Shopping List:

- One package of Kraft American cheese

- One loaf of wheat bread

- Campbell's Chunky soup - Chicken Noodle and Chicken and Dumplings


Bread, cheese, and soup. Am I a college student, or a Bastille prisoner?

Ouch.

I'm remembering the worst swim meet of my life tonight. It was against Greece or Gates or something, and by diving we were ahead by twenty. I was on fire that night, I was giving it everything, I had personal bests in all of my races. But somehow, the majority of the team thought that we were safely ahead and started slacking. By the last race we were only ahead by one or two points. I was in the last relay, and even though I had done my very best all night, it was down to me. I swam against a girl who had a 58.00 free, which non-swimmers should know shatters Class A sectional time by six seconds and is nearly impossible to beat.

I lost, and my team lost the meet. I lost, but I swam a 103.2, which is even today the fastest 100 yard sprint of my entire life. I swam my best after wearing myself out in all of my other races, when my opponent was entire lengths ahead of me. And every girl on my team who patted my shoulder that night and told me that it was OK that I had lost their meet, I wanted to smack. Because they were the ones slacking off, and I was the one that had to carry the loss.

Well, today I got an e-mail from the co-editor-in-chief of the newspaper. He must have imagined that he was whipping us all into shape. He devoted four entire paragraphs to the copy editors. There was caps and cursing, threats about taking our jobs away and giving it someone who would actually work. He quoted our complaints - "blah blah blah" - and advised us to work through our PMS no matter how hard it is (the three copy editors are the only women on staff). He went on about how much he gave for the paper, and how we should suck it up and take it a little bit seriously.

I give 100% to that paper. I write multiple articles a week and edit until late in the night, all for one class credit. I don't even get paid, I just do it because I love it. I love it more than any work I've ever done. I have always delivered to the very best of my ability, and I take it very, very seriously. And yet I get abused, degraded and patronized? I used to look foward to production nights, and now I'm dreading this meeting. I used to love writing articles, proving myself. Now, I have an article due in 36 hours, and I don't want to write it. What's the point, when my best is clearly so inadquate?

Today I discovered the easiest and most effective way to break someone. Wait until they're giving everything they have to give to something that they love, and then kick them. It might be one of the worst feelings in the world. Well, I won't be broken. If he wants a professional, excellent staff, then he'll get it. I will send a return e-mail, because as a professional woman I am not going to take any abuse. I will dress nicely and wear nice flats and refer to him by his full first name instead of his nickname. I will write the article and it will be the best work that I have done yet. I am going to pull off another 103.2, not because he deserves it, but because I do.

It's Official!

What is the line between girlhood and womanhood? Where is that moment when a girl officially becomes a grown woman? After a couple of years of trying to nail down the answer to this universal question, I have done it. It isn't falling in love, or parting your hair on the side, or getting your first designer bag. It's not your sweet 16, or your driver's lisence, or your 18 birthday. It isn't even graduation, or your first day in college.

You are officially a grown woman the day you find yourself running through Wegman's all by yourself, in heels.

Sweat, Blood, and Tears

I don't believe in the greener grass on the other side. I don't believe in worrying about what you are missing, instead of concentrating on what you have. I don't believe in sitting in your dorm room, looking up Wisconsin and UNC. Because the simple, sad truth is that we will never find a place made for us anywhere on earth. Places are not made to fit people - people have to make the places fit them. It takes work, and energy, and sometimes a little bit of grief to make your place fit you.

Grief because this may, at one point, have been the greener grass. This may have been the place that you worked so hard to get to, and had been planning for and dreaming about for a long, long time. When you sat with old friends and built castles in the sky, this may have been the place that you built your castle out of. And when you finally arrive, it's hard to realize that it's still just a building on the ground, the kind that you've lived in your entire life. And then the eternal question, "Now what?"

This is the secret, the magic word, the path to a good and worthy life. No one ever talks about it, because no one ever wants to hear it. The secret is work. Dirty, hard work. "Cursed is the ground for your sake; in toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life." It's a very hard fact to resign yourself to. There's no lottery, no short cut or back road. No magic password or hidden country that will get you from here to happily ever after. You will be working class all the days of your life.

