So, I'm in a small town in Ohio, where people smile and acknowledge each other when they pass on the street, and my heart melts a little every time. And I walked down the sidewalk today barefoot. If you don't also live in a city, you can't quite imagine how exciting this is.
I also haven't even been in the country 24 hours and have already made a fool of myself in a café, because every single time I come back here, I forget about sales tax, and that the price you see is not actually the price you pay. Very confusing!
As I was walking from my friend Moon's house to downtown Oberlin, one of the people I passed was a guy out working on his lawn. He looked vaguely familiar, in that way people do when you went to college with them but didn't really know them, so as I walked on, I tried to puzzle out where I knew him from. Did we overlap at Oberlin? Did he do theater, or improv?
A few steps later, it hit me. I didn't recognize him because I know him. I recognized him because he's the new dean of students ("new" in the sense of starting after my time) and one of the stars of this slice of utter Oberlin awesomeness:
The Oberlin College Friday Parody, which some staff made as a gift to the graduating class two years ago.
Since that video went (deservedly!) viral, Oberlin's dean of students is a familiar face!
Now I'm sitting in a café downtown trying to finish a translation that needs to be done by Monday, but not getting far because of all the people I know who keep passing by! Just now it was my former geology professor, who dropped by my table and chatted about everything from the Erie Canal to Celtic-era salt mines in Austria, and told me that just the other day he saw a book he'd wanted to pick up for me (related to a private study on the geology of the moon that I did with him when I was here) but he figured, when would he ever see me to give it to me?
Storm clouds keep rolling in, but not quite amounting to a thunderstorm. There's time, though. It'll happen!
p.s. I keep thinking of the song "A Summer in Ohio" from the musical "The Last Five Years" (which, appropriately enough, I saw performed during my time in Oberlin) but though the refrain "...it wouldn't be as nice as a summer in Ohio..." is ironically meant in the song, I actually mean it. There really is nothing quite like a summer in Ohio, if you want lazy days and friendly faces and the best of dramatic weather and endless nights of fireflies.
p.p.s. Now it's pouring! Cue thunder, lightning!
No comments:
Post a Comment