Spring has Sprung, As Will Exams

Another weekend has come to a close, and the last week of lectures is now in full swing. This causes me a great deal of trepidation, but with enough hibernation on my balcony and in studying spots in Café Dabar, I suspect that I’ll feel slightly less apprehensive about finals in a little while. While I had great plans to be a studying hermit over the weekend, there were a few too many great adventures to get vast amounts of reading done. I’ll justify this by imagining that the break allowed my brain some time to breathe, but I’m not sure that it really requires a ton of silliness to commit to memory terminology and convoluted diagrams, so I’ll simply admit that fun with friends is way too tempting, and I gave in at times. The most odd incident that took place over my few days off was my meandering journey to picnic site #1 in Hawrelak on Friday, during which I completely misunderstood Mike’s directions, was semi-stalked by sinister boys for several blocks, and wandered around the park several times with timbits, a lawn chair, and my backpack in tow all whilst eating my bagel for supper. This was of course complicated by the fact that the payphone in the skating shelter only took coins 1/5 times (really, at one point it rejected my quarter nine times in a row), and that I usually remember friends’ non-home numbers by a process of trial and error. Additionally, I was nearly pecked to death by geese, met up with three friends on the walk through Garneau and Windsor Park, had to avoid being sighted by the CFC group that was playing strange games in Hawrelak, struggled to not smear cream cheese from my bagel all over my belongings, and was extraordinarily exhausted from work. However, when I finally found the group of astonishingly splendid C&Cers, much merriment was had as songs were sung, bongo-techniques were conferred over by Ashlee and Jeremy, s’mores (or the edible ones, at least) were consumed, ketchup was mysteriously smeared on my chair, strange photos were taken, Dustin contributed to the destruction of the planet by not recycling (shameful!), new shoe purchases were admired, somehow-sticky (it wasn’t my foot!) green M&Ms were cast off to thumbless victims, fun driving in Brock was led by Crystal, I had an excuse to scream (albeit rather quietly), and my hands became covered in an odd mixture of s’more and fire debris.

Saturday consisted mainly of work, fabulous coffee planning with Nicole over a coretto and Italian soda (even Sebastian was there; it was a fun McKernan reunion), discussion of brain tumours and school horrors, barefoot walking down Whyte, and napping before meeting Crystal, Rob, and Dusty at my place. It is with these three that I learned that Waldo (of Where’s Waldo fame) wears jeans, there is such a thing as too much coconut rice, Dusty’s neighbour is hystericalyl insane when under the influence of alcohol, I am unable to stifle my laughter when people have small amounts of chicken/blood (but not chicken blood) on their faces (this was rather boorish, but sooo hilarious to me), pimps are attempting a siege of Whyte, Crystal can successfully drive while talking on the phone, my mom has no desire to replace expired Tylenol likely because she feels that Ibuprofen is so excellent, it is unwise to eat a forkful of chili peppers (fortunately this is not firsthand knowledge, but a fact garnered after Rob did this), Narnia creators were wise enough to include Frou Frou in their soundtrack, Dusty has really excellent taste in shoes, Rob will take relatively extreme measures to avoid odd formal celebrations with his equally odd St. Joe’s cohabitants, and sometimes Jess doesn’t stay home from movies when she says she will (lesson: always take keys when leaving the house). In between church, meals, and adventures, there was enjoyment of the alternating sun and rain this weekend. Jess and I determined on Thursday night that the best part of this official month of spring is the variability of the weather; in the past few days, I’ve been surprised to wake up to a warm sun, open the door to April showers, and walk through a friendly wind on my way to work. Rachel Weisz said in an interview in Variety a while back that she chooses to live in NYC rather than L.A. because the weather was monotonous in the City of Angels; at the time, I found that comment rather peculiar, but have decided that she’s quite right in her assessment of the weather. Psych studies have shown that weather has startlingly little to do with people’s moods, but when the weather is more changeable, and as unpredictable as Alberta’s, it’s more difficult to take the joy of different meteorological phenomena for granted. As a completely random aside, please note that in that in the previous sentence phenomena was in the plural form; for some reason people are very prone to mixing the singular and plural forms up, and particularly when my dad does this, it drives me nuts. He now makes this error consciously to get a reaction out of me; it is nearly as bad as my sister using the ghastly term “ridonculous” to get on my nerves. Enough grammar policing: back to the matter at hand. I think that God was very smart (yes, He’s pretty ingenious shockingly enough) to make our four seasons. Not only do winter and spring make really fabulous, and commonly used, analogies in sermons, but relatively innocuous change is always welcome. It’s always a welcome change when I can wear shorts after months of jeans and long johns, and when fall comes, I’m always thrilled to wrap up in blankets and wear puffy jackets.