But, here's another little-discussed secret. Once you resign yourself to the working life, you realize that you can still have your greener grass. It's there, it is attainable after all. And if you diligently work at nourishing the good, and weeding out the bad, your life will slowly start fitting into you. And at the end of the day, you have the immense satisfaction of looking out, over everything that you've touched, and saying to yourself, "I did that, I changed that. It is mine." You can make a beautiful life, one worth living. It just takes work.

So, stop waiting for life to be right. Stop waiting for the right place and the right time, stop living temporarily. You are here, now. Take what you can, and leave what you cannot. Then buckle down, get creative, and get to work. Give your sweat, blood and tears to a place, and it will start to look like you. The more you give, the more you will belong. And the passerby will envy your beautifully-kept lawn.

Tid-Bits:

1) You know how when it rains in the city, you can never get a cab? When it rains in the dorm, you can never get a washing machine.

2) Old Navy online sweater sale will dent your bank account, yet keep you cute and warm for years to come.

3) Electric blankets keep you warm, even without plugging them in.

4) Chocolate Chai is wonderful.

5) I need a haircut. Real bad.

6) Reading is so much easier and faster when the internet is nowhere within reach.

7) Cappucino's are of the least expensive, yet most delicious, fancy coffee drinks.

8) Crayon on wall = lots of elbow grease. And four Mr Clean Magic Erasers.

9) Some days are just made for naps, popcorn, and novels.

10) Secret to a happy life on an Erie campus; an umbrella.

An "Early Night" in the Hellhole

Last night, I was so exhausted that my eyes were burning an my legs were aching. So I decided that an early bedtime was in order. The lights were out as soon as A Few Good Men was over at 11:00. I was so looking foward to eight and a half glorious hours of sleep.

Well, around 11:30 when I was just drifting off, the Steelers lost to Denver by a fieldgoal in the last two seconds of the game. Which made my nextdoor neighbor shriek and scare the crap out of me. She proceded to run down the hall to continue screaming at one of her friends for a few minutes.

I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, having decided earlier in the year to never get upset about sleep disturbance until after midnight. Right around 12:00, I had just fallen asleep and my roomate comes in from the haunted house an hour away. She proceded to rattle the handle until discovering that it was locked, then came in and asked if I had closed her computer and how my night was.

In a few minutes, she was in bed, and I tried to sleep for the third time. Sure enough, a half hour later, there was a comotion in the hallway. It sounded like 15 girls being cruelly tortured, but in reality it was about five girls running up and down the hall screaming and laughing wildly, doing God only knows what. The kicker is - I think they were sober. I would have gotten up and told them to be a little more considerate, but I was way, way too mad at that point. Talking to these girls when they're acting out requires the patience and diplomacy of asking a five-year old to get in the tub. You'd think the world was about to end.

It's after 1:00am, and I have just stopped shaking in frustration when T-Mobile sends me a text message notifying me that someone else sent me a text message, but for whatever reason it couldn't make it to my phone. At 1:17 in the morning. Thank you, T-Mobile, once again, for making me hate my life.

I finally got to sleep around 2:00, after having decided to skip my 9:00 english class and turning off the alarm on my phone. Maybe I could sleep until 9:00, or 10:00. I could still get my eight hours after all! I did get six good hours in until, at 8am, I hear my roommate's voice. "Rachel......Rachel........You're going to miss English!"

Ew

Some guy just threw up in my hallway.

I have to go out to wash my face and brush my teeth.

I love college. I love college. I love college.

Ugh.

Who Am I To Blow Against The Wind?

It is 63 degrees, the sky is blue with white, fluffy clouds, and the wind is blowing. I swear, the sun doesn't even get this bright in the summer, and the lake is the bluest blue I've ever seen. This weather makes me a little bit crazy. It makes me feel slightly outside of myself, like anything is possible and reason doesn't matter.

I'm making a prediction- the wildest, craziest stories of my life will take place in mid-October.

"Daddy I want to drive today
I wanna get up and go
wanna find some time
Mama I hear what you're sayin'
I wanna feel alive and get inside

hey I wanna drive
I'm alright if you're alright

tell me what to think
it's been years since we've been
flyin'
show me what you're seein'
I wanna feel alive wanna take this
dive."

Second of the day, I know.

Today was such a perfect student journalist day, and I absolutely loved it. I got up early, and started typing up my news piece in the two hours before my first class. I finished with three minutes to spare, threw my Comparitive Religion books in my bag, and headed for my class. We learned about separation of Church and State, and had a debate that I got pretty involved in. I came back to my room after class and wrote a blog about what I thought, enjoying the fact that no one could interupt me with their stupid comments.

