Time after time

The story of my life for the past couple of weeks has been packing. I packed up my stuff from the house I've been living in and even though I hadn't been there very long it was the second time I've been sad about moving out of a place. I wasn't  sad when I moved out of my parents for college dorm life... granted I moved literally 3 minutes from home. 

Summer after my freshman year I moved into an apartment across town, now about 5-7 minutes from home, with a sorority sister and one of her friends. I had a rough end of freshman year and on into my sophomore year. I shall not digress into the details just that it was a time when I was shown the true colors of somebody I thought was my friend. But spring semester of sophomore year was when I became really close with my now best friend, Rebecca Taylor. She knows everything there is to know about me. She helped me decide on what I should do when I took time off from school. I was torn between staying in Oxford, going to Savannah, GA where my older sister was at SCAD, or convince my parents to let me do a NOLS course in Patagonia, Alaska, or in New Zealand. I ultimately decided on going to Savannah. When I moved in on July 2, 2006, I had very recently started dating a guy back in MS, like 2 months recent, and there was already drama from another female. But I was sad b/c I was in a place where I had no friends, just my sister. I admit I cried a number of times to sleep that first week. That first month there was hard b/c I didn't have a job just yet and the place I wanted to work kept giving me the run around. I gave the owner my resume 4 different times and each time she found something that was "unclear" and wanted me to clarify. The last time she did this to me, I told her that I obviously want to work here bad enough that I changed one word on my resume to clarify the reason why I wanted to work there. If she was not hiring or didn't want to take on one more person she should have just told me, and saved mine and her time. But I thanked her and never walked back through those doors.  

The last couple of times I had moved, I had my friends in the same town. Now I had moved exactly 598.6 miles from my parents driveway to my new apartment in GA. Granted, I met some wonderful people while I was there who challenged me spiritually and knew some details of my life. The RUF leader for SCAD became a big influence. He and his family were a big help more ways than they knew, and so were the individuals in the Bible study I became a part of. Savannah was a great decision on my part. I had job that made miserable and made me realize I needed to go back to college, but the people I met and became friends with are still apart of my life today.

I came back to MS Thanksgiving week, still dating the same guy, but fast forward to now. I've lived in three different places. There isn't any special attachment to any of the places. But last night for the first time since the Savannah move, I was sad about leaving a place. I think the main reason for my sadness was that I was moving back in with my parents. I'm frantically looking for a job and a place to live in the Chapel Hill, NC area. Why there you ask? Well, looking at grad school at UNC and I want to be able to claim in-state residency if and when I get in. But as I was packing up my things I was looking at all the pictures I had framed, collages of trips, and when I rolled up the rug in my room, I found a picture that I had been looking for since I had moved in. When I looked at the picture, all I could think was man we had a great time that night I want a repeat, but knowing that it wont. But it has been three years since Savannah to get to where I am today. Completely disoriented.

I'm studying for the GRE I have at the end of August. I have another phone call to make to the head of the graduate program I want to be apart of and also talking to my undergrad advisor about other things in grad school, and trying to remember which vacuum sealed space saver bag has my running shorts and socks in it so I can stop wearing my little sisters. My dad has hired me out to do a few tasks. Prepare some more meals for the family so my mom doesn't have an excuse to get out of packing and help with packing. So obviously while I'm digressing I'm putting off what I really need to be doing. 

The Grunt Monster

This is a photo of Cooper. He is a pure breed black lab. I love this dog. This was him at about 5 or 6 months. He was nicknamed the grunt monster from the start. If you have ever been at my parents house and Cooper is outside you understand why. He is one of the most vocal dogs I've ever encountered. He grunts and whimpers because he is excited. This picture was taken 9 years ago. He is now 102 pounds and intimidating. Anytime I go walking or running, he is with me. He is a protective dog, and he has actually scared friends that sneaked up on us; they quickly learned never to do that again. He has a mean growl and bark that it has stopped people that are about 20 yards away to reconsider walking in my direction.

