An American Deja Vù: Being Back

So I'm back. And for most of you, this is the only sign of life you have received from your favorite future doctor in the exact month (that's 30 long days to those of you with a longing for Christian and a passion for numbers). Whether you're reading this on Blogger or Facebook, man, do I have news for you. Sit down, grab your most comfy blanket, a box of tissues, and your biggest jar of nitroglycerin, because this post might just alter the course of your life.

Okay, I'll be sincere. This isn't about you (it's about time you start your own blog, I guess), it's definitely about me. And while we're on our way, let me first recap the past month of my life to you. Briefly (yeah, right).

Alicia and I landed in Sioux Falls (often referred to as SooFoo or Sucks Falls, the latter being more derogatory than it deserves) on August 11th, and her family greeted us at the airport with (silent) screams and hugs that couldn't have been more genuine. We went out to eat (count 1 of multiple fast food visits these past weeks) at Fuddruckers, and had the most amazing burgers (and my first Cherry Coke) over pleasant conversation with the family and one of Lish's friends who had tagged along. I immediately got along with her parents (I am a parent favorite, not surprisingly), and my somewhat crude, sarcastic sense of humor seemed to fit right in with the Coggins crowd. Now, our getting along was technically also the only option, because of the week we had ahead of us.

On the 13th of August we all ventured, by car, up to Grand Marais (Minnesota) and the Boundary Waters, with everything from tents, food packs, canoes, paddles, sleeping bags and matches to bug spray. We spent our first night at a camping ground at the edge of town (our last showers of the week), before we embarked on the 5-night trip into the wilderness. The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness has a no-littering, no-motors, no unauthorized fires, no toilets, and no other people policy, which means the most rustic camping around. The entire rest of the week it was life as only Rambo would have preferred it: up at dawn, preparing all our meals over the campfire, 4-5 hours of intense paddling to find our next camp site, making poopsies in the woods or specially engineered latrines 150 ft from the lake, and about 14 portages (that is, carriages of 4 kevlar canoes, several oversized backbacks and food packs, paddles and so on, from one lake to another, oftentimes through dense vegetation or up steep hills). You'd be surprised, though; I ended up loving it. The camp fire bonding, healthy physical exercise, incredible starry nights, sleeping on the rocky ground, and being without a shower or shave for a week all turned out to be exactly what I needed. Disconnecting from society, from the Facebook monster, from Mr. TV, and from all our ridiculous comforts is an amazing feeling, and I'd go back and do it all again tomorrow, if I could. As aching, smelly, hurting, and tired as my body was after the trip, my soul couldn't be happier. That, my friends, is the meaning of good pain.

Returning to Beresford, Alicia's hometown, we spent our next weeks relaxing and being spoiled. Dawn, Alicia's mom, cooked us incredible meals every day, and the evenings were spent playing Rock Band (on X-Box) or Dice (the Coggins dice game that truly grows on you after a while, as simple as it is - and it doesn't hurt when you ROCK it completely every time either). One of the nights Alicia and I went back to Sioux Falls, with one mission on hand: Wal-Mart. We spent about 3 hours just walking around, taking in the atmosphere that is Wally's World, and concluded they were the exact WM dosage we'd been craving ever since leaving the US last time. You might not appreciate it now, but believe me - Wal-Mart is up there with apple pie and peach cobbler when abroad.

On the 2nd of September, I moved into the dorms, and got my room set up. Thanks to Alicia and her decision to save money (on car insurance?) and precious time on living at a friend's house, I now have the sweetest room around. I bought a black fridge, I have a black loft, a black (coooomfortable) couch, huge TV, and even my own bean bag chair. I bought a blender (for those Men's Health smoothies and occasional Jimmy Buffet nights) - and yes, that is black too. I brought 5 (!) suitcases of personal belongings and clothes (and thanks to a mistake made by United Airlines, I only paid $100 for the 3 that were both overweight and in excess - remember, technically just 2 bags of 50 lbs each), so now I have almost all my stuff in one cool room. Classes are hard (I'm taking Organic Chemistry, Terrestrial Plant Ecology, and Genetics), but I'll survive. I'll have worse later, so this is a good time to prove I can do it.

Lastly, I'm single again. But you probably knew that one. And there's nothing I feel like saying about that on a forum as public as a blog, so I'll just leave it with that. Let me just, incredibly, quote Usher: "Breaking up is a natural evolution when you try to figure out what you want in life. If you're with an individual who isn't moving in the same direction and at the same rate that you are, it ain't going to work." And I suppose it didn't.

Labels: Breaks, College Stuff, Major Updates, Personal Issues, Vacations

posted by CK @ 06:36