September 2, 2001

I'm home.

Yeah, I leave for school in two days, but I'm still home for now. And I felt it on the drive home yesterday. For one thing, it was there - the ocean.

I missed the ocean. And it has little to nothing to do with Matt and his talk of how I remind him of the ocean when I move.

He's so romantic.

I have so many worries about school starting. I haven't been having the usual dreams - the bad residence room, the scary misplaced classes, the classes in theoretical time philosophy of the Pigme tribes circa 1750, the missing friends...

No weird anxiety dreams (not like Secra anyway). Just the whole mother hen situation and the bad feelings that come from that, the missing Matt, the missing the paper already, the worries about money, internships, friends, and classes.

I worry about how things might change with my friends this year.

Not once since I started university have I maintained the same core group of friends from year to year. And I worry that all the observations of my growing up are true and I might be an actual adult and want adult friends. I love my friends from last year, but being adults wasn't exactly high on their lists of favourite activities.

I fear the Beasley situation, that Phil is going to be... inaccessible, I guess. That Luce will be different. That Dice being off campus will be a problem. That things will be different with the uglylovebug (though she is an *adult* with a job and an apartment now) or with Thelma and Louise. That Christopher will be weird because he seems to still have a girlfriend.

I'm worried that I'm going to be different.

This is all because of Jan. And my mom and aunt Jo. But because of Jan. The last time I talked to her, she told me I was a very different person, that this was my summer to grow up. Sometimes when you grow up it means you leave everything *down* behind.

I wonder if that's going to be some of my friends.

I think Thelma, Louise and uglylovebug and I will be okay. But I worry most about how Beasley is going - we were good friends last year and now things might just be wrong: awkward, uncomfortable, horrid...

I don't want to know, really. I'm afraid that he's going to be angry with me still and I'm afraid that I'm going to aggravate the situation by thinking he's mad at me.

I should probably just stop thinking so much and pack.

Packing is good. I still have laundry to do, places to go and things to buy (cords, I was thinking, and a long denim skirt, maybe a couple of tees). Plus, I'm expecting a call from Matt.

He and I talked last night. It was wonderful. We didn't talk for that long, but it was great to hear his voice. I'm going to miss him so much when the numbness from all the moving wears off.

I'm afraid that Matt being in the picture might change the way some of my friends relate to me. I mean, he's... well, read about it and see. There's a certain amount of "What the fuck?" allowed in this situation. Hopefully everything will see I'm me, even if it is a slightly more mature and streamlined version.

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