Wayback Wednesday: Stranger Things Have Happened

When I was in college, I lived in a two story brick house with a finished basement with five other people.  The house was on Albemarle Street.  I loved Albemarle Street, even though I never once for the 2.5 years I lived there ever pronounced it right. 

I had my own room there, up the stairs and to the right, next to the computer room and next to Jandy's room--the resident pretend-like-we're-married couple at the age of 19.  They played Mom and Dad, while the rest of us all played wayward children and griped and complained about their "rules."  Home Sweet Home. 

Willie owned Albemarle Street--not the whole street, but just the house--I'm just not adding the number here in case some person in D.C. (long shot) reads this blog and decides to go see who lives there now.  Right when you went into the door on Albemarle Street there was a door to a left with a tiny, and I mean teeny tiny, guest bathroom.  This bathroom had no vent fan, and it got muggy and unusable, so Angie, who loved The Rolling Stones but hated the Beatles, called Willie and asked that he send a contractor over to install a vent fan.

The contractor came; skinny, bearded, tool belt hanging from his stick-like hips, and a dazed look in his eyes.  He spent a long time in the bathroom, cutting a whole in the ceiling, then said something about parts, and he left never to come back.

When I say never, I mean never.  About two months later, after many late night conversations with various guest about the hole, we finally get a call from the company.  This is how the call went.

"Doug was out there in February to install a vent fan in your bathroom?"

Angie says, "Yes.  He never came back.  What happened to him?"

"Oh.  He died of an overdose, and we're sorry we're just now rescheduling, but there were a lot of people on his list who were never contacted."

Just like that, so passé--so flippant.  Oh--he died of an overdose, as if this kind of thing happened every day to every single contractor you knew.  Angie hung up the phone and blurted it out to us, and we could barely stand it.  Crazier things have happened you know, like your roommate sticking your cats claws into the electric socket, and finding a friend who doesn't know how to ride a bike at the grand age of 21, and trying to teach her in your 9 x 11 backyard while you are all drunk...and there are about 20 other hippies standing around commenting on it.  Yes...stranger things have happened then the contractor ending up dead.

Like the time we went to Halloween at Art-o-matic.  I went as a goth girl, but really I was dressed as a slut.  We were waiting for friends to arrive, and we were already having a party, but Angie and Tiff and I decided to walk up Albemarle to the old Hechinger's, which they had turned into Art-o-matic (I wonder what's there now).  We walked around looking at the art, statues, murals, antiques--every single kind of art, and what some people describe as art that's not really art, was there. 

We left, me dressed as a slut, and I don't remember what Tiffany and Angie were dressed up as, or even if they were dressed up as anything, and we ran into Sideshow Bob and a Bear on the corner.  The Bear was tall, and I wanted to climb him.  And Angie, who doesn't know these people, sticks her tongue down Sideshow Bob's throat and then invites them back to our little soiree at our house.  By this time my other friends had arrived, and it was blatantly obvious that the Bear had little interest in Sluts, although I'm pretty sure Angie and Sideshow Bob were having a little show on the side down in the basement.  Again...memory could be deceiving me. 

I was an undergrad assistant for a Sociology professor, and the next day I had to describe to her why my hair was suddenly pink.  I put it in a ponytail, trying to hide the highlights, and still she discerned it as I was passing out papers to her Grad class and the lecture was about to end.

"Lauren, is your hair PINK?" 

Surprise, surprise.  Stranger things have happened, like your contractor dying of an overdose and the hole in your bathroom never being fixed, and just becoming a conversation piece for a "once upon a time" story.   

Memories of my Grandparents

Yesterday, I was sitting in the car driving to work letting my mind wander.  I had memories pop in, randomly.  It never ceases to amaze me how you can be staring at the back of someone’s hoop-dee and all of a sudden your brain takes you to another place.

Recently, my memories have been centered around my grandparents, Gigi and Gipop.  I saw them taking me to the Junior Museum in Tallahassee.  I “watched myself” preaching in the little chapel there, Gigi taking photos of me and laughing her head off.  Then we had a picnic of fried chicken, good Southern food, with Gigi and Gipop afterwards. 

Gipop and Me on my wedding day

I thought about going to Publix, which I thought was the coolest grocery store, because we didn’t have one in Montgomery.  Gipop let us pick out whatever ice cream flavor we wanted. I usually picked Neapolitan, because I thought it was cool to sample all three flavors! 

Back at their house, Gigi would make a salad with lettuce, a banana cut in half slathered with mayonnaise and nuts on top.  I remember thinking it was the strangest salad, but I always loved the way it tasted.  To this day, I think about that salad and it reminds me nostalgically of those long summer days with my grandparents. 

So many good memories.  Gigi and Gipop had a box of Legos to play with, and I would sit on the floor for hours making creations while they watched the “boring news,” McNeill Lehrer hour on PBS.  Their television was only ever on for news.  The rest of the time, we sat on the couch and read, or talked.  I’m convinced that my grandparents instilled a love of reading into me at an early age.  Their house was filled with books ready to take you on whatever adventure lay behind the pages. 

Gipop told ghost stories from his youth in South Carolina, and I used to lay my head on his big belly and he’d say, “I kind of like you, gal!”  I still say that to my kids today, but because they never had the gift of knowing Gipop they simply don’t understand the tenderness behind the saying.

