"You lost your virginity to Brady?!"
We were sprawled on the porch of the dorm, watching the sun come up. Brady snoozed in the armchair, and us girls curled up on the sofa. Steve made us hotdogs and we consumed them with gusto, after praising Jesus and smothering them with ketchup.
She smiled at me, slightly embarrassed. And I felt suddenly very warm, and full of love. Brady is a sweetheart, but he's also the strangest human being I've come across. Earlier that evening, I had been told about how he kept my friend company during a panic attack, when he didn't even know her but just knew that she needed to be held. Revelations about her sexual history just seemed make sense, in a good way, and in a very complete way.
"Most of my one night stands and I have stayed friends, or even become friends," she said, and I smiled at her. I realized, for half a second, that I was reminded deeply and poignantly of the Angela Carter book I love right now, The Magic Toyshop. Not to spoil the story, but it's about the varieties of love and the limits of love. I felt loved, and cared for, and glowy warm emotions radiating from my friends.
I don't know quite how to describe this, how it shouldn't seem right but it feels very right. I guess it's an intense fondness that came over me, fondness for her and for funny Brady, fondness for warm summer nights and good company.
2003-05-31, so lovely
Why do I meet lovely people three weeks before I leave? Ah, Frank is lovely. Frank is also a goofy hipster (hipsters are inherently goofy, they can't help it), and talks like an old man, but he's wonderful to talk about life and books with and (when I'm drunk) he counsels me about men and sex. Dog bless. He cuts away the dullness. He chases it away with a flaming sword. And in a week, or even less than, I probably won't see him again. At least for an undefinable amount of time (an offer for a bed stands if I show up in the UK) Anyway he keeps me company when I am lonely. We shoot the breeze like good college kids.
Highlights of our conversation included talking about constant moving as a kind of alive-death thing, like you're dead or should be dead but your life is prolonged, him complimenting my funny diction (I'm not lyin' if I tell you that's the quickest way to my pants! Okay, that or buying me a drink), and him noting that yesterday morning I was blasting Sleater Kinney. I fell asleep with Sleater Kinney playing... loudly.
Last night I chastised the hall tutor. "What do you meeeean I should turn down the FEMINIST RAGE that is SLEATER KINNEY! No way! Okay, so it's not all feminist rage, it's also songs about LIFE and the HUMAN condition, but that's beside the point. The Point!? You never came to speak to me when I was a lonely, new international student, Mr. Warden Man --You can't talk to me now. That gives you NO RIGHT to tell me to turn down the music. Yeah, so it's four in the morning? What of it? You're a terrible excuse for a father figure. I hope your children all hate you and resent you!"
And then, honest to God, I asked him if he was Greek (???)
I hung out in Sophie's room, Sophie for whom I have a deep love because she is the biggest sweetheart in the world. She said "You know, most of the time you were just normal drunkard, but it cracked me up when you pointed to your shoes on the floor and shouted "I have a pair just like that!" When I told her about the rest of my evening (mostly including feeding spiders to a cat, as well as another Stupid Incident in which I Kiss the Undeserving) she said "You said you didn't need me to put you to bed, but I won't believe you next time." Frank tucked me into bed too, even turned off the blasting Sleater Kinney, but man there was no keeping me there!
Solution: Those straps like on hospital people trolleys! I just know it.
You know, I really think I'm not one for moderation. Not like that's a revelation or anything, of course.
2003-05-29, I think it was the Tequila in that so-called long island iced tea
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