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She's leaving home
Jan. 18th, 2006 11:20 pmThis is the last time I'll sleep in my childhood home. : (
It started to hit me -- this move is actually happening -- when my uncle came to get my car this weekend. I don't remember a car before the Mazda; it's the car I learned to drive in -- learned to drive stick, no less (yes, that was a traumatic year); this car, as Jenna once said, smelled like high school, and it also had the remnants of my crayons melted into the back seat cushion fom the summer of 1990. It was a good car.
My room is 90% packed. Twenty-one boxes. The worst part isn't moving; it's not knowing where I'll be next time I come "home", compounded by the fact that I don't have the slightest idea where my other home will be, after May 28th. Grandview has its flaws -- it has many flaws -- but it'll always be the place I grew up. No matter what time of day it is, the odds are good that I'll someone I know if I walk down the street. No trip to the local library can last for less than 20 minutes, because I visit with at least one of the librarians in any given department. The strong community at Mount Holyoke has never surprised me, because I've only ever known a close-knit community; it's why I never wanted to go to a bigger school. It got stifling after awhile -- I didn't want a bigger school, but I didn't want one in Ohio, either -- but it always feels welcoming and embracing rather than oppressive when I come back.
Yesterday, I needed a hot glue gun. I called my neighbor, who didn't have one, but she took me with her to Science Olympiad practice at the high school, confident I'd be able to borrow a glue gun from the woodshop. Nobody was there when I walked in, so I went upstairs to the physics classroom, and Ms. Godez immediately agreed to loan me hers. (She also acted not at all surprised to see me, even though I haven't spoken to her since my first year of college. This, too, is typical.) On Tuesday, I borrowed my seventh-grade English teacher's car to run errands.
I ♥ my town.
It started to hit me -- this move is actually happening -- when my uncle came to get my car this weekend. I don't remember a car before the Mazda; it's the car I learned to drive in -- learned to drive stick, no less (yes, that was a traumatic year); this car, as Jenna once said, smelled like high school, and it also had the remnants of my crayons melted into the back seat cushion fom the summer of 1990. It was a good car.
My room is 90% packed. Twenty-one boxes. The worst part isn't moving; it's not knowing where I'll be next time I come "home", compounded by the fact that I don't have the slightest idea where my other home will be, after May 28th. Grandview has its flaws -- it has many flaws -- but it'll always be the place I grew up. No matter what time of day it is, the odds are good that I'll someone I know if I walk down the street. No trip to the local library can last for less than 20 minutes, because I visit with at least one of the librarians in any given department. The strong community at Mount Holyoke has never surprised me, because I've only ever known a close-knit community; it's why I never wanted to go to a bigger school. It got stifling after awhile -- I didn't want a bigger school, but I didn't want one in Ohio, either -- but it always feels welcoming and embracing rather than oppressive when I come back.
Yesterday, I needed a hot glue gun. I called my neighbor, who didn't have one, but she took me with her to Science Olympiad practice at the high school, confident I'd be able to borrow a glue gun from the woodshop. Nobody was there when I walked in, so I went upstairs to the physics classroom, and Ms. Godez immediately agreed to loan me hers. (She also acted not at all surprised to see me, even though I haven't spoken to her since my first year of college. This, too, is typical.) On Tuesday, I borrowed my seventh-grade English teacher's car to run errands.
I ♥ my town.