Last night I took him walking over to the park, like always, and a cop was driving out. He stopped and told me that I shouldn't be walking alone at night at the park. Before he could finish his sentence, Cooper came and stood between me and the cop car with a little growl and muffled bark, hair on end. The cop looked at him then back at me, and said, "You should be fine with him with you." Cooper stayed there until the cop rolled up his window and drove off. Not even ten minutes later I was heading out of the park on the opposite side I came in and a kid that was playing tennis tops over the hill. Cooper was about 5 yards in front of me and when the kid came over, he growled and the kid stopped in his tracks. Poor kid started walking backwards and ran as fast as he could back over the hill. Cooper came back to me wagging his tail proud of what he did. 

He is full of personality and has always been protective of all of us. The picture above is from Thanksgiving at the Lazy A. He was in heaven. He would sleep on the bean bags in the den area and pretty much had free reign of the kitchen and den area. He loves the walks up there b/c it is a lot cooler there than in MS. It is funny when you tell him to go get on his bed, he looks at you in a way that says, really? My paw is touching it. Isn't that enough? As he lays down he gives out these grunts as if he is saying "happy now?" I love Cooper.

He is very well trained. He just never had the hunting dog quality in him. The picture above was taken about 4 or 5 years ago, and if I had the after photo you will understand how trained he is. My sister commanded him to roll over and play. He decided that he would tackle me and play in the snow with me while continuously pinning me down. All the snow that was there disappeared. My mom and dad came out and started laughing because he was having such a good time rough housing with me. I love my lab Cooper.

When he is outside on my parents porch when I drive up our driveway. He is sitting and waiting by my usually parking spot. As soon as I'm parked and getting out he is in full swing of his vocal welcoming. Our two cats are there as well (that is a whole other blog about them). It is the best thing when you have a bad day or just in a bad mood, Cooper puts you in a good mood and brightens your day. There has been a couple of times I've brought a guy over to my parents house and Cooper didn't go up to the guy and wasn't vocal towards him. This is a sure sign that if there was any potential of the relationship being anything more... shot down w/ Cooper not liking him from the get go. The first time he did it, I should have taken note b/c that relationship ended on a very bad note. Cooper knows. 

I love this dog and I'm talking my mom into getting two more lab puppies from the same breeder so we can still have a lab around the house and so I can have a lab with me where I end up living. I need another protector. 

It isn't a good feeling when you are looking at your phone and then realizing that you know you didn't call or send text messages to certain people. I realized it this morning around 11 when I got a phone call from a guy friend asking wtf about a text and what I was referring to. I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. Then I realized what had happened. My roommate had used my phone in her drunken state on Saturday. She called and mass texted multiple people in my phone that she thought were people that she knew. Some happen to have similar names but are not the same person. It isn't fun doing damage control for somebody else's drunken mistakes. I was looking through the sent messages and I started dying out laughing. I should post these on the website TFLN I made phone calls to some of the victims just before my class. This is how the first conversation went....

SN - "So just out of curiosity... what the F*@$ did you mean by 'i want you more than anything right now...'"

SL - "Ha ha um hey, and I never sent you that. That would be just too weird and wrong."

SN - "Well, you sent it to me Saturday afternoon. Then I had some missed calls from you as well that afternoon. The voicemail was interesting and you sounded weird."

SL - "ha ha oh man... My roommate used my phone to call (her boy). I guess that conversation didn't go well. I guess she thought you were the ATO SN that she knew. Ha ha wow. I've got to check and see who all got that text and or phone calls."

SN - "You are going to have some fun conversations. Were you wasted on Saturday with her?"

SL - "No, would have been fun to be packing up drunk. Talk about an interesting unpacking experience later."

So that text "i want you more than anything right now..." went to 13 different guys in my phone. I have only been able to talk to 3 of them before my class started.  Out of these 13 guys, I know that 4 of them are in serious relationships, but I'm good friends with the girls; at least I hope I still am. They are the first ones that I called and they started laughing and were like what the heck. I know that some of the guys that were texted will let this text inflate their egos even more. I try to steer clear of helping inflate guys egos in anyway. This is an interesting situation.

