Anticipation

It was around midnight, and I looked around my room, not quite feeling like it was the right place to be. So, I went down to the garage. And I cleaned it.

I had worked an eight-hour Ben&Jerry shift, where I was visited by Ben and Audra which was cool, and got home, not exactly feeling all together good. But a surge of energy pulsed within me, and so I focused this energy on something I felt to be more or less productive. So I spent the next four hours cleaning out every crevice of the garage, sweeping out every dead worm, ushering out the live ones, rearranging all of the old boards and knickknacks and moving very large tables and furniture, all the while making an obnoxious amount of noise in the wee hours of the morning. I however didn’t feel that it was necessary to be concerned about how the neighbors felt. Or the skunk that decided to walk by to see what the noise was all about. The garage was gross. But now, it is bearable again. At least I can fly to Italy not having to worry about the garage. Or the laundry room. Or the kitchen. Tomorrow, I’ll take care of the bathrooms. The next day, I’ll do damage control on my bedroom. After the garage was put back together, I decided to take what I didn’t anticipate to be, one of the best most refreshing showers ever before realizing I was hungry. I inevitably then got dressed, packed up the laptop and some money and a disc of friends episodes and shipped out to Perkins at 4:00am. And now, here I sit.

I am getting extremely excited about Ben & Audra’s (inset with Joe) wedding on the thirteenth. Audra and I will drive to Dubuque, Iowa on the 7^th, and will spend a week checking out Master Schmidt’s studio and a whole bunch of things that will acquaint me with her city. What concerns me however, is the fact that not many people are taking my officiation of their wedding very seriously. They think its either “funny” or “weird” or “wrong” which may or may not be right, but I haven’t gotten any positive reinforcement from anyone except from the bride and groom [which I know is all that matters]. They’re two of my best friends and they felt it was fitting for me to do this for them. And I am honored. But I can’t help thinking that what I’m doing SHOULDN’T be taken seriously. Or should it? Either way, I will do my best, and it will be a special day. I CANNOT wait; apparently, the week before the wedding will be spent running around Dubuque getting ready and will be supplemented by a couple of days after the wedding hanging out there before Ben and Audra and I drive to Chicago and fly home from there (they of course will be shipping out to their honeymoon at some Mexican island). My little vacation to Iowa will be HOTT.

On top of that, I can’t contain my excitement about ITALY; people keep asking me “when are you leaving?” and I’m still at, “holy crap, I am going to be leaving.” And that means being away from all of this bullshit at last. I keep looking through the travel magazines at work, I look up Rome picture sites online and keep leafing through all of my pre-departure materials, despite having read them three times over already. I talked to one of the people who are going, and the kid seems cool; he’s from PSU, still in town actually for the summer, and is on the same flights arriving in Italy from Philadelphia. I looked through our suitcases at home and brought one down from the attic and cleaned it out. My laptop is ready to go and so are my passport, visa, and travel arrangements. Now…I just need time to pass before I can get the fuck out of here.

I saw James McKenna today. I walked up and shook his hand. Always interesting. And now, I’m not too sure if I want dessert. I deserve it, but I don’t want to spend any more money.