While a lot of my friends thrive on constant change, I suspect that I’ll always be someone who likes small fun changes and being contented. When I’m on vacation, I like settling into a city for a few days and finding spots for my toothbrush and ghetto blaster. My favourite thing about change is the fact that it brings along new things to love, but it requires time to grow to love these things, and thus some level of constancy is always nice in my life. My friend Caitlin is a ginormous fan of traveling, and is quite insistent that I go on a Caitlin-style trip at some point (her last one lasted eight months, and took her all around the world; I was slightly envious when receiving her postcards). I do plan on doing a big vacation bonanza at some point, and more with my family when I’m married etcetera, but I really enjoy being at ease here in Edmonton. Trips to really neat places make Edmonton seem rather dull, but hopefully people can find happiness nearly anywhere, and find total contentment with the people, places, and occupations that they love. On our big trip to Europe, I found myself once in a while wishing for my little river valley, the library, services at Zion, cafés on Whyte, and the relative quiet of life here. The kind of change that I particularly delight in involves getting new sheets for my bed, a haircut, a different favourite song, new friends, or finding another food/study spot/pastime/band/routine. Especially at my age, the changes that I want are something I consider more than I did when I was younger and routine was the norm; decisions involved more matters of preference than actual plans for my life. Now I can ponder how it would be to move to another city for a job or spouse, what leisurely activities will I have to cut back on when I have less time, and whether or not people will expect me to be less ridiculous when I’m older. Perhaps these changes aren’t nearly as big as I imagine them to be, because they’ll take place as I change (this paragraph is becoming even more cliché and statement of the obvious than usual). Though I don’t think I’ll ever stop being silly, loving my hobbies, or being passionate about Edmonton’s greatness, I suspect that the stuff that’s inconstant in my life will provide me mainly with excitement, escapades, insight, and novelty. But I will miss how things are right now!

A ton of my friends are in third year (yay gap years!), and about to make the jump into their final year of their undergrad degrees, which is a pretty big deal. Next year, they’ll be applying for grad studies, looking for jobs, and planning their crazy trips overseas. It’s been fun to see their plans precipitating, but also daunting to see all of the choices that have to be made. Soon, we’ll be moving out of our lovely parents’ homes, working 9-5, and wearing silly clothes to work. This is incredibly exciting, and I really can’t wait to be making these decisions, but it’s also odd to realize that things will never be the same again; I hope that my friends remain as their silly, fun selves, but we’re also going to develop different tastes and mature in some of our pursuits of fun. It’s particularly weird because I’ve always enjoyed more “grown up” things, whether it was non-Hollywood movies, crazy genres of music, reading serious novels, or going out for lunch, but now I feel like in addition to the part of me that loves serious, gratifying fun, I’m concerned that I’m going to lose at least a small piece of my asinine side with age. My parents can be exceedingly, and at times absurdly, silly, so I suppose you can be as elderly as they are and still be completely harebrained. Sometimes, I’m even alarmed by their silliness, though they thankfully subdue it when with people they don’t know well. However, my parents don’t really have fun while swinging, walking barefoot, air guitaring, wearing tiaras, or learning strange dances. I’m quite hopeful that I’ll retain my affection for these things, but maybe there can be elation in gardening, shopping in snobby stores, drawing out church banners, and sleeping a lot in old age. As long as I’m truly happy and in a good place with God, I suppose that’s all that matter! But I do find it difficult to imagine anything better than acting like a lunatic with Jess or hanging out with my hysterically extraordinary friends. At least there aren’t textbook readings for people of my parents’ age; that’s something I look forward to with great anticipation. On that note, I’ll get back to some reading before class (my second last day!). Hope all of your days are filled with harmless twists and turns, and a great deal of folly! As George Burns wrote, “Young. Old. Just words.”

À bientôt!