I called my roommate during my classes break and she just laughed. She said she would help with damage control but would be pointless b/c she doesn't know any of the people she called and texted. I think all I can do in this situation is laugh at it. Though some of the victims haven't answered phone calls or even on facebook. This is going to be a funny story to tell later in life I think.

So this past month has been really busy for me. These past two weeks have been jammed pack with a bunch of crap I've had to do. The reason I'm able to post as often as I do now, I write while I'm sitting in class, but I later post them when I am at home. I'm admitting to this only b/c since the end of May I've been in four different classes. I just recently started the fourth class this past Thursday. I haven't had a summer break at all. My "break" from intersession and first summer session and now second summer session is one day between the sessions. I haven't been able to enjoy these days off or the weekends because of papers, or having to run to Memphis for my mom and dad or I'm having to take care of stuff in town. The reason I have kept up with doing these posts in class is b/c I've somehow managed to have a 4.0 this summer. Shocker. So why mess with something that is working? :) 

But a huge change is about to take place in my life... I'm finally getting my car. I've been talking with my parents a lot this past month. It has been back and forth about what to get and what I want. I've had huge vehicles my whole driving life. My first vehicle was an AMAZING piece of machinery. 

A 1993 White Chevy Van, the interior was this blue velvet feeling material. All the seats were like Lazy Boys. Was dangerous driving it home after any away games. This isn't the actually van I drove but pretty close to it. It was given the name "THE Great White." This is what I learned to parallel park. I started driving this at my parents surprise. It was my junior year of high school and was the first year that I didn't have an older sibling to ride with to school. When my brother started to drive when I was in elementary school. It was a drag race getting to school... he would speed to get me to school first then he would speed back to take my older sister to the junior high then he would manage to make it to school on time... we always left with 15 min for him to get to school. My older sister started driving by her freshman year of high school. I was still in junior high at this point. But when I was a junior in high school, the van that i wanted to drive, THE Tan Van, had been given away.  

It had a HUGE moon roof in the back, the captain chairs could swivel all the way around. I have so many stories about that van. It was a legend at the high school even when I was in high school, that was about 5 or so years after my brother graduated. But my Great White van was awesome. The first day of school, my parents said to me, "OK. You can walk to school, get a ride from friends, or we can take you to school." I looked at them, then saw the van keys hanging up. I reached for the keys and said that I would drive. They were in shock. My mom said,"What are you doing? The van hasn't been driven in a few years. Is that not an embarrassing thing to drive for you?" My only response was,"No. I don't want to catch rides or walk. It is in the driveway so why not drive it? Think of all the people I can pile in there?!" My dad started laughing my mom was still in shock. 

It only got 8 miles to the gallon in town, but everybody knew when I was coming. It had a V8 engine. It was loud for a van. I had a TV, VCR, and Nintendo in the back along with two coolers. On many occasions I had about 20+ people in the van. Going to any house party I always had a spot right at the front of the house mainly b/c it looked like a family was there. It threw the cops off a lot.  Going to school in the mornings was always interesting. When I was going to be the first one at the light to turn into the high school, there was always friends sitting at the light. I would lay on my horn as i saw the light turning to red. When i would get to the light it would be red but i would roll on through and wave to everybody in a way to say thanks. The school cop followed me. He was laughing mainly b/c i ran the light blatantly and I was able to parallel park this huge van. He proceeded to ask me why I ran that light... I told him that I was going to be late if I had to sit through that light and my friends knew I was coming. He laughed when I said that b/c he said, "Yeah I heard your van, too. You have a loud engine and a loud horn. Will you be doing this often?" "Yes, sir. If I know the cars at the light they will know I am not going to stop." He laughed and was said,"Only you could get away with this." 

 

But I drove this up until I went to college. Freshman year of college I came in possession of the other family vehicle, a black two door 1994 Yukon. 

