On Going Back

Dear Martie,

We went to a state school near the border of Canada, when we made beer runs to our neighbors to our north, not because we weren't legal in our state, but because they had the good beer over the bridge -- and passports weren't needed.

I've been back once since and have had no interest in going back because I really didn't like the college, the education, or the career "services" I received from it. I have a few good friends and a lot of funny memories, but it in the end, it wasn't really a good fit for me. Or for you, since you dropped out after your junior year. You wanted to major in business and they didn't have that major. Guess what? They do now. "Business administration." How's that for a kick in the pants? They added a writing track to the English major the year after I left. Again, a kick in the pants. We were just ahead of our time.

So, nope, no interest in returning. A depressing school in a depressing town. Clarkson head-hunted me and the thought of living up there was unbearable. So I didn't even interview.

Except, now my stepdaughter is going there. And she's a drama major, and when one was an English major and read the play Antigone and the play being performed is Antigone, one who has read the play but never seen it performed -- and would like to -- has to go.

So Hubs and I made the trip last weekend and I steeled myself for the dramatic changes I would see on campus. I was away from our local university for five years and when I returned, I had a hard time  finding my way around at first because of all the new buildings and renovations.

But nope, this campus is the one I left 31 years ago. The apartment, converted from a garage, that I lived in just off campus for my final semester is even still there, with the same ugly yellow blinds in the windows. I wonder if students still manage to have bonfires in the driveway. It was so much fun that you were there for that.

Hubs and I went into the Student Union to eat lunch before the performance and I gasped. At how nearly exactly the same it is. The scalloped wall along the dining area. Here's the one where I sat pinned in by fraternity brothers for several hours, drinking beer and playing Crazy Eights while I was officially kidnapped until their pledge banner was returned. Hey, I got free beers out of it. And again, we were all legal.

The booths and benches are gone -- replaced by tables and chairs -- how would one get pinned in while being kidnapped now? And the arcade is gone, changed into a mediterranean eatery, but who needs an arcade anymore with smart phones with more games than we could have even thought up? Although do smart phones have the KISS pinball machine? Because that was the best pinball game ever.

And also missing is the jukebox -- again, with iPods, who needs to listen to a jukebox -- that played -- was it a Pink Floyd or Queen song that played every other song in rotation for our entire junior year? The Wall or Another One Bites the Dust?

But other than that, wow, was it ever back to the future. Except I was there as a parent of a co-ed, not a co-ed. That is a little harsh.

We sat down at a table along the window that looks out at our first dorm. And then I thought about you, my friend and former roommate. And what would you know about smart phones and iPods? We both got on email in its infancy, when you had to use the same service in order to be able to send and receive messages to one another and we considered carefully and decided on Prodigy.

I'm in the Student Union, Martie, and looking at our old dorm and nothing has changed. And I want to text you and tell you about it, but there's no texting in heaven, or wherever you are. And I sat at that table and unexpectedly burst into tears. Grief is not linear. It's a figure eight that comes around to leap into our lives when we least expect it and are helpless to stop it. There I am, a fat, wrinkled, gray-haired woman, sobbing over my Student Union sandwich. I mean, the first three are enough to make everyone there look at me funny, "Oh, there's someone's mother," but the last -- "and what is her problem?"

And I want to tell them all, "One day you might lose one of the very best friends you make here. And then you'll know what it's like to just burst into tears in the middle of a public place and be helpless to stop. And I pray it never happens to you."

But I just cover my face with a napkin until I pull it together.

I hate this place, but it brought us together and we had one of those friendships where two people click instantly and now I want to tell you about how much it is just like we left it; a little time capsule, but I can't.

I miss you. You've been gone longer than we knew each other. That makes me gasp in astonishment -- like the January cold of this place used to suck the air out of lungs -- just as much as walking into the Student Union and seeing how little has changed since we sat here as co-eds, with our entire lives ahead of us, listening to Pink Floyd and Queen and playing pinball and eating bagels and pizza. Except for you that "entire life" thing didn't work out so well.

I hope we find each other again sometime, although I know neither one of us really believe in that a whole lot. But I hope we're both wrong. I hope we're wrong. And Martie, in case you're listening, this place is just like we left it. All in all, it's just....another brick in the wall.