Then I wrote up my time managment paper due for class in one hour. I know, the irony. It was a good paper, though. I went to the class in which it was due, and the teacher read some of the student's essays. Considering most of us are Journalism/Writing/English majors, it was more entertaining than you would think.

I went back to my room and killed about an hour on facebook, the Collegian online, the Washington Post online, and the Columbia Review of Journalism online. Then my neighbor came by to talk, and then my RA dropped in to chat with all of us, and before I knew it, it was an hour later. After I had studied for my Plato exam for a while, I heard cheers from the lawn. It was the campus sororities playing tug a' war dressed in togas. I threw my notebook, pen, voice recorder and keys into my bag and sped out of the building, only to find that another staff writer had already been assigned the event.

But, I ran into an editor friend who was also poking around to see if there was a story. He was on his way to dinner before meeting up with the other entertainment page editor in the Reed basement. So after getting dinner (his was a pretzel, mine was Ben & Jerry's) we headed down, looked up stories for next week's page, and then just started chatting. Brittney Spears, Iran, Russia, China, Rupert Murdoch, and Steven Colbert.

The chat then turned to heated and hilarious discussion about the '08 election. I put down five dollars that Hillary Clinton would be our next President, as much as I don't want to see it happen. Because, we determined, no Republican was going to get near office after Bush, and I think that America just isn't ready for a black President, as wrong as that is. Then we watched the Youtube of Howard Dean screaming and laughed. I then headed back to my room for another hour of studying, despite pleas like "Oh come on, stay! Plato is common sense stuff, you don't need to study!" and leaving them to their work. In 15 minutes, its down to the newsroom for a night of learning how to make a page, laughing, and getting hit in the head with tennis balls.

Today, I really, really love my life.

Happy Christma-Hanah-Kwanz-akuh!

In my religion class, we had a 30 minute debate about whether or not public schools should be able to post the Ten Commandments on the walls of the school buildings. I've been thinking about it, and this is my conclusion.

This is the bottom line. The conservatives flip out when their kid comes home and asks who Allah is. The liberals flip out when their kid comes home and asks who Jesus is. Both are ignorant and fearful, and setting their own children up to become the exact same thing. So the conservative answer is to put biblical ideas all over public schools, so that their children aren't exposed to anything else. And the liberal answer is to wipe out any religous reference at all, so that thier children won't be exposed to anything else, either.

Both are wrong, and both answers will only spread ignorance and fear through a country that prides itself on tolerance and diversity. Separation of church and state means that this should not be a political issue, and it shouldn't be. I dont think the Supreme Court or President or school principle has anything to say on the matter - it's down to the parents and the teachers.

This is how it should work. Teachers and children should be free to share ideas and traditions with each other without being pushy, in the public school. I think there should be Islamic poetry read in english classes along with Bible stories. I want kids making dreidels and Native American dream-catchers in art class. I want buddha statues on teacher's desks, and Hindu artwork on the walls. I want teachers to say, "You celebrate Christmas, but I do...What does everyone else do during break?" And although children should be exposed to all different faiths, nothing should be forced. No group prayer or meditiation. Just the freedom to ask questions and recieve a fair answer.

I want my children well-versed in ancient stories from around the world, and I want them to understand universal values, not just WASP stories and WASP values. I want them to learn how to work with differences early on, and in an environment where parents and teachers can guide them through it. Above all, I want them to decide their own faith for themselves. I want them to know what else is out there, and I want them to understand WHY we believe what we believe. Religion is not a "because I said so" thing. A faith that stands without doubt, without test, is no faith at all but ignorance. I want the next generation to be firm in their own beliefs, and understanding and respectful of everyone else's. This starts with exposure to multiple religions in the public school.

And if you're not comfortable with exposure, with other ideas and curious questions at the dinner table, then fine. If it really is that important, then put your kids in a private school, and leave your poor congressman alone.

Wow, That Was Bad...

I've learned something valuable today.

Making a flag football team with people you have never met, especially a girl's team, is a massive, massive mistake. Then, when you match up that team with the women's softball team....Carnage. I can hardly talk about it.

