Good Times

Life is good these days. I had a blast at Alicia's bachelorette party on Saturday. I was a little worried about such a large group getting together and drinking too much, but there was next to no drama, and everyone had fun. We met lots of new friends throughout the night. Strangers bought Alicia drinks. There were many highlights of the evening, but I think my favorite memory is the one we call "The Great Fall of Leslie." A few girls from our group along with some new friends they met were kareokeing to "Total Eclipse of the Heart." Leslie had been harassing the DJ, asking when it was going to be their turn, but she was in the bathroom when he finally played it. All of the sudden, I see Leslie sprinting out of the bathroom and leaping onto the stage, where she fell flat on her face. Everyone stopped singing, and the entire bar stared. Leslie popped up instantly like a Jack-in-the-box and snatched the mic from one of the girls and started singing along. What made it funnier was that her voice was hoarse from yelling all night, so she had this old smoker's voice going on. We had a blast laughing about that one that night and the next day.

I had the strangest dream last night. It involved the most random group of people: former profs, one of my favorite writers, April, Evan, Silvio, coworkers from The Writing Center and my summer school program, and then some girls who lived in my dorm freshman year whose names I can't even remember. It involved this new dictator in California trying to kill infants with bumblebees to produce some sort of new energy source, my favorite writer coming into a writing class of mine, a talent show with other profs, and then my neighbor from across the street. I don't know what on earth that could mean. Probably just one of those "cleaning out the cobwebs" in my head dreams.

I came up with a question for my favorite writer in this dream, and now I really would like to ask her or someone else who writes personal memoir. I asked her if you ever get used to people asking you about these intensely personal moments we choose to write about, and if you ever develop some sort of protective layer or does it make you feel vulnerable every time. She's been writing about personal issues since she was 23, and she is now in her mid to late thirties, so I figured she would know how to separate work/writing from herself. Although, maybe that's just part of the job description as a memoirist--being okay with being vulnerable if we are in control, I guess?

This is my last week of work. The kids are getting restless, and I'm getting tired. I will miss the kids greatly, so in that sense, I am not ready to be done. I am tired though and ready to look to the future (aka get back into writing and moving in with the nuns) after I have some time for myself and get to visit Laura. I haven't seen her since like my birthday, so that's just too long. It's gonna be 5, almost 6 months since I've seen her when I finally arrive in NC. We've never been apart that long. Crazy how quickly you get used to someone being three blocks away, but how slowly you adjust to them being far away.