On Angela: It started out Crumby and then turned to mush

So that last post touched on some of my feeeeelings about my peers, as it’s a topic that’s been on my mind lately. I’m almost a year out of college, no longer surrounded by hundreds of people my own age. (Dad, you’re still the coolest, of course.) This shift in company makes me think about the people I miss, and then (for the sake of acting eighty) I begin to reminisce, which reminds me just why I miss them so much.

One of my little goals for this (and maybe next) month is to write about people who are close/important to me. Since I’ve already written about my dog, my sister, and my dad, it’s time for me to do a little branching out.

I’ve been thinking about my friend Angela a lot this week. I started to call her on the afternoon of my stomach-bug incident because I knew that hearing her voice while I waited at the bus-stop would give me something to laugh about as I trundled off to my first class. Unfortunately, mid-dial I saw my phone’s battery flashing a suicide warning and I had to forgo my pre-school (ha?) pick-me-up.

But in case anyone is reading this (ha? Hi, Grover) and doesn’t know Angela, I’ll try my best to describe her.

How do I go about this? I guess I’ll aim for chronologically.

Because she was a grade behind me, our friendship in high school was somewhat distanced. We were in some of the same classes and I’d hang out with her before play/track practice, but we each had our own group of friends from our respective grades.

However, one thing I’ve always been able to appreciate about Angie is her uncanny ability to escort me from crying to laughing, no matter what the situation.

When my dog died sophomore year of high school, unlike the back pats and sympathetic hugs my other friends gave me, Angela’s condolences (and I use that term loosely) took the form of disbelief:

“No it did not. You don’t even have a dog. You’re such a liar.”

…before transitioning to full-on mockery:

“Woof…Woof!” (Yes. She barked at me.)

…after which point I got in trouble for “distracting Angela during class.” (To be fair, I don’t think she believed me when we started the conversation, and it was the first time I had laughed all day.)

Although we rarely talked on the phone during high school, whenever I felt homesick or sad during my freshman year of college I found myself calling Angie.

Everything Angela sees and every person she knows becomes fifty times funnier when she tells you about it/him/her. I really don’t know how she does it, and her humor is impossible to replicate exactly. It’s not a matter of embellishment or mockery. She just has this knack of picking out random quirks that everyone half-notices and finding the words/facial expression/voice to make them all the more hilarious. It’s like she’s full of inside jokes that anyone can join in on.
(Wow. I ended that sentence with not one, but TWO prepositions. Squirm, nerds, squirm.)

But Angela, as passionate and diligent as she is funny, is yet another friend of mine headed off in the direction of medical school.Unfortunately, following her there is not an option.

If nothing else, taking Chemistry 101 my freshman year of college meant that my fingers, soiled with wiped-away tears and "stress crumbs," pounded out weekly “YOU STILL HAVE TO LOVE ME IF WHEN I FAIL” emails to my parents. So I don't think those same hands really belong in an operating room. 

I guess my plea to Angela is not “take me with you” so much as it is “don’t go.” I’m selfish. Don’t feign surprise. I’ve told my friend, the Social Hermit, countless times that I am so jealous he got to spend three of his four years at college with Angela. But I had--what, seven?--years with her before that. I’m greedy. (Again, no fake gasps are in order.)

I know if Angela were in these grad school classes with me, she’d bring out sides of my classmates I would have never known to appreciate otherwise.

“This is why it’s funny."
"This is why it’s fun."
"This is why he’s a good person.” 

She notices and enhances the positive without being cheesy or preachy. Something I feel like I’m failing to do right now.

I guess I’m just trying to “Angelyze” (oh hey, you like my new word?) Angela. With Angie there will always be more to say, in more ways than one: more humor for her to illuminate, and more things to say about her. But for now, this is the best I can do.

Angie, this is why you’re funny.
This is why I call you.
This is why you’re so adored.  

(Yes, I shamelessly photoshopped myself into this picture.)

Airing out freshman memories before they go stale: Part 2

Of the ten people that did make 34^th street’s cut, one who was particularly relevant to my own Pennesis is the character that Street aptly dubbed The Awkward Sophomore. 

(No awkward sophomore pictured, just two awkward freshmen.)

Oh dear Graham Trewgarl*, my very own awkward sophomore, a poem for you:

Graham Trewgarl, Graham Trewgarl

How does your awkwardness grow? 

With goodbye notes 

Full of priceless quotes 

You tape to our doors when you go.