To sum it up, after dropping a pass and botching a run, I played center and linebacker. Against a six-foot tall softball player. The first few plays were fun, since she was so suprised that I was actually trying to block her. For the rest of the game I just got ploughed; I already have a very nice bruise developing on my knee. Although I am good snapper. Who knew.

Anyways, it was humiliation. I can't even type the score. Next year, when I have a good group of friends to make a team with (I hear all of the RA's always make a team) what with practices and communication and the whole thing, it should be a blast. But as it is, we only have one other game, and I just realized that I can't make it. Since I am now an editor (still love saying that) I need to be in the office at 6:00, and the game is at 5:45. Oh well, it's not like I helped at all anyways.

My next intramural sport is swimming, which starts in November. That should be much better - at least it probably won't make me want to crawl into bed, hide under the sheets, and never come out until every member of the opposing team is either dead or out of the country. And in the spring...sailing club! I am so excited. I am going to get khaki shorts, a navy blue cableknit sweater, and red keds, and I'll french braid my hair. Just kidding. But really, even though I think I'll be making a fool of myself in the beginning, it sounds like so much fun.

Anyways, the real moral of the story is that you try and you try and you try. And sometimes you get a touchdown, and sometimes you get a big, fat interception. To continue with the annoying football analogy, Chi Alpha was a touchdown, the newspaper was a touchdown, Intervarsity was an interception, and this was an interception. And 2 for 4 is alright with me.

Announcement:

Guess who the new opinion page editor is?

Go on, guess.

Yes! Me!

I'm so happy.

All I Can See - Brendan James

I want to walk through this doorway
I want to open my mind
I want to pledge my alligence to
All I can find
I want a car that crash through the barriers
To a road no one knows
I want to feel less control
I want to bend, and land far from home

Forever the illusion of
The earth aroud the sun
Is a perfect lesson of
How it should be
So if I cannot learn
To journey and return
To never rest til I've seen all I can see

I want to learn a completely new language
One I don't understand
I want to help someone lost, someone helpless
With the strength of my hand
I want to come to the base of the statue built
Before the count of the years
And there I'll fall with my face in my hands and cry
And find their hope in my tears

Those who journey can
Easily understand
The more they see, the more they know, the more they will be
So this I swear to you,
And this I swear to me,
I'll never rest til I've seen all I can see

I want to know where strength of a person lies
In their past or their future
Is it in the way that they hurt or they love themselves,
Is it all an illusion?
I want to crawl from this skin that we've painted
Body, please let it give
I want to find the creator of all good things
And ask what it means to live.

There's Beauty in the Breakdown

I have seen some of the most beautiful things on this planet.

I have seen the Rocky mountains and the Grand Canyon at sunset. I have seen the Atlantic ocean after a storm. I have seen the arches in Arizona, and the sky over the great plains. I have seen the Adirondacks from a mountainside on a June afternoon. I have seen Rome and Florence and Nice. I have seen the Mediterranean sea from Italy, France and Spain. I have seen the Bay of Genoa from the mountains, I have seen the Vatican and the Coloseum at midnight. I have seen Florence from the roof of a belltower.

So why is home, on a sunny October afternoon, the most beautiful thing I have ever seen?

Things I've Learned This Week:

~ Bob Saget, you know, Mr Tanner from Full House, is in reality a crude, profane, and vulgar, vulgar man

~ Jamie Cullum has another album out

~ Brendan James is amazing

~ Care packages = Joy and Love

~ A "B" is when you support your own opinion well. An "A" is when you support both sides well, and then you win anyways.

~The glass in the picture frames is really sharp on the edges. Just a heads up.

~ Your thumb is not necessary when throwing a spiral

~ My political party. I'll leave you to wonder.

~ How to be comfortable here. Not necessarily feel at home, but feel comfortable.

~ It's ok to sit back and watch how something works before jumping in. It's not shy, and it's not antisocial, as long as you do jump in.

~ You can still be great friends with someone thousands of miles away, living a completely different life

~ Weekends here will just plain suck, for a while. But I'm ok with that.

~ When you do decide to be patient, kind, and understanding, people pop out of the woodwork and zoom over to you like you're a giant magnet. When you decide to care and be interested in others, and start worrying about the people around you instead of yourself, the changes are dramatic and immediate.