We used to go to Wakulla Springs, and we’d take a glass bottom boat tour through the swampy Florida marsh.  There would be huge alligators on the banks, and you could see fish and alligators swimming underneath the boat.  Afterwards, we’d eat either a picnic or in the café, then we’d swim in the “lake” which seemed dangerously close to the sunbathing gators on the other bank.  I never remember being scared of them though!  In the café, there was a huge alligator named Joe who had been killed at the Springs and stuffed.  He was shot dead by a poacher in 1966, even though he had never bothered anyone. 

Back at Gigi’s and Gipop's we’d spend nights playing Scrabble.  I always cheated, by using the little Scrabble dictionary, because otherwise I could never beat my grandmother, who had an immense vocabulary stored in her head. My oldest sister sometimes would beat her, and I always felt jealous, because I could never win!

Gipop always liked it cold.  Ice cold.  He drove me home from Tallahassee, or maybe just halfway, one time. I sat in the back, and I froze the whole time, but I never said anything.  When I transferred to my Dad’s car, I asked if he could put on the heat.  He laughed, and he told my grandfather that I’d been so cold the whole ride! 

I miss them, and I know how privileged I was to have them in my life.  These memories almost make me feel as if they are still here with me. 

Throwback Thursday: Machu Picchu

I promised a Wayback Wednesday post this week, and I didn't really make the cut.  So here's a Throwback Thursday post.  Enjoy!

In 1999, I was studying abroad in Argentina.  Since we were in South America, a group of us decided we would travel.  The study abroad program we were in was fairly lenient, and allowed us to take a week off from classes to do this.  They wanted us to enjoy our trip to South America and experience more. 

A group of us decided to travel to Machu Picchu in Peru.  I'd been to Peru before, when I was in high school.  I loved the people, the food, etc. so I was super excited to go back. I traveled with a group of four other students from my program.  We flew from Buenos Aires to La Paz, Bolivia first.  La Paz arranged their flights so you had to stay at least twenty-four hours, requiring payment of a "tourist" tax on the way out of the country.

La Paz is shaped like a giant bowl.  Flying in, our plane landed at the top of the bowl, and it was snowing. According to Wikipedia, La Paz is 11,195 ft. above sea level, but the altitude varies as the city is built upon hills.  We traveled down (literally) into the heart of the city and watched the snow turn into rain as we arrived at our hotel.

We stayed in a large hotel, which seemed more like a dorm.  I didn't have a great impression of the city, but we didn't stay long.  The city seemed dirty, and the area of town we were staying in did not have very many activities for us to do.  We ate at McDonald's, and I ate an avocado burger.  I remember thinking it was genius!  One of my traveling partners, Jeff, became ill the night in La Paz and spent much of the night in his room, most likely due to altitude sickness.

The next day, we went to the airport to fly to Cusco, Peru.  We were surprised by the tourist tax, because we had no inkling that we'd have to pay $25 to leave the country.  We also were searched, although luckily not stripped searched, in private stalls at the airport.  A lady took us into a stall, pulled the curtain closed, and patted us down for weapons.  Luckily, none of us were stupid enough to bring any weapons, so we were free to board the plane.

Flying to Cusco, I was reading the Celestine Prophecy, a book about new age spirituality, in which the protagonist travels to Peru and Machu Picchu.  I had randomly brought the book with me to Argentina.  While the writing style was not great, Redfield has some interesting thoughts on spirituality, and I thought it was beyond coincidental that I was reading the book at that very moment.

When we arrived in Cusco, a man met us at the airport telling us he was to take us back to our hotel.  We weren't sure if he was our escort or not (scary!), but we went with him anyway, and sure enough he took us to the right place.  At the hotel, we were given coca tea to attempt to alleviate any altitude sickness problems.  This tea is made from the coca plant, which is also used to make cocaine.  Well, apparently by this time my body was sick of the altitude, and I became ill.  In fact, I thought I would die.  I went through a huge pack of crackers and some soda.  One of my friends, lovingly, read to me from her touring book about how you could die from altitude sickness. 

I managed to make it to the ruins at Saqsayhuaman (jokingly called Sexy Woman by Americans), but after that I was holed up in my room for the rest of our stay in Cusco, while my friends enjoyed touring around.

The two photos I took in Cusco.  That llama kept trying to spit on me!

The next day we woke up, and I felt a little bit better.  We decided we would take a helicopter to Aguas Calientes, the little town at the base of Machu Picchu, and then take the train back later that night.

The helicopter tour was incredible.  We saw a lot of the countryside in Peru.  Choosing to travel this way brought a whole new dimension to the trip.

View from the helicopter.

Arriving at Aguas Calientes.

When we arrived in Aguas Calientes, we were told we could eat and shop a little bit at the street vendors before we boarded our bus to the top of Machu Picchu.  We walked around the dirty little town were accosted every few minutes by children (and occasionally adults) trying to sell us something.

When it was time to go we all boarded a small bus.  The bus began heading up a one lane road on a mountain.  This was a one lane road, but the driver insisted it was two lanes, and every time a bus came down, he would veer our bus to the cliff side of the mountainous road (no guardrails), and we would continue up.  Thanks to my fear of heights, I spent the majority of the ride in the middle seat, close to my friends, with my eyes closed!

Once we reached the top, the bus driver gave us instructions on when we needed to be back, and we went into the park.  The site of the green mountains was breathtaking. According to Wikipedia, Machu Picchu is still a mystery, because when it was brought to the attention of the outside world in 1911 it had long since been abandoned by the native Incans.  The Spanish did not know of the site during the Inquisition, so it is considered highly culturally relevant.

The site was once thought to be the birthplace of the "Virgins of the Suns," but lately scholars have thought it more likely that it was the large estate of an Incan land owner. Regardless, of what it was used for, it is the most beautiful, spiritual place I have ever been.

