My Mumbling Thoughts

I don't know how it happens. How do I manage to get temporary amnesia every single Friday and believe in my heart through and through that tonight, this very night, is going to be different than last week. Something will be different. Not sure what, but it will be. Sure I'll be with the same people, we'll be going to the same place and doing the same thing, but it'll be different. Somehow.

And so off I go, into the night keeping my eyes on watch for the new, different thing.

It never happens. Instead I end up in the same spot outside of the Froebel bar, with someone, crying on their shoulder about who knows what. Who cares? It's all bullshit. None of it even matters. None of it. I whind up waking up the next morning listening to the same sound that wakes me up every Saturday. The London rain.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.....

**

I don't remember the day, the time or how the weather was but at the same time I remember it all as if it were yesterday. Momma was there, Mel was there and so was Amy. The only three people who were with me at the airport for my Great Departure off to Good 'Ole England where I was going to expand my knowledge, become more worldly and experience life for the first time on my own. At the time I thought it was really fucked up how I only had three people with me, but now when I look back, I'm glad there wasn't a big group of folks there to see me leave. I'm not sure why, but I preferred it to be just those three. I do wish that Mendy could have been with me, but she had to work.

It all moved so slowly and I was glad to check in and get rid of all my stupid luggage that I was bringing over with me. How the fuck was I going to manage two massive suitcases and a shoulder bag? Oh yeah, and my bookbag that I wanted to bring on the plane with me plus my giant Coach bag that I call a "pocketbook". It might as well be another suitcase.

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but you're only allowed one carry on the plane." the lady behind the check in counter told me.

"I do only have one carry on. It's my book bag. This is my purse." Did she not know what a Coach bag was? It only contained my entire life.

"No ma'am. The rules have changed. You're only allowed one carry on."

"Seriously?"

She gave me a look as if to tell me that she really didn't want to repeat herself.

"Goddammit. This is such bullshit."

It was already turning into a good trip for me.

I turned to Momma and told her that the rules had changed to Stupid and now what was I going to do? I couldn't part with anything that I had with me. It was at that moment that the lady also told me that I could only put two suitcases under the plane. I had three.

It turned out that I had to squish everything that was in my Coach bag into my bookbag so I only had one carry on and Momma was kind enough to pay a $50.00 extra charge to chuck my shoulder bag under the plane. I gave my Coach bag to Momma and Mel to take back home. It was a sad moment.

We wandered around the airport until we got to the security gate. This was where we had to separate and say our final good-bye's. It was almost as if the security gate had magically appeared out of nowhere and suddenly boom! Time to leave everything behind in an instant and go off to a place where I wasn't entirely sure of what I was going to be doing.

The air was calm though. I wasn't nervous or even tremendously sad. I'm not even sure I was completely mentally there as I hugged each of them and waved good-bye. It seemed like the end of a country western movie where the cowboy walks off into the sunset and eventually fades away into the horizon.

After I had put my shoes back on, I began my walk towards the boarding gate. I paused to smoke my last cigarette in Virginia for the next eight months and waited around listening to my iPod and feeling quite bored. Momma and Mel called me to tell me some last minute things that they had forgotten to say before I turned my phone off. All this time I had been waiting to leave and now that the time had finally come I was a bit underwhelmed about everything that was currently happening to me.

Still at this point I felt nothing. I wanted to feel emotional. I wanted to feel the sadness, excitement, worry or even feel impatient to just get things going. But as I sat next to the window watching a man read a newspaper, I felt absolutely nothing. I wasn't in a hurry to get everything started. I like to think that part of me was simply enjoying my last moments in Virginia, alone, in an airport that I had been waiting to sit in for nearly two years. I'd see the signs every single day pointing towards Dulles airport and I wanted so badly to drive down the ramps where all of the airplanes lived. I'm sure I was just in great denial about everything that was happening though.

Eventually we boarded the plane and I took my seat next to the window and got as comfortable as one person can be in economy class. I watched my world slowly get smaller and smaller the higher we got in the sky and waited for that moment when it would hit me that this was all really happening.

It never came. And it wouldn't all actually hit me until I would take my very first steps outside of Heathrow airport.

The plane ride itself wasn't anything special. I barely got any sleep but was really looking forward to when we were going to be served dinner and all of our in-between snacks. I'm not sure why, but I've always been a big fan of airplane food.

When we had finally arrived and I looked out my window to see Heathrow, it was if I was dreaming and living my reality at the same time. It was extremely early in the morning and the sun had only started to rise. I was cold, tired but yet still carried on as if I did this all the time. I'm quite the little jet setter who always bounces back and forth from London and America.

I had made it to customs when I had to step out of the queue and fill out a little card with basic information on it that I wasn't entirely sure if it was 100% correct. I was so dazed from the lack of sleep that I just blagged on and hoped that they wouldn't notice if it was an absolute load of crap.