Cozy

It's not like I hate my room here. I've just always been completely indifferent to it since I've come to college. It's a fairly nice box to live in, it's clean and has everything I need. But at the end of the day, it's just a box. The walls have been recently painted a non-offensive color, but they're underneath they're still just cement. The carpet is pretty new and clean, but it's ugly brown and orange. My windows are nice and big, but curtains are forbidden, squashing the simple womanly pleasure of picking out a fabric. The imaginary cutrains would be a nice, soft yellow, I've decided, to compensate for the lack of sunlight in Erie. Then I would hang white Christmas lights behind the curtain, and in the winter when it gets dark at 5:00, I would have a bright, twinkling window.

But this morning, halfway through my article, I had to run out to the union building to buy some milk for my coffee. It was gray and rainy and cold out, sincerely cold, not just chilly. When I got back to my warm, bright room, jazz music was pouring out of my speakers, and I could smell my freshly brewed coffee from the door. The New York Times was open on my bed, and there was a half-finished article waiting to be written on my laptop.

I sat down at my desk, turned down my music a little bit. I poured my coffee and stirred in a tiny bit of milk. I opened up my Beacon noteboook and settled in to write some 500 words in an hour. And I comfortably realized that I could be happy doing this every morning for the rest of my life.

So for the first time, alone in the little box of my room, I almost felt like I had come home.

New Artist

Brendan James. Throw Elton John and Paul Simon together, and twist it to fit 2007. He plays real piano, the kind that you don't need to plug in, which is nice, and his voice could cut through butter, which is also nice. But, he can write.

Here are some lyrics.

"Its time like these in our search for peace
That it's fear we're most afraid of
But the blood we bleed and the air we need
They're hardly ever cold or used up
Let your beat go on."

"I wish there was more than this
More to run through the viens through my fingertips
For love I'd rather be poor than rich
Rather share my one life, give me more than this."

"In the corner of this world, there are traces
Under stones yet overturned, there are faces who still see
Who are hopeful, who believe, and they say
Won't you fight for us
Won't you write for us."

It's the last one that did me in. So, he only has one album out, with four songs on it. But buy it and listen to it, and keep a lookout.

REDC Cafe

I have found a spot!

In the business and engineering department, there is a cafe. It's big and open, and one wall is all windows, from three-story high ceiling to floor. The windows look over campus and down to the lake, and since both wings of the building extend on either side, the view is framed by reflective windows. Overhead is a giant skylight. The coffee bar is in the middle of the room, surrounded by tables chairs, and couches.

It's wonderful. The coffee is good and strong and almost worth the money. The barista gave me a large even though I ordered and paid for a medium, and put an extra espresso shot in it. Deal. I sat under the skylight with natural sunlight falling onto my pages, clouds passing occasionally overhead. I could see the blue, blue lake and all of the leaves changing colors. There was a job fair somewhere in the building, so all of the students milling around were in their best business attire. Nearly as many professors as students visited the cafe, so it wasn't just the same age group of people.

I felt like I was off-campus and in the city again. I felt like I wasn't wasting sunlight. It was bliss to be studying not in my room or the library, but next to a coffee bar, smelling the good coffee smells, listening to good coffee sounds, all with fancy, chocolatey coffee just a couple of inches from my books. Breaking every so often to people-watch, or stare out over the lake. The only thing missing was the usual cafe music, but I can get along without that.

So, every Tuesday for the rest of the semester, I will walk up to the REDC building, and spend a sinful $3 on coffee. I won't listen to doors slam, or gangster rap, or TV's blaring, or high-pitched, over-excited conversation. I'll watch the leaves change, then fall, then wait for snow. I'll have some peace and some quiet, and some away-ness from the school that I live at 24/7.

A Day In The Life Of A College Kid

My alarm went off at 7:16, and I hit the snooze until 7:36. I rolled out of bed, took my shower, and threw on a sundress anticipating the last scorching day of the year. I ran down to the student union building for my free Times, and then back up the hill to the cafeteria for breakfast. I read over my eggs and toast, and then went to English. Where I continued to read the paper.

After English I came back to my room, kicking myself for not allowing time to make coffee before class. I started boiling the water, doing the dishes and making my bed and running for milk while waiting for the coffee to be ready. One nice thing about dorm living - housekeeping takes all of 23 minutes.