Just arrived at the top of Machu Picchu

My friends tramped over to Huayna Picchu, a smaller mountain to climb.  I politely declined, as it seemed like mountain climbing without all the safety techniques, and our guide nicely told us that people often (or maybe sometimes) fell to their death there, and just the week before a man and his tour guide had done the same. 

While they were gone I sat on one of the terraced hills, and I looked out at the lush green mountains at eye level with the clouds, and I thought of the people who had stood there before me 500 years ago.  I thought about what their lives must have looked like, and how they had enjoyed this big expanse of land with nary a thought to anyone else.  They had looked out and absorbed the beauty of earth and the beauty of life surrounding them, just as I was at that moment.

When we left, I felt a huge disconnection from the spiritual world as we re-entered the world of fast track life.  As we were driving down the mountain, a little boy from the village below raced us down, as fast as he could.  When the bus stopped at the bottom, he climbed onto the bus, bowed for a huge applause and begged for money. 

Saint Patrick's Day Memory

Eleven years ago today, I met him.  My perception of reality, which may or may not be true, was that I had been visiting my sister in Massachusetts.  I came home.  A guy I worked with in the library called my cellphone (yes, I had just bought a little blue AT&T cellphone—it was horrid!), and he invited me to a kegger.

I had a lot on my mind.  I was done with Wish He Was My Boyfriend.  I was moving on with my life.  I needed a change. I thought going to a party with some people I didn’t know might be the way to achieve that change.

I asked my roommate Tiffany to accompany me, but she was tired or maybe she had other plans.  I called a few of my other friends, and they all declined.  I hemmed and hawed.  I didn’t want to be stuck in the house all night, thinking and analyzing my life.  I wanted to leave, to party, even if it meant going out by myself. 

I hopped in my car, the 2000 Toyota Camry, and drove the few blocks to the house where the party was being held.  I believe he lived on 42^nd Street in one of the townhouse apartments.  Walking in, a long dark staircase led up the stairs to the party apartment.  I could hear the noise on the 2^nd floor, drunken laughs and boys guffawing.  I built up the courage of one single girl going to a party where she only really knew one person, and was semi-acquainted with the other, and I walked up that long staircase, knocked on the door and was let in by unidentified boy.

There were only boys at the apartment, so you can imagine their thrill to see a girl show up.  Their entertainment had arrived.  They told me the keg was out back.  I could get a drink, and I immediately did to “chill” my nerves.  Some of the boys assured me that “Rob” (whoever that was) had left to pick up his friends, including a few other girls.  I made my way out to the back porch, (also known as Rob’s bedroom!) down some rickety white steps to the backyard and somebody helped me fill up my red Solo plastic cup with beer. 

When I walked back in, I found Sid my friend from the library had arrived.  We talked for a bit, and then I sat down on the loveseat in the main den, unsure of what to do with myself.  From there guy after guy came, sat down beside me and talked to me for a while before moving on.  It was like being in a speed dating round with alcohol. 

Before too long, a drunken boy came in with another guy and a girl!  Imagine my surprise.  He stumbled over to the loveseat and introduced himself to me as Rob.  He was obviously drunk.  He had brown fuzzy hair, and he smiled at me a lot.  We discussed writing and music.  He told me he really liked writing poetry.  It served as an outlet to him.  I also think this is where the nagging began, because I told him he shouldn’t drink and drive.  He never has since—or that I know of.  Soon, we needed another beer, so we walked out to the backyard and sat on the cinder block wall drinking from our Solo cups.  We looked up at the sky and stared at the stars together. 

When it was time to go, Rob walked me out.  He saw my car, and he said “Ooh—I’d like to drive that one day.”  I was still unsure of him.  I said, “Um, yeah, maybe.”  I think we kissed, and it was a drunk sloppy kiss.  We exchanged phone numbers, and I left.

I remember arriving home at the house on Albemarle.  Tiffany was there.  She asked how the party was.  I told her I met someone, and she asked if I thought I’d date him.  My reply was, “I don’t know.  He’s nice.”  

The next day I had to work at the library.  I really didn’t expect to hear from Rob for three days, as boys seem to have this requisite amount of time to wait so they don’t seem too eager.  In the afternoon, around 3:00 PM I received a phone call from Rob. He asked if I wanted to come over and watch the Simpsons. I declined because of working.  I remember telling Tiffany I couldn’t believe he had called so soon.  I didn’t know what to do with a boy who wanted to be with me after playing on and off games with Wish He Was My Boyfriend for two years and not letting anyone else serious into my life.

Tiffany said, “What’s the harm in hanging out with him?”  They were all pleased I’d be letting go of my obsession with Wish He Was My Boyfriend.

And so I thought, what’s the harm?  That evening I went to work and about an hour into my shift Rob showed up at the library with toys for me: a rubber ball and bubbles. 

He said, “I brought you some toys.”

“Um thanks.”  Yes, Lauren was not so good at this relationship crap, even though I’d been in a few serious relationships beforehand.

From then on, I pretty much saw Rob every day.  I didn’t really ever decide to see him. He was just there, and he grew on me.  I was happy to be with someone who really wanted to be with me and who showed me that he did.  I was happy to meet his friends and to feel joy in my heart when he walked in the room.  I remember telling Tiffany about Rob’s eyes, and how they were green with specks.  I remember thinking I liked him a lot, but still holding back.  I wasn’t quite over Wish He Was My Boyfriend.  I *maybe* told Rob this, but I’m not sure he heard me.  He was head over heels in love with me, and we all know what that feels like.  Then a part of me decided the relationship worked, and I was so glad to have someone to journey out of college with, to help me discover what I wanted to do with my life, to laugh at my jokes, to make me smile after a long day at a job I didn’t necessarily like or want.  We were there for each other.

