Valentine’s Day Round-Up

Okay, so it turns out I didn’t take as many pictures as I thought I did over Valentine’s Day, but I did have great hair…

Valentine’s Day started amazingly (slight sarcasm).  On the Turnpike, my car began alerting me that there was not enough air in my tire.  Turns out it was the same one that kept losing air earlier in the winter.  A very slow leak.  I aired it up and then continued to Mike, who had tuna steaks, shrimp, veggies, and WINE waiting for me–all by candlelight!  Helluva guy, right?

We spent all night listening to music and talking to each other.  The next morning, we took my car to Sears so they could look at the tire.  They proceeded to tell me that there was a nail in it at an odd angle and that it couldn’t be plugged.  And because Delilah is an all-wheel-drive vehicle, I would have to buy four brand new tires…totally $817.00.  WHA?!

I called my daddy and whined and he told me to find a tire place that could do a vulcanized patch.  So being that we were in Franklin, PA on a weekend, there were hardly ANY tire places open.  But we found one!  They agreed to do it (although it might take a little while to squeeze me in).  I told the greasy guy behind the counter that he was my hero, and he laughed.

So Mike and I went to Franklin On Ice and saw all the ice sculptures.  Cute right?

Reminded me of Arctic Blast at Ashland University.

It was frigidly cold so we hurried back, and they called for me to come pick up my car.  Know how much they charged me?  $18.00.  AND THOSE DAMN PEOPLE AT SEARS WANTED ME TO PAY $817.00!!!!!!!

Such bull.

After that we went bowling:

I look angry and disheveled but it’s okay.

Then we got dinner at Foxtales and watched a movie.  It was such a good night.  🙂

So there you have it!  My Valentine’s Day weekend!

 

Back to Ashland

Lately, I’ve had an intense desire to return to Ashland University.

I feel like I’m looking for something…and something tells me it’s down in Ashland.  It’s like the thing I’m looking for is something that I’ve long since forgotten since my time there.  Something I had there, KNEW there, but I don’t know anymore.  I’ve forgotten something.

But what have I forgotten?  And why have I forgotten it?

Is it because there are no trees here in Brunswick to climb?  Or the fact that if I did, people would probably report me?  Tree-climbing is much more forgivable on a campus.

Is it because I don’t live across the hall from people I love and trust?

Is it because there is no plan once I leave work?  Because Wal-Mart is too far away just to go to for the fun of it?

Is it because everything was undetermined?

Is it because I was meeting new people every day?

What have I forgotten?  And how do I remember?

I feel that this will be an endless series of questions unless I go to Ashland.  Walk around.  Remember what it was to be there and what state of mind I was in.  Something is missing…it almost feels as though I’ve lost my thumb and the ability to put it on anything to pin it down and figure it out.

Ashlanders, do you know what I’m talking about?  Have you remembered what I’ve forgotten?

 

If You’re Going to Ashland University In the Fall…

When I was at Ashland, I spent a lot of time fretting about making the perfect grades and steering clear of trouble.  And then I got caught by Safety Services for being in a boy’s room with my friend Kay after 2:00 am (which is the curfew for being in rooms owned by members of the opposite sex) with a few cans of Natty Lite (on a dry campus).  Then I calmed down a little bit about following all of the rules, but I made sure I still tried as hard as I could for the best grades.  But if I could go back, I might do things a little differently, and there are certainly things that potential Ashland University students should make sure that they do.

So, AU students, make sure that you do the following things before you graduate:

1. At least once a month, go into Convo for breakfast, and don’t leave until after dinner.  Think of it as a 12-hour social experiment.
2. Skip class once in awhile.  It won’t kill you.
3. When it snows, “borrow” a Convo tray and go sliding down the bridge.
4. Climb to the top of Redwood (between Clayton and Redwood, there is a means of climbing).
5. Climb the trees on the Quad.
6. Go find the Beer Stone in the Ashland Cemetery.
7. Find the Sublime Stone there, as well.
8. Smoke cigarettes outside of A&H.
9. Go to house parties – but beware of cops.
10. BDubs isn’t the only bar–Linder’s is kind of fun.  But O’Bryan’s is where it’s at (you can still walk there).
11. Creative Writing students, spike your coffee.  They expect it.
12. Take naps.  As often as you can.  Naps in the real world do not exist.
13. DO NOT tan on the quad in a bathing suit.  It’s trashy.  (sorry if I offend you, but blah)
14. Attend the events you think will be stupid.  Stupidity often brings fun.
15. Half.com.
16. Build a fort in your dorm room.
17. Hide your alcohol in case you get locked out, and they have to unlock your dorm and see 3 bottles of Jager on your desk.
18. Contact paper your dressers and keep a tally of how many drinks you have each school year.
19. Rearrange your room once in awhile.  Makes for much more fun.
20. Catch your RA doing something wrong, then leverage it against her.
21. Go downtown to Crazy Ray’s, just for the experience.
22. Get piercings and tattoos at Main Street Tattoo.
23. Remember that Wal-Mart is an acceptable form of entertainment.
24. Mentos & Diet Coke–do it.
25. Learn to climb out of windows in Fraternity Circle.
26. Watch the bricks and metal stairs when it ices up.
27. Look at the awesome pictures in the Student Center.
28. Same for Convo.
29. See if you can balance all the wooden borders on the Quad.
30. Ride the creepy elevator in A&H.
31. Beki – Put some awesome graffiti in that creepy A&H elevator. Stop it between floors so you don’t get caught; let the paint fumes inspire you.
32. Sneak onto the stage in A&H.
33. Sneak down to the bandroom in A&H.
34. Make out in a teacher’s office hallway just to say you did.
35. Host a radio show, and come up with a stupid handle.
36. Bounce off of the padded walls in the radio station.
37. Go barefoot.
38. Shelley – Throw a bouncy ball down the hall and see how many doors u hit! Hide when someone opens the door to see what’s going on.
39. Shelley – bake cookies for the floor
40. Sarah – Do not pee in the Amstutz elevators. Ew.
41. Sarah – Pick a few tulips.
42. Sarah – Hang out in the writing center (creative writing majors especially)
43. Sarah – Write a column for the collegian even though probably no one is reading you.
44. Sarah – Get a pet – especially one that is tricky to hide (cat, hamster, gerbil, etc. – hamsters in exercise balls are especially entertaining)
45. Zach – the bottom drawers of our dressers came out to make a good hiding spot for all kinds of booze. then put the drawer back in… voila ‘what booze?’
46. Gina – Write your name and years there in the back of your closet. It’s kind of cool to leave a record of yourslef and see who has come before you.
    
47. Gina – Jump in the fountain!
    
48. Gina – Decorate a tree on the quad for Christmas, a la Charlie Brown.
49. Gina – Visit Grandpa’s Cheesebarn. It falls under the cheesy category, haha, but is an Ashland tradition.
50. Gina – Take a picture next to the Ashland: World Headaquarters of Nice People sign (I still want this!)
51. Barbs – Do tear all of the pages out of a text book and trash a friends room during finals.
52. Barbs – Do go to Dennys for coffee and desert after midnight.
53. Barbs – Do jump in the fountain and run when safety comes out.
54. Barbs – Do talk to weird people in jean jackets…you may find a friend.
55. Dave – Paint a mural on your dorm room wall! (of a red sports car crashing into an Amish Buggy?)
56. Aimee – Do create a book-throwing Olympics during finals week.
57. Aimee – Do take a picture on the giant Ashland sign outside the student center.
58. Aimee – When you go to Dennys after midnight, make sure it has also been after some fun…..
59. Aimee – Do sneak a picture of the Cat Man.
60. Chris – Do go to the late night breakfast during finals week.
    
61. Get hit by a car in a crosswalk, and your tuition is paid for.  That’s worth a broken leg to me.

I miss Ashland.  A great deal.  Have fun.  And prior AU students, please feel free to add to the list!

Happy Tuesday!

Jump in the fountain!

 

Happy Birthday to Me, RIP to my Life Plan

When I was 18, I had a life plan.  I was going to go to college at Ashland University, meet a man (I knew my high school relationship wouldn’t last), and get married the summer/fall after graduation when I was 22.  By 26, I would have one baby.  By 28, another.  And a farmhouse, an awesome job, and maybe the desire to write still.

Here’s what really happened:

I didn’t find anyone at college that I could have married (some will argue this–it will be discussed another time), and I majored in Creative Writing, which left little to no opportunity in the job market without a Master’s Degree.  My advisor, Joe, looked at me in December and said, “How do you feel about grad school?”

