Odyssey

For one night, college life was all that it was supposed to be. No, not what was promised to me in countless television series, crappy made for TV specials and movies. No, I didn’t get smashed out of my mind. I didn’t do some night putting with the Chancellor’s daughter, pull a prank on the Dean of Admissions, or even wear a toga. There weren’t any drugs, or loud techno music thumping in the background, though there were some rather amusing drunken students stumbling around. But, none of that ever mattered to me. College was never about any of that stuff, not in my mind.

What was accomplished that cold Friday night was far more important. In just one voyage up a cold stretch of interstate, I reunited two star-crossed lovers, navigated through the wintry streets to find long lost friends, stared down the site of my greatest defeat and jetted through with two hands clenched upon the wheel, screamed my lungs out under the dark sky, while a river of bright yellow lights chased after me and I made friends out of complete strangers.

I slept cramped in a bed with too many people, lied awake listening to the droning snores around me and the rustling restlessness of the creature in the bunk beneath mine, and faced the jeers and catcalls of the locals. I drove home through the Plains of Lansing on barely four hours of sleep, and my eyes strained to count the water towers against the bright blue sky. Everything had that spark of exhilaration that comes from an over-abundance of adrenaline, a lack of sleep and a body fried from laughter, smiling and singing until one’s voice is hoarse. Everything had that glow that only happens when you push forward with no regrets and go because you are young and you can. Before I took off with my energetic co-pilot, my mom gave me a sad smile and told me she had forgotten what it was like to be young. Those were perhaps the saddest and sweetest words she had ever spoken to me, and while they won’t be forgotten, I simply hugged her and vanished into the night.

It was like being a kid again, and moving forward into the great wide open at the same time, throwing aside my inhibitions, my anxieties, my duties, my regrets, and simply living. I could have stayed home and fretted the hours away, but for one night at least, nothing mattered but the present. Perhaps it seems foolish to put so much stock into this one trip north, but it meant more than the simple facts could ever portray, so to hell with the mundane detail of it all. In the end, they don’t do it any justice. It was not a mere car ride, but an odyssey of the likes of Homer. So, when I tell you that I was accosted by three trolls guarding a bridge and gave up my sword to be allowed past, does the truth really matter? What is more important, anyhow, the mere facts or is it the meaning behind the experiences? Besides, they could have just easily been the warriors of Leonidas at Thermopylae, or mermaids frolicking in a river, and I suppose in some ways they were.

It was an adventure that rivals my greatest as a child. I met a Princess by the name of Leia, a doctor, a mentor, a soccer player and lecturers from Harvard and Yale, yet they were all one and the same. Where is Yale anyhow? For once, it didn’t even matter. And so, I sat down and talked with those mythical creatures, those fictional characters, those three Spartans, my back up against a hallway wall and lost all concept of time. I simply watched the world go by around me. Couples danced down the corridors, doors opened and closed, people walked past, and I sat and talked to three strangers that soon became friends because I was young and this was exactly what college was supposed to be. I talked and laughed and navigated my way through the myths they weaved. I got a sock thrown at me, and found further evidence that rock ‘n’ roll is the answer to all our problems. The minutes flowed past and I forgot that I was expected elsewhere, that I was late, and must’ve seemed lost to those I had left behind. Perhaps I was lost, and after an hour in that state, Eli found me, and was quickly lost right along with me. Because, who wants to be found when there is so much more in being lost?

It was the kind of night that college life is supposed to be full of, and all too often isn’t. It was spontaneous, exciting, new, yet familiar, and fun. And I learned for certain, it is important to just seize the moment, and act. Otherwise, you just end up with regrets. All that was missing was one red headed kid, but then again, how fairytale can this get? I’m not sure I could handle that kind of perfection, anyway.

“And you, you help me with your voice, you listened when my voice was void of sound, you touch me with your smile, you show me to my smile, and you…” – Cindy by Tammany Hall NYC