Sorry, I'm back. I promise I was not typing in tongues; I just jumped the poetry gun (which is no doubt a weapon made of wildflowers, English Breakfast tea, and latent sexual angst.) 

A little backstory: As I said, Graham Trewgarl was our hall's very own awkward sophomore. He had a pretty big room across from Mo's and kept to himself most of the semester, entertaining the occasional guest who would stop by to play video games and talk in muffled tones (or so I gathered from my post out in the hallway.)

However, as first semester began to wind down, Mo coaxed Graham Trewgarl out of his lair (ironic considering traditional hibernators' seasonal patterns.) 

I discovered their budding friendship one afternoon when I came to wake Mo up from her daily nap with the serene sound of my eating her goldfish (a beloved daily ritual for both of us, I'm sure) and found, much to my surprise, Mo already awake and chatting with Graham Trewgarl! It was awkward and somewhat unnerving. I probably lost at least 7 ounces during that period. 

The friendship got a bit weirder  remained the same when Graham confessed to Mo that he had slightly more-than-friendsy feelings for her. Although Mo didn't reciprocate his feelings, they continued to hang out, and we all got to know Graham Trewgarl a bit better.

However, sometime around winter break Graham Trewgarl announced that he was taking a semester off to work on various movie sets and would not be rejoining our hall second semester. We each said our awkward 'oh no's, and I'd like to think they were all heartfelt. Sure, he would avoid us sometimes, and yeah, he wasn't a champion chatter, but he was still a part of our breakfast-club-on-ritalin-and-sports-scholarships hall. We all thought we were sad to see him go...until we got the goodbye notes. 

Typed onto strips of paper that he taped to each of our doorknobs, Graham Trew's goodbye notes were kind of like a white man's fortune cookie. Except, instead of a fortune, these texts were either insults, compliments, insults veiled as compliments, stamps of approval, or messages to the extent of "Everyone else got a note, don't worry about it. Bye." And unlike a cookie, they almost always (see exception "Julie" below) left a bitter taste in their recipients' mouths.

The highlights that stand out in my mind are: 
(keep in mind these quotes are from memory)

Mo’s:
"So I told you I liked you. Way to avoid me for the rest of the semester."

Elise’s:
"You are so loud. Loud in the bathroom. Loud in the hall. Loud with your voice. Damn, girl. Why you so loud?"

Mine:
"You’re nice—almost too nice."

Tiffany's (my asian roommate):
"We both know there are too many white people on this hall."

(blogger's note: Dear Graham, You are white. You're white! Is that the real reason you're leaving? To reduce the number of white people on our hall? Because, um, you're white, Graham Cracka. It’s like those girls who say they “don’t like girls.” All those assumptions you make about/use against other people could just as easily be thrown back at you. Finally, and more to the point, you’re white.)

Julie’s:
"Wow, I really wish I could’ve spent more time getting into a deep conversation with you. You seem like a great person and I’d really like to make out with you once you and your long-distance boyfriend have broken up."

(okay, so maybe part of this quote is "subtext," but anybody at a 5th grade reading level could see what was written between those lines.)

Now, I realize that said notes were written almost four years ago, and Graham’s opinions may have changed considerably since then, but that does not make them any less hih-lar-iii-oooous. Especially given that said letters were distributed en masse and left like valentines (minus candy--boo) and call Elise "loud" and Julie "perfect" and me "too nice" with italics, which is a font detail that takes extra time, kind of like the extra time he's probably spent thinking about how he's going to knock Elise or me out because we're just a little too conscious for his liking. 


But it's cool because, as I mentioned in the previous post, earlier that semester (by the grace of Jordan's still-in-high-school girlfreak--I mean, girlfriend) my trusty little cell phone and I had already weathered brain assessments (a little too tumor-free), face makeover plans (a little too not-on-fire), and speculation about the size of my vagina (a little too not-little.) No comment on the validity of these claims. Especially the last one. Eyes up here.

So it's cool. Our bridge is not burned so long as my facefire doesn't set it off and that's highly unlikely because I've placed the bridge across my giant vagina so that people don't fall in when they visit the area ("The Grammill Canyon," I think is what the locals call it) and even if our bridge does burn, the brain tumor is likely to wipe out any memory of why I might not want to be friends with him, so I think worst case scenario is that we, Mr.Trewgarl and I, have ourselves a fresh start.

Nice. Almost too nice.


