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| Fuckin' sweet, you can see my huge calf tattoo. "I Read Past My Bedtime." |
Amanda’s flight got in at about 5 on Wednesday, and I surprised her at the airport. She’s always forwarded the email from travelocity to me, so it was easy to find out what gate she’d be at. It was fun to ride the T with her, aside from the creepy guy on the silver line who kept trying to join our conversation. My mom made seafood for dinner, since it’s easy to get really fresh seafood out here, and Amanda promptly told me the theme for graduation (keys) and we scouted Dollar Tree for supplies.
Thursday, we sadly underestimated how long it would take to do what we had to do. We had to finish packing, get more stuff for graduation from both Michael’s and a different Dollar Tree, and drop off a birthday present. And eat lunch. We were supposed to meet two classmates at the airport, but we didn’t even get to campus until about 5 minutes after one of them landed. Luckily, the classmates were real adults, who managed to find each other and had enough money for a cab from the airport. While the were in transit, Amanda and I unpacked and moved our furniture, which included pushing the beds together so we could put my box fan on a desk and get air on both of us at night. We then went with some people to the Shake Shack for dinner, which is kind of expensive but tasty.
I’ll just give you the highlights instead of slogging through every individual day.
We had one of my former mentors for our first half workshop leader, which was cool because she’s into speculative stuff, which most of us are, too. She was able to deal with our collective perviness pretty well, and I commend her for that. We can be raunchy. Also, apparently I can’t help but write funny stories, which is frustrating sometimes, but people I talked to about it more (mainly Amanda and *Eddie*) said it’s a good thing, so I’ll just try to roll with it I guess.
My class was on Monday (14th) went well, though I don’t have a clear memory of most of it. I had about fifteen people including my evaluator, so that was nice. It was a small enough group that the discussion didn’t get out of hand, but big enough that it wasn’t just me talking to my evaluator for an hour. I also wore a dress that gave me the best cleavage, and someone even took pictures. ^_^ *Eddie* told me he couldn't see it, since I was behind the computer the whole time, but I was actually to the side of the computer, and he was making considerable eye contact with my boobs.
Tuesday was the reading for all the students who weren’t graduating, and then we had a free night. I ended up going to a hibachi place with Joe-ə (points if you figure out what that says). Turns out he also thinks hibachi is the balls. Shirley Temples and a tall man with a creepily deep voice are all that one needs to have a good night. We also got ice cream at the place near my house and sat at the pond in my town. And I forget exactly how, but we decided that my first born child is going to be named Zilphaya Canaganoogin. Jones, of course. With a mouthful like that, she’ll need a common last name.
Wednesday (16th) was my graduate reading, and that went well, too. Well, according to Amanda’s mentor I was unintelligible because I don’t open my mouth when I talk, but *Eddie* said that’s an East Coast thing and he was sitting right next to her and could understand me fine. My high school English teacher came, which was nice. I had asked her to come because the other teacher I had in high school (I went to a small Catholic school, so I only had two English teachers all four years) had kind of killed reading for me, which in turn killed the budding love of writing, but this teacher revived it, and I even used a short story I wrote in her class in my application for Solstice. She gave me this book, which I look forward to reading. I’d say I’m going to read it right away, but I’m so overwhelmed with the freedom I have now...I have some books that I borrowed that I should read first, but then I have that book, and books I just bought, and books I already have...good lord.
Anyway. She had to leave right after the reading, I think to do wedding stuff, because she got married on Friday (18th). Instead of crappy food in the cafeteria, we had crappy food in the Moncrief room (upstairs room in the fancy building). Of the few things they offered, I could eat about half, and the black bean burger was fucking disgusting, so for dinner I had a crappy cookie and a crappy brownie. And then decided I was in high school, and let the older boy I liked pump me full of alcohol. I had a total of 3 1/3 beers (I stole sips from one of his), where I normally have 0, and sometimes even 1 makes me tipsy. I found out I like Corona, and *Eddie* and I had an intensely personal conversation alone in the downstairs room where all the readings happen, including mine earlier that afternoon. I discovered I like Coronas, and was highly amused by pretty much everything, and he was amused by me, and the entire time I looked like an anime character. Which was cool, but completely unintentional. And afterward, I drove Amanda and someone else to the grocery store, which went fine but in hindsight may not have been the best idea. I probably should have made one of them drive, and *Eddie* scolded me when I told him the next morning.