I love this Yukon. I've been driving it for five years now. It has 200K miles on it. It has a lot of stories to go a long with it. It is the most reliable thing our family has owned. There has been times when I've pulled up to boyfriends houses in the past and they are taken off guard when they see the beast I drive. It usually overpowers the vehicle that they drive. My all time favorite story from when I've been driving it was when I was leaving from the end of the road at Sardis with a guy friend of mine. The road was washed out to the point where if you didn't have four wheel drive you were going to have a really hard time NOT getting stuck. Well, there was a small truck that left the lake the same time we did. This truck was an old Toyota truck w/o 4 wheel drive. The guys following us out got stuck. They yelled at the guy that was with me (he was directing me so I wouldn't drive into a huge rut), and asked if we could pull them out. I tell him that I could just let me pull back in so I could use my front tow hooks. At this time in my life I had my sorority tag on the front tag plate. As I'm driving down towards the guys the mouths drop realizing the truck wasn't his but mine. I hope out all 4'11" of me and ask them where there chains or ropes where and proceeded to get them out. I could tell they had a huge blow to their egos. It was funny seeing their reactions, but that wasn't the first time I've had to pull people out. I have some country in me, and it comes in handy.

But the days of the Yukon are numbered. My brother and his wife will get it and be able to use it. My parents and I have decided on the car I originally wanted. But now the price had been reduced and they agreed to it. I'm glad I held out on them. I'm getting to pick it up this weekend...

It is an oyster grey '08 Volvo. It was a demo vehicle that only has 1,400 miles on it. It is the smallest vehicle that I have ever had as a daily driver. It will take some getting use to. Obviously by my car history, I can't be a road bully anymore. Sad day but it definitely gets better gas mileage and is probably half the size of my Yukon. I'm ready for some road trips in this car! The color of this car really catches your eye. It is beautiful and it is sweet! It is coming at the end of my undergrad career which is unfortunate, but it doesn't mean that this vehicle wont acquire stories. I'm excited about it and ready to put my own miles on it!

This weekend I went down to Jackson for a wedding; one of my first cousins got married. This was my first Episcopalian weddings. I always find it interesting how different weddings can be depending on the denomination. Baptist are the quickest weddings Presbyterians are a close second. The longest I would have to say would be Catholic and Episcopalian. But regardless, my cousin looked beautiful, and the reception was fun. The first time for me to be at a reception at a church and be able to drink wine and beer. First for everything I guess. 

But before all the wedding stuff went down, we had a HUGE dinner at a restaurant. There was 16 people in our party (when we got in we were too late for the rehearsal dinner so we got together w/ some close family friends of ours). It was a lot of fun, and afterwards the "of age" kids went out to a place called The 930 Blues Cafe. There is always an interesting crowd at this place. The liquor drinks are real pricey but really stiff, but the beer is cheap. 

There is a character at this bar that sings on Thurs. Fri. and Sat. nights. MS Jackie Bell...

 (*there is a video to be posted that will give you a better sense of this woman*) It is always a different show when you go. People dancing in the hot packed second floor room, drinking their beers or mix drinks from mini solo cups. I love dancing. It doesn't matter to what, how much I have been drinking, if there is music I will dance. But It is always more fun, without question, when you are dancing with somebody. My older sister made the comment to me that when she was showing some of her friends some videos of me and my little sister when we were mascots and some dances I've choreographed, she had to explain to her friends that she has never been able to move her body the way we can. My younger sister and I have received the same comments about being the mascot... They don't believe that it was/is a white female in the outfit. But back to the blues cafe...

I enjoy places like this. Off the wall places where you can sit back and enjoy the live music or get up and dance. I prefer the dancing part, but I do sit back and enjoy the music. 

Boom Boom

This is were I want to be... Alaska and camping. I actually enjoy camping and doing stuff outdoors. Getting to have a disconnect from everyday life. These two photos above are my brothers. He took these when he was doing the NOLS Alaska course. NOLS stands for National Outdoors Leadership School. I've been trying to convince my parents to let me go do this. They are not going for it. If I got to go, I would want to go to Alaska or Patagonia. Three months or so of being back to basics so to say. I was talking to somebody about it and he thought I was crazy for wanting to pay to go through this. His train of thought was if you want to see this stuff get a nice hotel and go out during the day to see what you want then get to shower. There are times when I like doing those things... get a hotel and get to see sites during the day but what you get to see and do at NOLS you don't get to do or see in little day excursions @ hotels. This was all a day dream while sitting in my class. 