*Name has been changed...ish

Airing out freshman memories before they go stale: Part 1

Penn’s weekly humor magazine, 34^th Street, recently published an article documenting the ten people you meet freshman year and, oh boy, did it bring back the mems. (What’s that? “mems” isn’t working? Oh, okay.) However, one character from my freshman year experience that did not make the list but definitely made my own "top 5 most emotional moments of freshman year" list (spoiler: the evoked emotion = fear) is a not-so-lady-like lady I'd like to classify as The Jealous High School Girlfriend. 

Jordan was a freshman football player in two of my first semester classes whom, I'll admit, I didn't find terribly hard to look at. However, I had my own long-distance thing going on--just your typical highschool relationship: expired by Thanksgiving, thrown out by Christmas--and I had already made the decision to save any infidelity for my 50s, when I'll go all Mrs. Robinson on some Benjamin Braddock of the future.

Jordan had his own long distance noise, a fact I learned when I suggested that we "study for the test together" and he responded with, "I have a girlfriend." His response struck me as a bit of a non-sequitur. (Let me clarify, I suggested this with my books held nerd-style against my chest, my finger no where near my mouth, and both eyes fully open--not even a squint going, let alone a wink.) 

At first I worried that eight years of all-girls school had impaired my proficiency in late-adolescent innuendos. But then I realized, nope. By saying, "I have a girlfriend," Jordan meant, "I have a batsh*t crazy girlfriend who probably verbally abuses me."

(Actual crazy not pictured)

Lesson learned...a little too late. 

One friday evening I texted Jordan about the homework for that weekend, and he texted back with a response and then some small talk. He suggested we go out to ice cream sometime (bogus for many reasons, one of which being the dearth of ice cream places on campus...unless he meant soft serve in the dining hall, which is tacky at first glance, but appeals to my frugal side.) 

Naturally, I asked him how he was okay with his proposed rendezvous, and yet my suggestion that we study together made him sweat. The next text he sent was something to the extent of "well, you've already turned me down for lunch twice, (sidenote: apparently saying goodbye after someone announces they're going to get lunch = rejected invitation) so I thought you might be more open to going out for ice cream." 

I wasn't exactly sure how to reply, so I sat on my thoughts and tried to shrink them down into 160 characters or less. However, before I could respond, I noticed that he was calling me. "That's funny," I thought. "Why would he be calling when we seem to have this texting thing down pat?" 

Turns out, he rang with somewhat urgent news. Evidently, he had accidentally sent that last message to his girlfriend, whose name also started with M (still, didn't he have a 'reply' option?) and so he was just "warning" me and was "sorry" if I "get some weird phone calls tomorrow," but not to worry because it was "just my girlfriend." Huh. 

Also, this means that when crazyGirlfriend called up Jordan, instead of being like, "woah crazy girl, calm down, it was just a friend...a guy friend...using my phone...to text another guy" Jordan was like, "oh, hey baby. Yeah, about that, here's her name and phone number. Okayloveyoubyyyye!!"

The first call came around four o'clock the next day (I guess that's the time when all the High School bars open) and the calls continued to come all through the night (like a Boyz II Men ballad, only terrifying.) Jordan's girlfriend and her band of cronies filled my voice mailbox with menacing messages that, if nothing else, deserve to be lauded for their creativity. 

A bouquet of some of my favorites, if you will: 

Set my face on fire, brain tumor, big vagina. That's a big pill to swallow, even on a Saturday.

Ah, young love. So passionate.

Although I tried, I couldn't save those messages. My friends and I talked about how hilaaarious they were, but listening to them still made me want to enter the witness protection program. Although those girls really could've used a thesaurus, I've got to hand it to them, their arguments were still persuasive enough to convince me to avoid Jordan for the rest of the year.

I hardly ever saw Jordan after freshman year. However, at graduation this past spring, I spotted him posing for a picture with his (I assume not crazy) Penn girlfriend. She looked friendly and warm as she smiled for the camera. I watched them, my mind blasting back to 3 years earlier, and marveled at how happy the two young adults seemed. 

As the picture-taking continued, Jordan moved his face closer to hers, which was tanned but free of burn wounds. Her mortarboard rested on her blonde head, which showed no signs of tumors or recent surgery, and her gown was average size, no longer or wider than those of her normal-vagina-sized peers. "Good for them," I thought, snapping back to the present. 

And if those two "f*cking get married someday," I can honestly say, good for them.