Friday, Amanda and I fled campus. We had real food, which consisted of Dunkin Donuts for lunch and Papa Gino’s for dinner. Our pizza was the balls. BBQ sauce, bacon, ½ onion, other ½ mushroom. Try it sometime. Mainly the BBQ sauce and bacon, other toppings aren’t as important. Anyway. We also got the last few decorations for graduation, which included blowing up balloons. And we got our nails done. I got a cool blue color, and on my ring fingers I got white, and the nail tech made a black key on each one, to match the graduation theme that I totally didn’t know about. Amanda got a sick lavender color, and she decided we need to go back there in the winter and have a spa day. Don’t have to tell me twice!
I helped the 4th semesters set up for graduation, because I feel bad about the weird blocks of time they have to do it. They can either do it after the last reading and pray everyone leaves early (which doesn’t always happen), do it really early in the morning before workshop, or skip the publishing panel and do it right after lunch. Sadly, the one with the most amount of time is the night one, and that’s what they did. I feel like it’s a little crappy that they don’t get much help in the timing department. Like maybe ask everyone to leave as quickly as possible afterward, so the 4th semesters aren’t there until 11:00 at night? We were there almost that late in the winter, and it sucked. I drove *Eddie* home after, because I felt bad that it takes him upwards of an hour to get home on the T, when I could drive him and it would take like 20 minutes.
Saturday was the big day! Whatever. I had a cute little talk with Amanda’s mentor, because she was our second half workshop leader, and she talked to everyone one-on-one. She said I was “doing good work” in reference to my full-time job, she said she thought there was a market for my novel (maybe her illness last residency put her sourpuss attitude about speculative fiction in perspective?), and she told me *Eddie* is interesting. Boy does that not even begin to cover it. I changed into my grad dress, which I’m wearing in the picture above, and had awesome cream colored heels with a peacock feather on them. And I got my hair done. There’s a blow-dry bar down the street from school, as it turns out, and I had them curl my hair and stick my cute flower clip in it.
I didn’t really get nervous until people started taking pictures of me. I don’t even know why I was nervous, because I barely had to do anything.
A lot of people went to this restaurant called The Cottage afterward, but I don’t really like crowds, so I ended up with just *Eddie*. We went to Kowloon, a Chinese restaurant that I went to a lot in high school and I love because the food is good and the restaurant itself it kitschy and cute. We got a bunch of dishes and shared, cuz we’re cool like that. I had a few Coronas, and he had a zombie and then let me pick the other drinks he had. I picked Suffering Bastard, and then Planter’s Punch. He asked if that was peanuts in vodka, which by that point was pretty fucking funny.
Then, when the check came, he wouldn’t let me give him any money. We almost fought about it, because I can’t let someone just pay for my food. My ex boyfriends didn’t even really do that. And now that I think about it more, he was even trying not to let me see how much it cost. But I did see, when he went to sign it and add the tip. It was a $95 bill before the tip. I kept trying to give him money, but he wouldn’t take it, and insisted it was my graduation present. Fine, two can play that game. I’m getting him a freaking great graduation present. Which I will talk about later.
There were still a lot of people in the common room when I got back, so I stayed in there for a good two hours and bonded. I actually did a lot more bonding that is normal for me, and I’m proud of myself. My favorite new person is someone I will refer to as *the Bird*, and she’s awesome. She hard core had an hour long conversation with me about poop and periods. What more can one ask for in a friend? She told me her ultimate plan is to teach college-level poetry, and maybe teach at Bennington, a school in Vermont. I am all for this, since it would put her at a 3-hour drive from me instead of the 27-hour car drive and 4-hour non-stop flight it is now.