It’s been exactly eleven years since the Saint Patrick’s Day, and life has taken off.  Rob and I have been through a lot of tough times together.  We have survived our marriage thus far, not necessarily enjoyed it all, but we’ve supported each other through the tough times, even with arguments, silent days, passive aggressive behavior, withdrawing completely from one another and finally reaching out and trying to find each other again.  Searching for our twenty-one year old selves in each other’s hearts to see what brought us together in the first place: love and companionship.

Wayback Wednesday: The Blades and the Monster

While I was digging through boxes last week, I came across my chap book from Mr. Franek's
English class in tenth grade.  Our chap book was a collection of our work from the year, typed up and bound.  Mine had a green cover, and I entitled it "A Bird's Eye View."  Here's a photo of it, very much disheveled now:

Mr. Franek was the best English teacher I ever had.  He wrote in the back of my book, along with my grade (B+/A-, because try as I might I rarely ever received an A in his class) "writing, I suspect, is a release for you," and "I don't worry about you.  You like to read & write. Don't ever stop."  Boy, he had me pegged, and those words were so inspiring for me back then, as they are now.

Here is a rewritten story, pulled from my chap book, about an incident that happened to my sister Allison from my sister Kelsey's point of view:

It was the summer of 1983, and my cousins had come for a short visit.  My mom made me and my cousin Sarah sleep on the floor in Allison and Lauren's room, because Aunt Karen was sleeping in my room.  My mom gave me a sleeping bag from the little closet.  The air conditioner was broken, leaving the house unbearably hot, so my mom put a small electric fan in the room to circulate air.  She placed the fan between Sarah and me and warned us not to sleep to close to it, because the blades were sharp.

In the middle of the night, Allison woke up screaming from a nightmare.  She had dreamt Jesus was sitting on the end of her bed drinking a Pepsicola and told her to be careful. We all laughed about her and went back to sleep.  About an hour later, she awoke frightened again.  She said, in her dream, a man had kidnapped her and killed Lauren.  She was afraid, and she crawled out of bed to sleep on the floor in between Sarah and I, and extremely close to the fan.

Around one in the morning Allison woke up.  She felt something wet on her hand, but couldn't tell what it was.  Allison tried to wake me up, but I groaned.  She walked over to the light and turned it on.  The first thing she saw was blood on the wall.  Allison peered down at the ground and saw a trail of blood leading towards the light switch.  Blood streamed down her arm, and she saw a huge gash on her hand.  She began screaming, as she realized what had happened.  I sat straight up, saw the blood, and I began screaming too but Lauren slept soundly.

My mom ran upstairs when she heard Allison's screams.  She burst into the room yelling for Allison and me to stop fighting, but then she saw the bright, red blood stain on the wall.  Allison was cuddled up in the corner, crying, and there was blood everywhere.

My mom called my dad (he was on call that night and was on a call at the hospital), and she told him to bring Allison directly to the emergency room. 

Mom told us to get in the big, brown van, and she went back upstairs to pick up Lauren and bring her downstairs.  Lauren woke up, bleary-eyed and half asleep, and Mom whispered something about going to the hospital.  Uninterested, Lauren quickly fell back to sleep.

My dad came outside to help my mom carry Allison into the ER.  She was still screaming and bleeding.  They left Lauren and I in the van with Aunt Karen.  The doctor on duty sent Allison to x-ray to make sure she had not injured her bone.  The blade in the fan had cut her hand deeply, but luckily missed the bone.  Her hand wasn't broken, but she did need stitches. 

The doctor made sure that Allison had not cut any tendons.  He, with my dad looking on, then proceeded to sew up her hand, placing twenty stitches into the skin.  Allison left the hospital with a lollipop in her mouth, holding my mom's hand and skipping.  She was happy again.  Allison climbed up into the big, brown van and sat down next to me.  Lauren rubbed her eyes, waking up, not knowing where she was or what happened.

"Where are we?" Lauren asked.

"At the hospital," Allison said.

"Why?" Lauren asked, curiously.

"Well you see, a big monster came in the middle of the night and ate my hand off!  But it's all better now, because Daddy fixed it!"

Wayback Wednesday: Cross Country Trip

Disclaimer: I have a total of TWO photos for this post.  I have somehow managed to lose the album that these were in, and unfortunately my friends weren’t able to send me photos of the trip in time.  Oh well, enjoy this extravagantly long post!

The summer after my junior year in college, my friend Jon came up to D.C. to work for one of the Alabama Senators.  I was working for an environmental organization at the time.  We decided to take a cross country trip from Washington D.C. to San Diego, California for Jon’s Circle K convention.

The day we left we drove eight hours through the mountains.  Jon and I stopped at a little state park to eat our peanut butter and jelly lunch (the first of many).  We walked around on the hiking trails a little bit to stretch our legs, but the mosquitoes were bad, and we wanted to make some good time that day so we kept driving.  I’m not sure what part of the country we stopped in that night, but we stayed at a KO in a little cabin.  We were the only people there without an RV.  We were super excited about our adventure!