I settled onto my freshly made bed with plumped pillows and Plato. Within an hour, I was down two cups of coffee and 20 pages. Someone knocked on the door to inspect my room. My illegal sandwhich griller (don't tell anyone) was safely tucked away in the bottom of my closet, but my crayon artwork covering my wall didn't go over so well. Since I want to be an RA next year, I reassured them that this time next week, it would be 100% gone, even though I'll hate to be without my big yellow sun, and my little sunflower by the window. After they left, I finished my last five pages of Plato. I blogged to vent about the horrificness of last night's game. I microwaved up some of the pasta I had made a couple of days earier, and ate some oreo's, and headed for math.

Math was, as usual, a waste of my time. Poly Sci was, as usual, confusing and immensely interesting. After my last class of the day is for some reason when I get depressed. So I rushed back to my room, threw on shorts, an old t-shirt, and running shoes before my tiny, poisonous midafternoon room could suck me in. I walked the fifteen minutes to the gym and hit the stationary bike for a half hour. After I had thoroughly kicked my own butt, I hobbled back to my room taking much more than fifteen minutes.

I collapsed into my desk chair and listened to my NPR Wait Wait...Don't Tell Me podcast while finishing off my noodles. I get about half of the questions right, and was pretty proud of myself. And yes, I am aware of the fact that this makes me a geek. After a forty-minute rest, I found I could move my legs again. So I got dressed and I did some math homework until dinner. I'm not entirely sure what made me think this was ok, but I got the meatloaf. I don't know, I was starving and beef sounded good, and how badly can you mess up meatloaf, right? Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

After dinner, I watched Friends and read the rest of the Times until my Chi Alpha meeting. Chi Alpha is the non-weird Christian group on campus, they meet twice a week, and I've really been enjoying it. Now, Monday night football is on. My room is not air conditioned, so I'm in a tank top and boxer shorts, with my hair in a ponytail, and I'm trying really hard not to move. I'll call my family, and then I'll make a grilled cheese sandwhich on my illegal appliance. When the game's over, I'll go to bed.

I know. My life is devastatingly wild.

Dear Talking Heads...

Green Bay did not lose because Brett Favre fell apart in the second half.

Sure, he threw two intercpetions, but everyone, literally, everyone knows that's just part of the deal with Favre. Favre had to deal with 3 fumbles after he had driven the ball into scoring position. And some play calls that were real head-scratchers. And, you know, 12 penalties for a total of 93 yards (by the way, no excuse.) And, on top of that, HE LOST HIS CENTER BEFORE HALFTIME. How would you like to be staring down Urlacher without your first-string center? I'm surprised you weren't wetting yourself from all the way up in your press box.

So, talking heads, if you had to play under those conditions, you wouldn't look any better. Favre did fine, but his young team heard the words "undefeated" all week and got cocky. McCarthy should be whipping them back into shape this very morning.

Last of all, to John Madden:

I know that you're in love with Tony Romo. But he is NOT "The next Brett Favre!" HIs style is reminiscent of Favre, yes. But if all it takes for you to be ringing in the next #4 is to see someone sling the ball a few dozen yards down the field under pressure a few weeks running, you are on crack. Let's see him take out a linebacker with one hand, or what he does when he breaks a few bones, or when he recovers from an addiction, or when his father dies. Let's see a superbowl ring or 3 MVP's in a row. Let's see him play for the Cowboys for the next 15 years without missing a single start. Cut his salary in half and see how inspiring he is. You are supposed to know football better than this! If you can't speak intelligently about the game, stay home and watch the game from your couch, like everyone else!

Love,

Rachel

Remember when...

I said that if college was like high school, that I would just die?

Well.

I'm not dead.

G to the hetto

At breakfast this morning, I was sitting near some RA's. They were all talking about the problems they've had with their residents, and I was listening because some of the stories were funny. But then they started talking about how glad they were that they didn't get X Hall this year, it being the worst hall on record. Guess where I live. That's right.

Not only that, but when I came back from breakfast, there was a page-long, single-spaced rant from one of our RA's posted on the hall door. She ripped us all a new one, let me tell you. First was the notification that in one month, our hall had wracked up $400 of damage. She was ashamed to admit that we are her residents, of having to babysit us instead of trying to get an education, of what a nightmare it all was. There was caps and cursing and the whole deal. The last line was "P.S. When you all fail at life, the only thing that I will do is stand and point and laugh. Laugh really, really hard."

