e_clare

( old news )

In more recent news, I made it to Connecticut safe and sound, losing my way relatively few times and successfully navigating my way out of New York City and back onto the interstate. Fun moments on the drive included:

• Politics in southern Ohio: spotting two giant pro-Strickland yard signs, and zero pro-Blackwell-for-Governor signs.
• "Hi, Dad? I know you said that I would just reconnect with I-95, but I don't think I'm supposed to be going back into Pennsylvania..."
• Singing along to the iPod really, really loudly -- not something one can really do on public transportation.
• Gas prices steadily rose as I moved East...until I hit New Jersey, where I found gas inexplicably 10 cents cheaper than in Maryland.
• Subsisting only on coffee for all of Monday -- this gave me the strength and force of will to drive like a maniac through New York and southern Connecticut.
• "Dad? I shouldn't be in the Bronx, right?"

Today I managed to unpack almost everything seeing as I don't have any desk drawers, the stuff I generally file in the junk drawer is proving difficult to place), and finish a book. I can mooch internet access from the neighbors, I still have two more books, and I should really be getting to bed.

This 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.

As predicted when I "lost" it six? seven? years ago...I just found my beloved copy of D'Aulaires' Norse Gods and Giants (recently republished as Norse Myths).

Mom always said we'd find it again when we moved. :)

Seriously, this is the best book EVER. Anybody who owned the Greek Myths knows how cool Ingri and Edgar d'Aulaires' illustrations are, and the Scandanavian mythology is awesome on its own. When I read American Gods this summer, the Norse myths I'd practically memorized as a kid all came back to me, and I pegged whatshisname as Odin almost from his first appearance. Last week when I finally read 1602, I was excited about Thor for all the wrong reasons. (I still don't know where he fits into the Marvel canon...Justice League?)

Anyway, I'm rambling in order to procrastinate further. I'm going back to packing: now I'm on a mission to find my Beauty and the Beast dolls.

I've definitely fallen into a rut. Good news is, I packed three boxes of books today. Bad news: those were the first three boxes I've packed. Now I'm getting into the hard stuff, like figuring out what to keep and what to pitch, and why I kept all of these old high school papers anyway.

My family -- the historian and the librarian -- have a habit of keeping things long past their prime. Going through a box the other day, Mom pulled out taxes and receipts from 1987, '88, and '89; information about housing at Indiana University ('87); a Newsweek from the week I was born (with Michael Jackson on the cover - yay?); a pre-wedding article on Princess Diana and Prince Charles, written in the style of Masterpiece Theater; and a 1974 ad for a car/grocery bonus offer.

She was looking for her undergrad paper on medieval illuminated manuscripts, which I'm not sure she ever found.

This evening, I found notes from NHS and literary magazine meetings my senior year, notes on a smattering of AP calculus classes, French vocabularly lists (3 pages), and a draft of my graduation party poster. I wasn't looking for anything in particular, fortunately, because I don't think I'd have found it. Yesterday, when searching for glue, I discovered two letters from an Egyptian penpal I had (briefly, looks like) when I was 15. I didn't find the glue.

This is why it's good that we're moving. Now we can get rid of things that we truly don't need -- "historical value" or not -- and it'll be a very happy thing.

Of course, sometimes you find things you've saved for a reason, even if it's purely entertainment. My mother has a copy of a handout from her college friend's Catholic high school, simply because it's one of the funniest things EVER. I remember hearing about it as a kid, but didn't see the actual paper until last week. Here, for your reading pleasure, I present the following excerpts from the "No-Nec Club" rules. (With apologies to any Catholics or anti-sex-education folk who may be offended by the mocking that follows.)

( that's not a typo )

finally started going through and tossing out the high school papers this afternoon. even though i know that i never throw anything away, i've still been surprised at how much stuff i actually kept.

the manila envelope labeled "titanic," for example (and its buddy, labeled "star wars articles"). there's the card my freshman english teacher gave me after i cried at the parent-teacher conference, the "happy 15th birthday; you go, girl!" locker sign from 9th grade, and a "some notes on notecards" handout from the 8th grade career research project.

i'm keeping the academic papers, funny handouts ("there is no sanctioned senior skip day!!!", the h.s. newsletter reminds us), and whatever miscellany strikes my fancy. i've still got two large plastic tubs of stuff to go through--no idea what it could be.

(instead of actually cleaning before my graduation party two years ago, we just threw all the junk into big bins and moved them upstairs. haven't touched 'em since. mom's suggestion before we have company is always "get some more storage tubs," but i try to talk her out of it, just because it would be two more years before we got to them.)

EDIT: the "nostalgic" icon looks more like "how did i get here?" weird.