The whole thing wasn’t as sad as I thought it would be. Even being at the wrap-up on Sunday morning wasn’t that sad. Amanda and I drove *Eddie* home, since it’s kind of on the way to my house anyway. I can’t believe I just dropped him off at the T last time, what a douche.
Then, Amanda was at my house till Wednesday morning. Sunday, I unpacked while she slept, and then my parents took us (and my brother) to this place in Rockport called the Lobster Pool. They have really yummy fried food which isn’t super fried so it doesn’t make you sick later. My mom made Amanda wear a lobster bib, which was funny. We got lobster, onion rings, and fried calamari (which I did not eat) as well as fried shrimp, scallops, and haddock bites (which I did eat). Of course, my brother got hot dogs. Then we went to the Richardson’s Ice Cream HQ in Middleton and got ice cream. YUM! That night, Amanda and I went to Barnes & Noble, which just started this 3-week long pop culture thing, so there was free stuff to be had. We gathered it all up, got some books, and then sat in the café and had drinks.
Monday, we went to the 99 for lunch with my brother, and Friendly’s for dinner. My poor brother did not give a fuck about the writing stuff Amanda and I talked about. She and I also decided that we’re going to AWP 2016, which is in LA. I’ve always wanted to go to LA, and the dates for that one are right around my birthday. There’s also an anime convention the next weekend. Woo hoo! When we got home, my parents were there, and they gave me my grad cake, which was a mama and baby unicorn, and Amanda and I split the baby unicorn.
Tuesday, we were busy bees. We went to Friendly’s for lunch again, because yum, and then we went to Plaster Fun Time. I painted a neon-rainbow stegosaurus and a magnet of a triceratops hatching from an egg, and Amanda painted three cats with neon fish and a magnet of a sugar skull Darth Vader. Then we went to the Used Book Superstore in the next town over from mine, and we fucking went to town. We inspected that place from top to bottom, and bought all the things for almost none of the money. I seriously bought 12 books and a game and it cost $45. Amanda bought 7 books and a journal and spent $20. Then we had our awesome pizza again, and just went home because she had to finish packing.
Dropping her off in the morning was sad. I even texted *Eddie* about it, and when he woke up he told me about a ridiculous tribute band to Judas Priest called Nudist Priest. I shall have to look into them. And damn him, for still having a girlfriend but doing all the nice things, like buying me dinner and giving really strong hugs and telling me silly things to make me feel better about one of my best friends going home, which, since I did it earlier, is a 41-hour drive and at least a 7-hour flight.
I’ve been doing pretty much diddly squat the rest of the week, and sleeping oddly late for me (read: 8:30/9:00 AM). I start my new job in earnest on Monday, and my shifts next week are all 8-5. Friday is also 8-5, but it’s different because it’s my company’s annual conference, called the CHILD Conference (as of right now, I’m not sure what it stands for). We’re going to the Cross Point Hotel in Lowell for the day, and doing all kinds of fun things. The woman at orientation compared it to a pep rally, which is so not my thing, but I’m actually excited for this.
There are things that make me feel better about this whole grad school thing being over. My job, for one. It’ll be fun, which I know because I’ve already had several shifts there. I also accidentally found a really solid company, that treats their employees really well. For another, I’ll be back in the winter. I’m going to take off at least some time, and maybe the whole time (though I probably won’t have enough vacation earned to get paid the whole time), and I’ll stay at the hotel with Amanda and Hannah. We’ll do a fun spa afternoon and hardly ever eat in the crappy dining hall and on days when Hannah and I aren’t auditing any classes (provided I can take all the time off), we’ll do stuff like go to the Aquarium and the Museum of Science. And I’ll contribute to the Flash Fiction Anthology they’re making. I’m also trying really hard to convince Amanda and Hannah to move out here. That would make it a lot easier, especially if *the Bird* eventually moves up here, then that would leave just one person who I’m really close to who isn’t out here, since three of the people I like already live in MA.
Whew, now I’m off to heal the carpal tunnel I got from typing this monster, and to mentally prepare myself to plunge into the working world.