We got up the next morning and drove to pick Cassidy up in Kansas City, Missouri.  We were meeting her at the airport, and that night we would stay with her cousin.  We saw the arch, which looked the same as it did when I saw it as a child!  The next day our adventure continued.  We drove to Russell, Kansas and stopped to have lunch there so Jon could see Bob Dole’s birth place.  We joked about the bugs on the windows in Kansas, because the highway was so boring.  We didn’t stop to see the largest ball of twine, but I wish we had!  We had a long drive ahead to Colorado Springs where we would stay the night with “Wish He Was My Boyfriend.” (Remember him?)

We had a fun night.  We all went to a Mexican restaurant and enjoyed a few margaritas.  The DD driver, whoever it was, drove us to a bowling alley next where we encountered a friendly brown bear of the blow-up variety!  We were living it up.  We went back to Wish He Was My Boyfriend’s apartment to sleep.  The next day we went to Garden of the Gods.  We were all a little bit tired, but the scenery was beautiful. 

Our drives from here on out became smaller, and we began to make more use of campgrounds.  On the way, we stopped at McDonald’s quite a few times, and I partook of the fish sandwich quite often because at that time I was vegetarian at the time. I know—fish is not a vegetable, but I would allow myself to eat seafood!  We also made much use of a certain Texaco card, much to my friends’ parents’ chagrin!  Do you know how much you can actually buy with a Texaco card?

The next day we drove to Steamboat Springs.  I remember on the road passing the exit for Littleton and talking about the Columbine shootings.  The incident had happened only a year before.  Steamboat Springs was a little town.  We stayed in a campground there, and we went to the rodeo.  Jon, Cass, and I were chatting as the rodeo was beginning and I looked down the bleachers and Blue Eyed Guy was  sitting right next to me.  Blue Eyed Guy was an acquaintance of my ex-boyfriend who lived on the 6^th Floor of Leonard Hall.  I often saw him at American, and we always talked casually, but I never knew much about him.  Turns out he lived in Steamboat Springs, Colorado and just happened to be at the rodeo when we showed up there: strange indeed.  Reminiscent of running into Robin in Spain.

When we left Steamboat Springs we headed up through Wyoming and we drove through the Flaming Gorge National Park.  This was breathtaking, and was not even on the map we had.  The bright orange rocks were beautiful, and the gorge circling down to a crystal clear lake at the bottom was breathtaking.  I highly recommend exploring this area if you have some time.  I wish we had been able to spend more time there.

We drove through Jackson, and then we went through the mountains that separate Wyoming from Idaho.  I remember being terrified driving down the mountain with a huge Mack truck on my tail.  I kept imagining it running us off the road.  We arrived in Idaho Falls late.  It was a strange place.  We ate at a steakhouse, and the people all struck me as odd and quirky.  I think Cass and Jon felt the same way.  We went to our hotel late, around midnight, and we pull in on a fairly cold night and some girl is riding her bike around the parking lot in a bikini.  We all laughed at this, but it sort of creeped us out and made us feel glad that we weren’t going to spend anymore of our time in Idaho.

The next day, we drove down into Utah.  Jon had left his pillow at the Idaho Falls hotel, and we weren’t going back there, so we stopped at a rest area.  We asked the information guy where we could find a Wal-Mart.  His response, “That’s a woman’s store.  Perhaps I should call my wife.” This was my first encounter with a Mormon in Utah.  We found one on our own, and Jon was able to buy a new pillow. 

We drove through Salt Lake City.  We didn’t have time to stop at the Mormon Temple.  I regret this decision, as my parents went there this past year and said it was beautiful.  We were on a timetable though, and our stops were pre-planned with a certain number of days in between.  I loved the rocky landscape in Utah, but we all commented how we’d miss large Oak trees and grass if we lived in Utah.  I couldn’t even do a description of the red rocks of Utah justice.  They are beautiful, and majestic.  Driving into Zion National Park seemed to me like driving into another world.

The day we arrived in Zion, it was hot.  Very hot.  We were not allowed to build a fire to cook any food, so we resorted to our old standby for dinner: peanut butter and jelly.  We walked around and hiked a little bit, but we were rather unprepared for the narrow hiking trails and my fear of heights did me in, so mostly we just admired the scenery around us, talked, and played cards. That night, I insisted to Jon and Cass that since we were in the dessert the temperature would drop significantly.  We went to bed with our tent completely zipped up, and we almost died of heat prostration (literally!).  We woke up sweating, and Jon and I unzipped the tent to let some fresh air in, but we still woke up in a pool of sweat.  I didn’t take into consideration that we were at the bottom of a canyon and the hot air was trapped like a bowl around us.

Hot, and in bad need of a shave, at Zion National Park, Utah 2000

We drove down the back roads, the famous Route 66, and reached the Grand Canyon the next day.  Who would have thought that a giant hole in the ground could be so amazing?  Standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon makes one feel infinitely small: a speck of dust in the grand scheme of things.  The power of nature is forceful enough to cut through rock and carve a vast canyon into this earth.  In one word: breathtaking. Our visit to the canyon was the highlight of my trip.  We pitched a tent that night, and Jonathan insisted that we leave the screens, but I told him it would be cold since we were on top of the canyon.  He didn’t believe me, and in the middle of the night he had to rustle in the car for his larger sleeping bag and close up the vents in the tent because we were all freezing!

Cass and me in front of the Grand Canyon, 2000

After the Grand Canyon, we drove to Las Vegas stopping at the Hoover Dam on the way.  I was depressed in Vegas.  I missed the nature we had just left.  Cass and Jon enjoyed themselves there, but what can I say? Gambling is just not my thing.  Was it then that I went up in the mini-Eiffel Tower and almost had an anxiety attack due to my fear of heights?  It may have been my second trip to Vegas.  Heights are not my thing.

