude and often completely irrelevant.

So, although the Pope and Brother Jed are not the same in their demeanor, their wardrobe choices or their decisions about what is the best way to spread God's love, what is the same is that there are people everywhere with a hole in their heart who have nothing good to add to the global or personal conversation.

Stomach Viruses, Oxygen Tanks, and Crying Babies

 What do these three things have in common?

For my first post of the new year, I have decided to share a story about last year. It's a traveling tale, which guarantees an opportunity for you to laugh at my expense, so enjoy.

This past December I went home for Christmas break after my first semester away at college. It was the longest period of time that I had spent outside of my dorm room since late August, and I have to admit that by the time I was on the road back to Tallahassee, I was sorely missing my twenty-five square feet of living space, complete with extraneous pillows and minimal closet room. I spent the first half of the break in Florida and then flew out to California on the 28 of December. Normally I love flying. I just bring a blanket, some fuzzy socks, and headphones and I pass out. This was not normally. For some reason, the gods of cheap airfare travel decided that it would suit their purposes to inflict upon me a twenty-four hour virus right before flying. I'm not exactly sure why that suited their purposes, perhaps they consider whatever goes down those terrifying airplane toilets (in my case a lot of water, stomach acid and not much else) as tribute of some sort. Whatever their plan was, it resulted in my feeling, and looking, like poop when I walked into the Orlando airport with my older sister.

Can I just say thank God that my sister was even with me? I'm pretty sure that she was more than thoroughly annoyed with me for being sicker than a dog, but she was still  awesome and even bought me an expensive bottle of Fiji water.

Anyway, as soon as we sat down on the first plane out of Orlando and into Atlanta, I knew it was going to be a long haul. Someone sitting in the vicinity was wearing an overpowering perfume and I thought my head was going to burst. Either that or my stomach was going to declare mutiny on my slowly sinking ship of a body. I put my sweater over my face to block out the smell, the light and the noise. A well-meaning stewardess stopped by after noticing my makeshift tent and offered me some non-aspirin pain medication. I gladly accepted, but less than ten minutes after we'd been in the air, I had to sacrifice the aspirin, er, non-aspirin, to the gods of air travel.

The one hour flight to Atlanta took what felt like a lifetime, during which I visited the closet-sized lavatory twice more. On the third trip that I made to pay homage as the gods' new favorite mortal, I found that instead of a desire to upchuck, my body now had a desire to faint. I took a momentary assessment of the situation and decided that I would rather pass out in my seat than in the tiny bathroom, particularly as we were getting ready to descend into Atlanta, so I pushed open the door and began to make my way down the narrow aisle of the plane. I didn't make it very far. A flight attendant made me sit down at the back of the plane and ran off to get what I thought was ice.

It turned out that she'd said "oxygen". I'm not sure how I mistook that for "ice", although the blood was rushing in my ears and I was experiencing the joy of a barf bag for the first time ever. Regardless of what I'd thought I'd heard, what she came back with was a huge oxygen tank and a mask. I have never been so mortified in my life, except possibly when she asked if I wanted the paramedics to meet me at the gate.

Yes, please. I would love for some paramedics to wheel me off the plane and through the airport...

No! No, thank you. I have never had pleasant experiences with paramedics, I really didn't want this flight to go any further downhill.

The flight finally ended, we touched down in Atlanta, and I got off the plane, on my own two feet, thank you. The next flight was not nearly as awful, although it was three times as long which made it awful in its own right, but at least the gods of air travel had finally decided that I had been an adequate disciple for long enough and left me the heck alone.

Eight days later I had to board another plane to fly back to Florida after a wonderful stay with my family. This trip was nowhere near as horrendous as the trip from Florida, but it was a red-eye flight, so suffice it to say that I got about two hours of sleep that night. There was not one, not two, not three but four babies on the flight at 10:45pm out of Sacramento, and all four of them were seated within ten feet of me. That means that nearly fifty percent of the space around me was taken up by screaming babies.

Sitting directly next to me was an adorable little girl and her mother. This little girl must have been at least seven or eight, but she was very tiny. I didn't think she would cause much trouble, considering it was way past her bedtime and she probably just wanted to sleep. Well, yes. She did just want to sleep. Unfortunately she just wanted to sleep on my shoulder. Why my shoulder when her mother was right there? Who knows.  It was difficult to fall asleep when her head kept going *bonk* onto my shoulder, but at least she looked clean and free of head-lice. Then again, it was just difficult to get to sleep because airplane seats are the worst.

Tell me, who designed the airplane seat? I want to know if they finished their design, looked at it and said, "Good. Good job. This looks like something people will want to sit in for six plus hours. Good for you, Bob. Good for you."

The thing that made my trip back  to Florida so fantastic is that I was landing in Jacksonville and being picked up by my boyfriend and his mom. First impressions are incredibly important to me, so I was really excited that the first time his mom would meet me would be after six hours on a plane. I hope you note the intense sarcasm. Being the person I am, I put a change of clothes in my laptop case (the only bag that I brought onto the plane) along with some makeup, and when I touched down in Atlanta at 6:00am the morning of Saturday, January 5th, I went to the ladies' room, changed my clothes, washed my face, and put on some makeup. I then drank a strong cup of coffee and read a book until I arrived in Jacksonville, as fresh-faced and sociable as ever.

Of course, thirty minutes into the drive back to Tallahassee, I was fast asleep, but at least I looked like a human being.