I began my last undergrad class. The Blue and the Gray, history class on the Civil War. I've been wanting to take it for the longest time but every time i tried to sign up for it; it was always full. Took me two years to finally get into the class. I wanted a certain professor but he ended up not doing it this summer in Oxford, so I'm commuting to Tupelo. I'm glad that it is only meeting three days a week, don't know how much I would like driving to and from Tupelo Monday through Friday.  I know my dad does it but then again my dad is Superman. I say this b/c I'm the 3rd of 4 kids. My brother is the oldest at 29, my older sister is only 15.5 months older than me, then my little sister is six years younger than me. Back to my dad, while growing up, I can only think of a few things that he could not make it to. He was at my sporting events when I was younger. In middle school and high school he went to the football games on Friday nights that I cheered, then later mascoted, at, then would be at my cross country or track meets early Saturday mornings. He would even make it to my soccer games on weeknights or on the weekends. He even suffered through the dreaded cheerleader competitions. You have to keep in mind there were three others who were just as involved with extracurriculars. To this day I do not know how my dad did all that he has done. 

But being one of 4 kept life interesting to say the least. Last night at dinner, we were all telling stories. When this happens, you have to be prepared to sit for at least another 20 minutes. My mom went into how she would go to any length NOT to take us to the grocery store. She wants to know what the person was thinking when they came up with the mini grocery buggies. My mom had to put up with the three of us, my little sister wasn't in the picture just yet. We would cut up and get into more trouble than any mom would want their kids to be getting into. We all turned out pretty well I would have to say. No criminal records or serious jail time. Other families in Oxford still talk about some things that we got into together but didn't get into serious trouble, mainly because we were getting a lecture from the cops our families were friends with.  When you saw three teenagers like this:

What are you going to say? We all say that we keep my parents young, and we do. How many people say that their mom and dad would do the "jump on it" dance without hesitation if they heard it come on? That is a whole other story that I could tell, but I don't think I should at this time. Tonight should be another night of goofing off. We are all going down to Jackson tomorrow for a wedding. A cousin is getting married and so just imagine. Friday night we are getting dinner at a restaurant with a close family friends of ours. There will be 15-20 of us. My mom asked the lady on the phone if there were any of the private rooms open, and there are not. So my mom gave them warning that we all might get a little loud and want to kick us out, but the lady on the other end assured her that we should be fine. We shall see. 

Wish You Were Here

I'm still amazed by how much songs remind me of certain people. When I get lost in thought because of these songs, makes me miss hanging out with this person or persons. Cliché song of the moment is "Wish You Were Here," Incubus version. You realize over the years, well, let me rephrase that... I've realized over the years how some people I have hung out with have all gone our separate ways. I have very few close friends but a lot of acquaintances. I don't mind this. Odd, because I love hanging out with people and having a good time, but I find myself now hanging out more often with my younger sister and my older brother and sis-in-law. I know I have said a lot about my family but I have a lot of fun hanging out with them. But anyway...

So excited that I only have a couple more days of class... I only have one day break which kind of sucks but then I'll have three day weekends all of July. Kind of excited b/c there are some concerts I want to go to in Atlanta and Birmingham. I'm also well overdue for a road trip. So we will see what comes together. Still trying to get a job lined up for when I'm finished. Don't mind if I'm not working immediately in August but much rather have a job sooner rather than later. Hopefully I'll be able to do the traveling and interviewing for the MS Arts Commission. I would be able to go all over the South/Southeast doing interviews research and so forth. Talk about road tripping and getting paid. That would be the best thing.

Last night I wasn't able to sleep b/c roommates were up socializing till the wee hours of the morning. So decided to watch a movie and suggested to me was The Boondock Saints. I always forget how much I like this movie. I've always been more of a fan of "guy" movies than chick flicks. But I do like my share of certain chick flicks. I could go on for days about the movies that I love but that could and would get too redundant. 

I get to enjoy my afternoon for once and not be sitting in a classroom... love it when I get emails saying class is canceled. That always makes my day so much better not matter how good or bad it is. So I'm off to enjoy the afternoon by the pool.