Evading Disaster while Counting Blessings

I feel I would be remiss if I did not update you on that impossible dream I alluded to yesterday, that of escaping Week 2 of Class #2 unscathed. Take heart, there was no recreation of Christina’s Homewood Wilderness Adventure; however, further proof surfaced that I am, in fact, a moron.

I assert that the trouble stemmed from the fact that it took me nearly two hours to get to campus from work (a scant 30 miles away). I had left myself a little less than this amount of time, so when the parking lot that was 95 North extended onto MLK, I had had enough. I was proud of myself for cutting across and finding my way. I pulled into the same parking lot as before at 6:10, a mere five minutes before my class was to start. Last week, Professor/Julia Roberts voiceover artist mentioned that lateness is a blatant sign of disrespect for her. Clearly, I did not want to appear disrespectful, as I had done everything in my (considerably insignificant) power to be there on time. My first challenge was to avoid the temptation of walking the perimeter of campus to get to class (at the center of the center quad). This might not sound like a temptation, but with the construction and closed sidewalks, and given my escapade on the way to class last week, this route is the only known. I just did not have that kind of time.

So, I hiked up my (light heather grey pencil) skirt and walked up the multiple sets of stairs as fast as my (black, leather, stretched out from Little Sister’s use) flip flops would carry me. I followed another student around a couple of buildings on the only available sidewalks and realized quickly that this route was exactly what I needed. I probably should have told her that, because she kept looking suspiciously over her shoulder at me, even taking a longer route, although ending up exactly where I did, to avoid being tailed by me. Then I realized she was a weirdo if coming to the conclusion that there are other students taking classes at the same school at the same time as she is so frightening. Instead of apologizing, I laughed at her. But only a little, and not too loudly.

Of course, I could not head straight to class. Because I had been in the car nearly two hours, had consumed no fewer than 100 oz of diet coke that day, and because I always have to pee at the most inopportune times, I (remembered from last week that the restroom on the ground floor is out of service) ventured upstairs. I screeched into class about a minute or two late, of course the last one there. All conversation ceased when I plopped into my chair, and I smiled. Prof/Julia didn’t seem to hate me, so crisis averted.

In class, we had to practice our interview skills on each other. I interviewed a woman who told me that, unlike me, she had nothing interesting going on in her life. She then proceeded to tell me how she moved here from California 10 years ago to care for her mother, who had had a stroke. If her mother was still around and she so yearned for California, why did she stay here, I asked. She told me that shortly after her mother began to recover, her younger sister died suddenly of cancer. And three other siblings got cancer shortly thereafter, leaving 10 children to raise. My classmate became primary caregiver, at various points, for 10 girls, sometimes driving them to schools in three separate cities before heading to the fourth for work. Her siblings gradually recovered, but just this summer she had to bury her only son. She spoke plainly and firmly, and, searching her face for emotion, I saw calm sadness in her eyes. “So, when I say there is nothing interesting going on in my life,” she explains, “It’s because there isn’t. Only caretaking. And pain.”

Although her story was heartbreaking—she had given so much and, seemingly, gotten so little—there was an air of grace and contentment about her. “I don’t make plans anymore,” she said, dismissively. “Nothing that’s happened to me is what I planned.” I thought, despite how overwhelmed I have felt lately, maybe I was the one with nothing going on in my life. And I felt grateful.

Preparing to leave class, I got into a discussion with Prof/Julia, as I discovered I was the last student in the room. I was rummaging, as usual, for my keys. But I searched every section of my bag twice and I couldn’t find them. I sought a custodian who referred me upstairs to another custodian who, eager to help, had me call Security from the elevator.

“Isn’t that door gonna close on you?” The voice said, through the intercom.
“I don’t know, he’s holding it with his foot,” I replied, while the custodian echoed the same.
“Are you sure you left the keys in the bathroom?” The voice asked, and I shook my head.
“Well, you have to come past Shriver anyway, don’t you? Where’d you park your car?”
“Umm, I’m sorry, but I’m new here and I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. I’m just hoping to be able to find my car when this is over, but without keys, it doesn’t do me much good anyway.”
He didn't laugh and said that no one had turned in any Toyota keys.

The custodian began searching the trash cans for my keys (I acted surprised at first, but then remembered that time in 7th grade when I came back from PE and couldn’t find my clothes—they had been stolen from my locker. Ms. Geist threatened to keep us all in the locker room until the clothes resurfaced, so, miraculously, they did. In a trash can. And I was actually widely accepted and well-liked.). I thanked him for his help and decided it was a possibility I had locked them in my car.

I made it to the lot with no trouble to find my keys glistening in the lamplight, right on my passenger seat. Thank God for the microcosm of college campuses; I called security and a truck pulled into the lot within five minutes. He circled the lot, looking for my car, and if we had been playing hot/cold, he was getting absolutely frigid. I walked across the lot and said, “I think you’re looking for me.”
“You the elevator lady? A very handsome man in his sixties asked.
“I am. It’s all the way over there,” I pointed, sheepishly.
“Is it too far to walk?” He asked, offering me a ride. I told him no, I could probably beat him there.
“Okay, fine, wanna race?” He asked, and pulled ahead of me. He won.

It took about ten minutes. I had to be his assistant and hold the flashlight, he had to try, twice, to convince some guy that his Plymouth Voyager was probably not stolen, just misplaced, and we gained a spectator by the time we finished, but finally I got into the car. This man was so adorable—if The Boy looks and acts like this guy in 40 years, I’ll be a lucky girl. I mean, I am anyway, but you know.

So, I finally got home to poor Little Sister (and the very excited beagle and blasé mutt) around 10:30. I slept in a waterbed with a 12-year-old and a self-centered beagle that woke me up 15 minutes before my alarm went off. See, this is one of the reasons I don’t have a dog. Today I ate my lunch that Little Sister had meticulously packed in a brown paper bag and written my first and last name on in green magic marker. She is cooking dinner tonight and expecting some “bonding.” I am a zookeeper at the moment, but it’s a happy zoo.