After Vegas we made our way to San Diego.  I LOVED San Diego.  It is beautiful.  It cracks me up how everyone calls the interstate, “THE 5.”  Not, take Interstate 5 to ________ road, but take THE 5 to _________road.”  Jon had convention stuff to do in San Diego, and I was interested in doing separate things than Cass, so I sort of had some alone time there.  Also, Cass and some other friends had decided to go to Mexico, and my mother told me (I listened for once) that I was not, under any circumstances, to cross the border and go to Mexico!  I went to the San Diego zoo by myself, which was amazing.  The pandas were incredible, and by far it is one of the best zoos I’ve ever visited.  I also explored the Mission District, and ate delicious fish tacos in a Mexican restaurant there.  We visited a haunted house too, although I didn’t see any ghosts.

After San Diego it was time to go home.  We drove straight through (almost), but we stopped to surprise our family in Montgomery.  They were happy to see that we had made it back safely from our trip.  Then we went back to DC to the real world.

Wayback Wednesday: Vive Espana!

Our FORSPRO Group--Spain 1995

I wonder if it’s possible to have writer’s block on one particular subject.  I have sat down to write this story of Spain so many times, and I have not been able to do it.  I have so many memories, but my memories of Spain are rather fuzzy.  Certain things stick out, but I have no idea of the chronological order of events.  Maybe this is because I went to Spain 16 years ago (SIXTEEN YEARS, can it really be?).  The memories are not so fresh.  Plus, I didn’t actively write in my journal  the way I did when I went to Peru and Argentina years later, but here goes.  Wayback Wednesday: Spain.

The summer after my sophomore year in high school, a school group of mine signed up for a FORSPRO trip to Spain.  There were six of us at first: Senora Baker, Andrea, Whitney, Anne, Ashley, and me.  We would study abroad in Salamanca for a portion of the summer. 

We flew from Montgomery to Atlanta to JFK and then over to Spain.  I remember being excited to be IN New York when we arrived in JFK, even though we never left the airport.  This was the first long trip I had taken without my parents, and I was going overseas.  Sure, I’d spent many a summer at Camp Seafarer, but I had never been abroad without them.  This was probably every sixteen year old girl’s dream: freedom!

We flew Iberia airlines to Spain, and we arrived in Madrid.  We met up with another group of students who were also members of our FORSPRO program.  This is when we met Andrew, his brother Chris, their dad, Karyn, Shelby, Adam, and several other people we would become friends with over the next weeks.  They were from Virginia (Andrew and his family was, at least). 

We went sight-seeing first in our air-conditioned motor- coach.  We traversed the countryside of Spain staring out at burnt sunflowers lining the landscape.  That summer was HOT.  It was the same summer that all of those people died in Chicago.  For almost the entire time we were in Spain, the thermometers read between 40-45 degrees Celsius.  Hot, hot, hot. 

We went to Toledo, Granada, Sevilla, and Burgos.  We walked through a walled city, and I remember feeling like we were walking back into time.  We watched a man make and sharpen a sword.  We went to the Alhambra, and I remember the beauty of the gardens and the architecture.  We laughed and had fun, getting to know our new friends and adjusting to the new culture, amazed at how different our culture was from theirs.  We were asked several times if we were from Los Angeles and if we knew Melanie Griffith.  This was about the time that she had become engaged to Antonio Banderas.  The Spaniards looked at us funny when we answered we were from Alabama.  Most of them had no idea where it was.

Regarding Columbus in Burgos

Whitney, Anne, Ashley, me, Andrew (top row), Dina and Andrea (bottom row)

The Alahambra -- Moorish influence in Spain

The Court of the Lions -- beautiful Muslim artwork.

Chains on the Cathedral in Toledo

The Town Hall in Toledo, Spain

After this initial period of travel, we arrived in Salamanca to begin taking our classes.  My group stayed in a building that was used as an all boys’ Catholic school during the school year.  There was a monastery behind it, and we (or at least I) thought it was so funny to see the monks walk around in their brown robes.  We were each assigned a room with a bed.  The rooms were small and simple: one bed, a tile floor, a sink (where we washed our laundry!), and a large window that looked out onto a back courtyard.  Andrea’s room was next to mine.  We quickly realized that in order to not wake up in a pool of sweat we needed to put our mattresses on the floor.  This way, at night, we could sleep with our arms stretched out onto the tile floor, thus cooling our bodies.  Having no air conditioning was a major adjustment at first, but we all became used to it by the end of the summer.  An odd smell emanated from behind the school, and there was a park that we started calling "Shit Park," because a manure plant emited nasty smells throughout the day. Senora Baker did not like us to go to Shit Park, because she thought it was dangerous.

Our Dorm: Colegio Calasanz

Anne became homesick, and she actually ended up going home.  Andrea, Whitney, and I were all placed into the same class with a professor named Julio. Whitney reminded me that we also had a large lecture-style class on Civilization, but we rarely attended this—somehow figuring out how to rig the attendance records.  The class was early, and we were usually too tired to attend after tromping around Salamanca at all hours of the night.  One of the few things I remember about actually attending school that summer was that we read a book about Francisco Franco in Spanish.  I remember thinking it was the most boring thing I’d ever read.  Julio, our professor, had good sense of humor though and he took well to his completely female class!!! 

Our Class with Julio.

