I walked out of my last undergraduate final in a daze today, gentle reader, and a happy one at that. Tonight would’ve been an ideal time to talk about the sublime, Paternism, fin-de-siècle, and other choice bits, but I’ve since jettisoned them from my brain. Lucky you!
With a blank slate firmly embedded in my skull, I groggily went on a trip–made road trip by the atrocious traffic–with Esther to Oak Park. Though the traffic was horrendous, the trip was wholly enjoyable. We visited some of Frank Lloyd Wright’s magnum opuses, grazed at Maple Tree Restaurant, conversed, drove by opulent Norshore houses, and had an overall fun time, all with that pleasant mobility characteristic of college life.
I will miss such days, you know, but as the peerless Mr. Harthouse said in Hard Times, “What will be, will be.” May the Lord help me purge my mind of Dickens.
Having immersed myself in a frightening four hours of British literature, I just entered the suite to discover Brand-o and Esther making a piñata. College, gentle reader, can apparently drive people to extreme boredom.
“A piñata,” you say. “How cute.”
You’d think so, wouldn’t you? The problem with the handicraft is that it bears an uncanny resemblance to a SMALL CHILD. They call it a “snowman,” but its silhouette is unquestioningly tot-like; were the police or family advocacy groups to look from outside in, they would go into hairy conniptions.
I articulated as much, but production blithely continued as wads of newspaper were slapped onto the precious creation, a creation suspended from the ceiling by its neck.
Well, we’re probably going to get a call from University Police anytime now, but I’m content with the effort I expended on warning our in-house Van Gogh and Gauguin. I’m so content, in fact, that I’m compelled to beat that damn snowman with a golf club. Ironic, you might point out, but therapeutic as well.
My favorite paragraph from Hard Times, gentle reader:
“They carried him very gently along the fields, and down the lanes, and over the wide landscape; Rachel always holding the hand in hers. Very few whispers broke the mournful silence. It was soon a funeral procession. The star had shown him where to find the God of the poor; and through humility, and sorrow, and forgiveness, he had gone to his Redeemer’s rest.”
Thanks, Mr. Dickens.
In other news, congratulations to Patrick for finding gainful employment at this joint.