- My first remote update! I am at GSP. It is planning week. I am in List-Making-Mode.
- It’s the smells that set off my memory, and the strongest of those memories, weirdly, are ofthis week last year, rather than GSP proper. Maybe it’s because that’s when I first encounteredthese smells–the same way the smell (odor? miasma?) of Nevin still reminds me of my five weeksthere during my GSP, instead of my whole freshman year.
- Same floor. Same room. Six dumb flights of stairs or the bitchy elevator. And the lights don’twork as well this year.
- But! I get to practice saying “Sixth Todd” as all one syllable again.
- I got
- I shouldn’t say this, because Kim and Taylor will probably read it, but I don’t think it reallymatters now. Last year’s campus director was named Laura. This year’s director of seminar is adifferent Laura. The first one is about as gone as you can get, but every time someone mentions thesecond Laura by name, I shudder involuntarily.
- The new campus director is named Joe, and he’s kickass, awesome, right on. I’ve been lookingforward to working with him since the retreat in April, and so far it’s every bit as good as I’dhoped.
- Just finished American Gods, which wasbetter than chocolate (and chocolate, of course, is better than everything).
- I loved our staff last year, and I would have been happy to see any of them return. Not many ofus did–some by choice, some not so much. But the few who did come back… well, if you’re readingthis and you didn’t make it this year, don’t take this the wrong way: again, I loved you all. ButErin, Mooch, Jimmy and Caudill are the ones I would have picked if I’d had four choices, andthey’re all back, and that makes me really happy.
- But.
- B Rich and Harney would have been in my picks too, except I knew they were going to be head RAslast year anyway. And they’re brilliant and exactly right for the job, and it’s going to be a goodtime, with them around.
- There’s simply no comparison to draw between them and the people who had those jobs last year.Not just apples and oranges, but, like, apples and tungsten.
- So it’s not that I miss last year’s head RAs because I want them doing the job again. It’s thatEmma and Drew were my friends, and now that I’m here again, with these smells and that room andthose memories, I miss them so much it’s like a knife in my side.
- That said. It’s going to be a good six weeks.
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