summertime at school (why am I here)

Funny story.

So it's the end of the school year, and I pack up all of my belongings: clothes, shoes, curtains, rug, lamp (what's left of it), desk stuff, and bedding into IKEA bags. I haul them out of good old Dayton 106 into my new dorm. My room has an extra little window strip and my bed is too tall for me to sit on...I have to get a running start every night to make it up there. There is a pretty nice view of a field and trees outside my window. The room doesn't fit my stuff though! Even though it is bigger and even though mom took home half of it already (including Kevin). Kinda hard for me to understand.

The dorm has a different feeeeeel about it. Different roommate, different neighbors, full of people taking summer classes, more late nights, less practicing in practice rooms, more ABC family and Harry Potter movies running in the lounge. The room next to me has the most obnoxious door that gets stuck on the hinges every time it opens and slams shut every time it closes. AND FOR ONE THING I am on the BOYS side of the hall. The boys' bathroom is nicer than the girls'. The girls' bathroom has seizure inducing lights that flicker and make constant buzzing sounds. The showers are secluded in a small corner next to a door that you can't go into or out of. Like a horror film waiting to happen.

I settle in my stuff and everything stops around me. What do I do now. The sky has been overcast for seven days. I am stuck somewhere I don't want to be. I don't know why I ever came to the conclusion that I should be here for the summer. I'm kind of lonely and I need to be somewhere new. I need to travel, I need to write music, I need to perform, but instead I'm in Ithaca 105 for the summer. Wow.

Okay...so then I head out to my new babysitting job (found me on SitterCity.com hah!) The grandmother who is VERY young in spirit picks me up. She has zebra striped glasses and straight blonde hair with bangs. She speaks with a German accent and is over enthusiastic about the fact that I go to Westminster. We drive up to a big white cottage house with a red barn and I head inside. Two kids run up to me screaming happily. Madelaine, the girl, is 3 years old and her brother Vincent is 5. Cutest. kids. ever. Brownish-blonde hair and dark brown eyes. Vincent says hello in German, and I look at him, confused. "I'm from Germany!" he says. "Come on! Let's go build a fort!" He pulls me by the arm and Madelaine runs ahead, a Dalmatian, two Labs, and a speckled looking Beagle of some sort follows behind me. This is going to be interesting.

I spend the next four days with these kids. 30 hours and some of the most chaotic experiences of my life. Including but not limited to a European party, their mother being rushed to the hospital, a miscarriage, a frantic German father, Madelaine falling asleep in my arms, bedtime stories, playing hide and seek with Vincent, Barn dances, American flags, roasted pig and toy guns, cranky kids, being offered a bottle of Jack Daniels at the end of it all. I felt like a nanny in a movie. It was insane. They payed me extra and I gladly accepted.

I take a cab home on the last day and the cab driver and I talk about life. He asks me where I want to be in ten years and I think about it and say, "I want to be on the road, touring." He says, "Hey! You should try out for American Idol or something." "Ehh...I don't know. I've thought about it before but I think it'd be too much pressure," I said. "Well, it'd be character building. Why not go for it? Go after what you want before life passes you by. I'm turning 47 this year!" Oh my gosh, Hannah. He is so right. Maybe not about American Idol...but DEFINITELY about going for it.

Moral of the story: need apartment. no kids for long time. cab driver says try out for American Idol.