It was then that a blonde girl sat down next to me crying. She was wearing a black and white shirt that I didn't really like and was carrying the same folder that I had recieved from my uni. We were attending the same uni. What a strange coincidence. I wasn't exactly sure what to do. Should I comfort her? Maybe ask her if she was okay? Was there anything I could do to help?

No. Instead I kept my mouth shut, finished filling out that stupid card and went through the gates to collect my suitcases.

I grabbed a trolley and after I piled all of my things on top I proceeded to walk for what seemed like seven years through all of the different corridors that Heathrow has. The more and more I walked, the more and more I thought I would never make it. I would just collapse in the middle of the floor and die. I had worked all that time only to fall dead in the airport and never even begin the start. Even though there were signs everywhere pointing me in the direction of Terminal 2 and I was following them, I was sure that I was lost and would be late to meet the university goup that would be driving us to where we would be living for the next year.

I somehow managed to find the correct terminal and immediately began looking for a spot that I could sit down at and smoke. I was panting and sweating so badly I was afraid that I was attracting unwanted attention to myself. I stepped outside pushing my trolley along and sat down on the nearest bench. My glasses immediately fogged up reacting to the cool, damp air that hit me in the face and I blindly lit my first cigarette that I had had since I left. It was good. It was nice. It was possibly the best cigarette I've ever smoked my entire life.

After my lenses calmed down a bit, I took a look around and surveyed my new surroundings. I could hear so many different accents and saw loads of people who were hailing cabs or walking to their cars so they could go home. They all seemed to know where they were going and what they were doing. I had absolutely no idea. I just looked like a very small girl who was all sweaty and in a brand new country doing who knows what. I was so unsure of everything and realized that I was alone this time around. I didn't have Mendy here to keep me calm and tell me that everything would be okay. I wasn't going to be wandering around London being a tourist. I was a student now and I had to learn how to properly live away from home.

I then had the second greatest cigarette of my life after I stubbed out the first one.

Back inside I found the meeting point and met my first Uni Official. Her name was Gail and we made some small talk about the flight and crockpots. I'm not sure why we talked about crockpots. They just came up somehow.

"Well the next bus isn't going to be here for a little over an hour so you can go ahead and grab some food if you want and have a rest. Don't worry about your suitcases. You can leave them here with me and I'll watch them."

"Oh, thanks. I will do."

I found a little coffee shop called Costa and bought a water bottle and a croissant. It was the first thing I ever bought in London and I decided to keep the receipt since I'm a sentimental sap that clings onto things like that.

Since I had some time on my hands, I decided to do the one thing that I always do when I'm bored. Smoke. It's what I do best.

Sitting in the smoking lounge, I immediately recognized the blonde girl who had been crying next to me at customs. I could see that she was a chain smoker as well and was sat chatting to another lady about living in London.

I searched my bookbag and couldn't find my lighter.

Fuck. Where the fuck is my lighter? I just had it a minute ago. Great.

I gave up and decided to make some conversation and ask the crying, blonde girl for a light.

"Hi. I was wondering if I could borrow a lighter please?"

"All I have are matches, but you can use them if you want."

"Oh, thanks."

I lit my cigarette, inhaled deeply and leaned back on the uncomfortable airport chair.

Make conversation with her Sammi Jo. Otherwise you're going to be a lonely hermit all year and won't know who anybody is. Go on. Say something. Y'all are smokers, it's what smokers do. You make conversation while you smoke. Now you're smoking so go ahead and make conversation. Go on. Go!

"So I noticed that we'll be going to the same uni. I saw your folder." I blurted out to her.

"Oh yeah. That's cool. What are you studying?"

"Creative Writing." It was weird hearing myself say that, out loud, for the first time to someone that I didn't know. I was studying creative writing. To be a writer. In London. God, it was so cool.

"Really? Me too. Whereabouts are you living? On campus?"

"Yeah, Lee House."

"Really? Me too."

I laughed a little.

"That's cool. So where are you from?"

"Northern Virginia."

"Shut up, really? Me too! Where in VA?"

"McClean. I swear, if you're from there too, this has got to be set up."

"No, but I know where McClean is. That's like, fifteen minutes down the road from me. I live in Manassas."

"No way! My boyfriend lives there. Down by the WaWa."

"Oh my god, I actually know where that is. This is so weird."

"I know. But kind of cool. Oh, I'm Trish by the way."

"I'm Sam. It's good to meet someone from my neck of the woods."

"Yeah. We'll have to stick together, the two Americans representing VA."

"Definitely."

Who would have thought that the girl that I thought was annoying and would get on my nerves would turn out to be one of my best friends at uni and we would stick together. She would hold me together when I was homesick and we'd sit and chat about things back in Virginia and places that we missed. Nobody else would understand our crude humor or get certain American references, but we would and we'd laugh about the most random things. We'd find out that she was living on the second floor in Lee House and I was at the very top on the fourth floor, and after we had settled in, we'd find ourselves downstairs outside the front doors of our house, chain smoking and blabbing on about stupid shit just like on the first day when we met.