We also made several other friends, Colleen and Jennifer, as well as a few French kids, Little Goman, Alice and Florence, who loved our Southern accents.  The first week we were trying to cool down and adjust our body to no air conditioning.  I remember sitting on the lip of the second floor window looking out at the courtyard and talking to Andrea who was sitting in her window.  Senora Baker came into the courtyard and had a horrified look on her face.  She told us that we could do anything in Spain, except sit in those windows.  We took her literally, and we did everything in Spain!

The food in the dorm cafeteria was horrible.  The only thing edible was the salad if you somehow managed to scrape off all the globs of some gross mayonnaise-based dressing it was drenched in.  We fairly soon came to depend on the bakery immediately across the street from our dorm and school for our meals.  We would arrive in the morning to have French baguettes.  In the afternoon, we’d usually walk down to the Plaza Mayor and I often would buy a tortilla espanol.  This became my staple diet while in Spain, and I actually lost so much weight there that at one point my underwear started sliding off!

Friends: Colleen, Jennifer, Andrea, me and Whitney

Many of our nights were spent roaming the city with Andrew and our other American friends.  We were “so” American.  We were young, and we wanted to drink.  We had two regular spots: the Chupeteria and the Liter Bar.  At the Liter Bar, we would usually buy a drink called an Orgasmo.  The bartender at the Chupeteria came to know me that summer too, and he would often cut me off. We also like to frequent Burger King, where you could buy a cheap burger and beer.  My parents wondered why I ran out of money while I was there!

Lauren, Whitney, Jennifer, Andrew, and Andrea

We listened to the Tunas play in the Plaza Mayor at night.  We enjoyed churros and chocolate, and we enjoyed each others' company. 

The Plaza Mayor -- Salamanca, Spain

La Tunas (musicians) in the Plaza Mayor performing at night.

One evening we were watching TV in the Rec Room of the dorm, and a bat flew in the window.  After initially panicking, and trying to shoo him out of the door we came to enjoy his company, and we even named him Roger. 

Roger -- the *other* dorm resident!

One night, our group was going out to drink as usual.  We stopped at Burger King for a bathroom break.  We had been there earlier for dinner and a few cervezas (yes, they served beer at Burger King in Spain!).  I went into the bathroom, and looked at myself in the mirror.  I glanced at the girl next to me and she looked familiar, but I didn’t say anything at first.  I went into the bathroom stall, wracking my brain trying to figure out where I’d knew her, and it came to me.

“Robin?” I questioned.

“Oh my God, Lauren.  I thought that was you, but what are the chances?  What are you doing here?”

In the bathroom of Burger King in Salamanca, Spain I ran into Robin Freeman, a girl I had known from Camp Seafarer in fifth grade.  She was on a study abroad too.  She normally lived in North Carolina (I think).  It certainly is a small world, and I wondered what the chances of actually running into someone you know in a foreign country are?  Strange occurrences like this have happened to me since, including the fact that Jennifer Hinckley (who we met in Spain but who lived in California) ended up being roommates with one of my childhood friends during their freshman year in college at Vanderbilt completely randomly.  I digress—back to the story…

Towards the end of the summer, we (Andrew, Andrea, Shelby, Karyn, and me) decided to go to a REM concert in Madrid.  We bought tickets, and we arranged for a ride on a bus that would take us from Salamanca to Madrid.  We were super excited, until we learned that Michael Stipe was sick and had canceled.  Instead of refunding our tickets, the Cure stepped in and took over as the main group for the concert.  We took the bus to Madrid.  The day was so HOT.  I remember seeing the HUGE digitalized thermometer in front of the Plaza de Toros as we shuffled in for the concert and it read 45 degrees Celsius.  This translates to roughly 113 degrees Fahrenheit, and honestly people will tell you Spain has dry heat so doesn’t feel as hot but when it is 113 degrees it is HOT, especially when you’re in an outside mosh pit with a bunch of sweaty people.

The concert started, and we were in a mosh pit.  I didn’t drink that day.  It was too hot.  I was worried about dehydration.  One of the girls with us drank though, and she drank a lot.  About halfway through the Cure concert she seemed to have a nervous breakdown and wanted to leave.  We told her we had no way of leaving, but we all managed to get her onto the motor coach and we waited for the concert to end, giving her water to alleviate her dehydration.  I learned two things at this concert: 1) I don’t like mosh pits—they are scary and dangerous and 2) don’t ever drink alcohol when it is 113 degrees outside and you’re surrounded by a ton of people.

Senora Baker also took us on some separate excursions, away from the main group.  Our small group went to el Escorial.  I’ll never forget the “wedding cake” tomb where the Kings and Queens of old had buried their small children who died from various diseases.  She also took us to el Valle de los Caidos (The Valley of the Fallen).  We went up on top of the giant cross, and on each corner, North, South, East, and West was a HUGE statue of each of the four Saints. 

Valle de los Caidos

As the summer came to an end, I was dreading going back home.  I missed my family, but I loved being on my own in a foreign country.  I loved the Spaniards, Salamanca, and my friends.  We had a little mishap in the airport with our plane being overbooked (never good), but luckily one of the adults on our trip had some clout with the president of Iberia airlines and soon we were on our way home.  For the next few months I HATED the air conditioner.  When it would blow on me I felt like I was freezing, but I loved Dr. Pepper, which I had dearly missed while I was gone.  Oh the life of a sixteen year old.  I also had to repay the debt that I owed Andrea (from running out of money) by working in my Dad’s office for the rest of the summer.