I thought my living situation was just the typical Behrend experience. Stepping outside of your room in the morning to find that your whiteboard and Halloween decorations have been torn off your door and your third dry-erase marker is gone. Finding unconscious guys in your hall on a weekday morning, having to wipe the penis drawings off of my whiteboard every so often. Girls shrieking and slamming doors in the wee hours every night of the week, walking into the bathroom to find that someone was sick and missed the toilet. Drunk kids playing tag around your hall at 2 am on a Thursday night, then running outside to scream profanity in everyone's open windows.

Nope, I just got lucky. On one hand, it's comforting to know that Behrend as a whole is not as half as bad as I thought. I mean, if this is worst, then it has to be better everywhere else, and I'm just surrounded by the exceptions. It's also good to know that I'm not crazy, that most people think that what I live with is ridiculous. It's such a relief to know that it isn't in my head, that I'm not stuck-up and snobbish - it really is this bad.

But still, this is where I live. What kind of luck is this? I get in at the end of the day, and I shut my door, but I can't get away. It's constant, it's all around me every second of every day. If I had my car, I could just get off campus for a few hours a week. I could find a park to swing and study at, I could get to the beach, or out for a meal. I don't go home every other weekend because I'm homesick (although I love my family a lot), I go home to get away from all of this for a couple of days.

But, I don't have my car, and I do live in the nightmare hall, and nothing is going to change that. Pretty soon I won't be able to leave every other weekend. So it's time to get creative.

Things I've Learned This Week:

~ Plato's three-realms of reality theory

~ technology tends to do anything other than make life easier

~ I hate BS-ing, but I'm good at it

~ Putin will not let go of Russia, and Russians are OK with that

~ how to dish it back out and make it count without being profane or crude

~ that you can play catch with a tennis ball for two hours, and it never gets old

~ I'm pretty bad at writing reviews and sports pieces

~ I'm pretty good with news and opinion pieces

~ if you're going to run old news, you have to put a local spin on it

~ that my math professor will find a different way to solve every single problem, no matter what

~ the Daily Show is hilarious!

~ the thing I miss most in Rochester is the coffeehouses

~ the secret to success is initiative; they assign you one article, and you write two. Eventually, someone fails to turn in a an article and the editor is flipping because he has empty space to fill. It makes you look really, really good when you have one ready to go, and they remember it.

Adventures

" 'O!' said Bilbo, and just at that moment he felt more tired than he had ever remembered feeling before. He was thinking once again of his comfortable chair before the fire in his favorite sitting-room in his hobbit-hole, and the sound of the kettle singing. Not for the last time!"

Yes, I am referencing The Hobbit. Out of all of the literature I have ever read, from Hans Christian Anderson's fairy tales, to the great classics, even to the Bible, the Hobbit is what's getting me through this stage in my life. It is the only thing I have ever read that accurately represents adventure.

One day Bilbo is reading and eating by the fire, when everthing is turned upside down. Before he knows it, he's out the door without hat or handkerchief, off on this dazzling adventure. And it is a real adventure, not the average kid lit adventure where the heros are never afraid, and always win the big fights, and have witty lines at the most perilous moments. He is short and chubby, and always hungry, and he nearly does his company in a few times along the way. Every few pages he longs for home, for everything to go back to how it was. The adventure is long and exhausting, and it rains and the food isn't always good. There are even a few times when Bilbo believes that he will not survive, that this adventure will kill him and it will be the last thing he ever knows. In short, this book is not about a happy, comfortable hobbit.

But Bilbo does survive. He makes it home alive, and he brings exotic weapons and lots of money. He looks at his old maps and he knows what hangs off the edges. He has made lifelong friends, some scattered all over the world, others closer to home. And he knows who he is; he knows what he can take, what he can accomplish, and what he can change. He writes a book, because he has lived a life worth writing about. And I grew up on the book. I read it before my double digits, and now as a just-barely adult, I turn to it again.

It's ok that I'm tired and stretched too thin. It's ok that sometimes I wonder if this really is going to work out in the end. That every hour or so, I just want to hang it all up and go back home, where I'm safe and comfortable. But I don't go home. You see, they don't write books about safe and content people. They write books about people that don't even know if they'll make it, but keep going anyways. And even though I don't enjoy it now, I trust that at the end of all of this, I'll look back and be glad that I did it. I believe that I'll look back and shudder at the idea of what could have been; a life safe at home by the fire.

Calling It Now:

Favre announces his retirement at the Superbowl.

Remember I said it.