Having no real reason to stick around and suffer the consequences of my choice of major, I said, “Sure.”

“UNCW,” he said.  “Apply.”

And I did.  Because if you know anything about me, I did everything Joe told me to do (let’s not be freaks here).  I respected him as a man, a professor, a writer, and a friend.  So I applied to one graduate school (the best in the country for creative nonfiction – WOOT!) in Wilmington, North Carolina, and I happened to get in.

I’m sure I angered the HELL out of the professors, because I never responded, never accepted, never did anything.  I told myself (not them) that I wouldn’t go there unless I got some financial aid, and a teaching assistantship.  Two days later, I did, and I couldn’t refuse the offer.

So I went, and I spent three years in NC from the ages of 22-25.  I still did not find a man down there…until the end of my second year, when I was 23.  I saw him walking around my neighborhood.  His name was…is Mike.  Mike moved to PA and sent my 24th birthday present in the mail.  He gave me my 25th when I came home from grad school.

A week ago, my mother (whose birthday is 5 days before mine) looked at me and said, “I turned 26, and 5 days later, I had you.”

Today, I turn 26.  I am currently 4 years behind on my life plan.  There is no ring, there are no babies.  But I do have a great job, two degrees, and an incredible man who came to see me a day early, so that for the first time in 2 years, we could be together on my birthday.  I’ll complain every day about not being a little closer to that original life plan, but truth-be-told, I’m thankful that I didn’t meet someone at Ashland, and that Joe said, “Go to UNCW,” and that Mike happened to be walking past me one day.

Let’s see what this year brings.  🙂

 

“Following the Rules” At Ashland University

When I was a senior in high school, I only applied to two colleges.  I knew where I wanted to go, and that place was Ashland University.  (I applied to the other place so I could have more than one school under my name on the senior bulletin board at school.)

See, I was a bit of a scaredy cat about being away from home, and my cousin Heidi would be a senior at Ashland during my freshman year, so I felt like I had a little back-up and guidance for my first year of living away.  So she was a security blanket.  🙂

And oh did I love Ashland.  LOVED it.  I felt at home there immediately, and actually started enjoying myself.  But while all my friends were off at rule-lacking colleges like BGSU and The Ohio State University, I was starting to realize how conservative Ashland was.

These are the rules that people laugh at when I say them:

1)  The closest guys got to girls in terms of living situations was co-ed by floor.  i.e. girls only floors, and guys only floors.  There was no mixing.  We had very quiet sleepovers.

2)  You had to live on campus until you were 22–which meant dorms until you were of senior status and could live in the senior apartments.*  You could get around this buy claiming residence within a certain radius of the university and becoming a “commuter.”

3)  *this is where the * comes in.  If you made one mistake, you couldn’t live in the senior apartments anyway.  So I drank my freshman year, got caught, and 4 years later, it bit me in the ass and I couldn’t live in the senior apartments.  Hello, dorm room.

4)  Any boy on a girls’ floor (or girl on a boys’ floor) after 11:00 pm had to be escorted by someone of that floor’s gender in the hallways.  (This meant walking boys downstairs to the community bathrooms so they could pee after 11:00 pm).  We ran down guys’ hallways at 3:00 am as fast as we could so the RAs and RDs wouldn’t hear us.

5)  Boys were NOT allowed on girls’ floors after 2:00 am AT ALL.  And vice versa.  Again:  We ran down guys hallways at 3:00 am as fast as we could so the RAs and RDs wouldn’t hear us and learned to be VERY quiet.

6)  Dry campus.  No alcohol whatsoever. You couldn’t find someone who can open a beer can more quietly than an Ashland University student.  So what if I was in Amstutz at 3:30 am with my roommate on a guys’ floor drinking Natty Lite out of plastic cups and Safety Services Cathy happened to walk by and “smell alcohol”?

Now, for a Judeo-Christian campus, these all seem like good rules.  I know universities that have a rule stating that if there are guys and girls in one room, all feet must be kept on the floor (so as to avoid lying down…so as to avoid booty).

And while these rules were obnoxious sometimes, I have to say that it made it a lot more fun.

Of course none of these rules stopped us.  But it rather made it a game.  It was FUN to see if we could get away with it.  And we did.  🙂  Except my sorry senior ass had to live in a dorm room.  Oh well!