Wayback Wednesday: Impulsiveness

I have an impulsive personality. I wish I didn’t. Some people might describe me as *sometimes* doing rather crazy things without thinking of the consequences. I make decisions impulsively. (I like to think *now* that I make quick decisions, instead of impulsive ones. I’m always the first to know what I want to eat at a restaurant!) I shop impulsively. If I see something cute for the kids, then I will buy it without thinking about the costs. I am controlling this now, and I’m not buying clothes for them that they don’t need. I’ve had a problem with impulsiveness my whole life. I’ve never done anything dangerous, and I try not to put my needs ahead of others. Son #1 has impulsive/aggressive problems, and this is not me although I expect he receives his impulsiveness from me. I just sometimes go out on the lamb. I do something that no one thought I’d do. I act unexpectedly.

In the Spring of 2000, I did just that. I had an impulsive moment. I was in love with my best friend, only he lived far away at another school. My two good girlfriends, Angie, Tiff, and I had been up late talking. Angie and I had been drinking. We were giggly college girls:

We didn’t want to study for our exams. We were procrastinating: another one of my vices. We were talking to Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend on the phone, having a great time. It was late, probably two or three in the morning, and as I recall it was a school night. Our school, American didn’t normally have Wednesday classes so we were all free to enjoy ourselves the next day, but Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend had class the next day. He was studious, and he did not like missing classes. I’m not sure how fond he was of impulsiveness either. 

 

I said, “Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend, we’re just going to get in the car and come up and see you, because I miss you.” I’m sure it was sort of slurred and funny sounding. 

Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend said, “No, you’re not.”

Here’s where Lauren’s emotions and life rules out everyone else’s priorities. I should have listened to him, but I didn’t want to hear what he was saying. I think I did a lot of that in college.

So I said, “Yes, we’re going to come up to see you tonight!”  My friends were egging me on.  We all liked the idea of a spontaneous adventure!

He sort of laughed and said, “Yeah right. You’re not. I have a test tomorrow. I’ll see you in _____ number of weeks.”

We hung up, and I looked at my two girlfriends and I said, “Let’s go. Why not? It will be fun. He’ll want to see me when I get there.”

My friends and I set out for a road trip in my 2000 Toyota Camry (I still have this car, only Hubby drives it now!) at three o’clock in the morning. The trip up was fun. We stopped and bought Dr. Peppers and beef jerky, a staple from gallivanting around in the country during my high school days. We sang Christmas Carols, in April, all the way up there. We switched drivers after two hours, because Tiffany was tired. These are the things I remember from that trip: it was pitch black driving through those mountains at night, there were a lot of trucks on the highway, the lights in the tunnels were so bright that driving back out into the darkness was utterly shocking, and there was a TON of construction going on once we hit the Pennsylvania state line. 

 

We rolled into Pittsburgh around seven in the morning. We parked around the corner from Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend’s dorm/apartment. The three of us stumbled to the door, half asleep (but not in frog pajamas) and buzzed up to his apartment. The buzzer rang upstairs to his phone. He picked up, and it was obvious that he was still asleep.

“Hello,” Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend said groggily.

“Hey. We’re downstairs. We came to visit.” I said, the girls giggling in the background.

“What? No you’re not.” I guess he thought it was just one of my morning wake-up calls.

“Yes, we’re downstairs, buzz us up.”

He buzzed us up, and when we made it up the stairs he opened the door. He did not look happy to see me. He did not look pleased that I had, in all of my selflessness, driven four and half hours through mountains and tunnels in the dark just to come see him. I wonder to this day, what in the world was I thinking? Desperation, much?

“I’ll go get you some blankets, and you can sleep here,” he said, pointing to the floor. Not exactly what I had in mind. “I have class at 10. You can come to breakfast with us at 9.” 

 

Man of few words. Man mad to be woken up by crazy girl who wishes to throw herself at him at 7 in the morning, after having talked on the phone with her until 3 in the morning!

At nine he woke me up.  We talked privately.  I told him I wanted to stay and hang out for the day.  He completely refused.  He wanted me to go home.  I was not part of his plans.  He had school, and he needed to study.  I remember feeling upset.  I remember thinking I’d be flattered if someone came to see me at 3:00 o’clock in the morning.  (Although, I know that’s not true because only a year before my “then boyfriend” had hopped a Greyhound bus from Michigan to come see me after I said I wanted space, and I was not amused!)  I expected Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend to drop everything to be with me at that moment, which was presumptuous and entirely unfair on my part.

We went to breakfast at one of the schools’ cafeterias. Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend’s friends WERE entirely amused that we had driven to see him in the middle of the night. THEY thought it was totally cool. We talked over breakfast. Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend hugged me, wished me adieu, and we left around 9:45, approximately two hours and forty-five minutes after arriving.

The problem stemming from this visit was that I only “wished he was my boyfriend,” he wasn’t actually my boyfriend. This whole act in itself was desperate and impulsive. Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend *really* didn’t want me to come, but in my head I thought he did. After this act of selfishness, I don’t blame him so much for trying to set me up with his best friend, even though he knew (or in my mind *must* have known I was desperately in love with him). Maybe this was his way of putting me down easily. Maybe he couldn’t own up to his own feelings about me, just because of the distance—I will never know. It’s a wonder that Wish-he-was-my-boyfriend and I stayed friends for another two years or so. We played games we each others’ heads for awhile, and eventually when I couldn’t get what I wanted I moved on. I will never know exactly what he thought about me that morning or how it made him feel. 

 

On the drive home, I couldn’t fathom why he didn’t want me there. It never occurred to me that I didn’t take his feelings into account. I didn’t listen when he told me he didn’t want me to come up. I just came, selfishly, to achieve my own selfish means. Impulsiveness is like that.