Posted by Sam at 06:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

It's six o'clock in the morning and I haven't been to sleep since ten o'clock the previous morning. I haven't showered, changed my clothes, brushed my hair or left the flat. God, I hope that I'd never leave the flat looking like the state that I'm in.

I reckon I probably won't go to sleep either. I'm just not sleepy. I don't have the desire to lay in my bed, close my eyes and drift off to count some sheep and catch some z's. I just don't want to. I want to stay awake for as long as possible and see when my crash point is. I'll probably have a shower in a bit only because I have some coursework to hand in and I've got to go four steps outside of the flat in order to do that.

It is that time for us all. The summer ball was this past weekend and now all that we have left is to hand in coursework, some of us have to take exams and then it's done. We're finished. Our first year of uni is complete and we're let free for the summer to do who know's what. Some people are getting full time jobs, others are going travelling while most of us will probably just head on back home to our lives that have been waiting patiently since we left. In truth, I could probably go back home anytime after this Wednesday since I won't have anything left to hand in, but I'll be here until the end. The 16th of June is the last day we can be here. After that, our room keys will be deactivated and we'll be chucked out of the front gates with all of our shit.

I have been thinking about this day ever since everybody left for our Christmas break. People packed up a lot of their things to go back home and it was hard seeing them go off into the blue yonder with their suitcases in tow. I could deal with it for the most part since I knew they'd be coming back in a couple of weeks, but I could only imagine what it would be like when we had to officially move out. We'd have to go through all of our things that we've accumulated over this past year, chuck out a lot of shit that we don't use or even knew we owned and clear out all of stuff in the kitchen.

It's hard to think about. And yeah, I get choked up easily if I think about it for too long.

I'm going to miss my Lee House bitches.

So much stuff has happened to me since I arrived here. So much stuff has happened to us all since we've been here. We've all changed. I suppose others have had much more dramatic transformations than others, but we're certainly not the same as when we first stepped foot into the flat. We've had millions of late night conversations, trillions of smoke breaks together and oh lord the drama, drama, DRAMA. It never ended. I'm not sure it ever will.

We barely have three weeks left in our flat and already I'm having my silent meltdowns when I don't think that anybody's looking. I sit in the kitchen with everyone chatting shit about random things like we always do and I think how many times we've done this. And how many times have I taken it for granted and didn't permanently engrave in my memory how much I'd miss this and how I should have cherrished more moments like these. I should have recorded it all. My memory simply isn't good enough because what if I missed something? What if something happened and I just didn't remember? How unfair would that be?

I've learned that uni time is much different from reality time. While things go on outside of the uni walls, our little uni bubble, life is moving at warp speed inside. One week roughly equates to three months on the inside. Even though we've only been living here almost ten months, it feels like we've owned this place for five years. This is just how things are. There will always be the bar. There will always be the bop. There will always be the Bede boys and the bag of drama that they come with. Everyone will always be right just down the hall and you'll never get lonely because someone is always here. It's very rare that you'll be completely alone in the flat. And if it ever does happen, you can just go down to another floor and see somebody there that you know and hang out with them.

It's a really strange place to be. I love it and hate it at the same time. This is my second home, this is my extended family and this is the new life that was born after I left home. As frustrating as it can be at times and even though I sometimes just want to disappear and forget that I live here, I don't want to leave. I never want to leave. It's my issues that I have with change, I know this. I also know that uni has fallen into a rut for me and change is not only unavoidable but it's absolutely necessary for me. If I don't do something to change how I've been over this past year, I may go mental. Absolutely mental.

The second half of this term after Easter has been insanely busy for me. I've been working at a cool little shop ever since I got back from Virginia, catching up on a massive stack of coursework and sorting through all of my things that I need to do for next year. I also had to prepare myself for the summer ball which is only the biggest thing that our uni does every year and what we've all been obsessing over since day one.

I know I've been a terrible blogger for the past couple of months. You don't have to tell me. I don't update anywhere near as much as I used to and I'm not exactly the most detailed person when it comes to certain things. I don't think I really explained anything over this past year as well as I could have. So I'm working on a thing...a story. About me (naturally). In London. It's probably going to take me ages to write out since I want to make sure everything is right and flows alright. I already started working on it about a week ago, I just haven't had any time to finish it up and post it up on here. But it's in the works and I figure after I get back home and start work again, I'll have plenty of time to detail my entire uni experience back in my little cubicle just like the old days. I'm well excited about getting it all out. Because let's face it. A lot of shit has happened. A lot of words need to be shared.

We have lovely blue skies today. Perhaps now I'll have that shower and wear a dress when I'm out and about.

Posted by Sam at 06:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)