Every day gets us closer to the inevitable. I woke up early and ran a couple loops through South Hills. There were school kids at a few corners, waiting for their buses. On my second loop on Myrtle a little girl said, “Hey! I saw you ten minutes ago!”
“I saw YOU ten minutes ago. Why aren’t you at school yet?”
“I guess my bus is late.”
I looked to my left and saw her parents smiling at our brief interaction. I kept running and sort of smiled as I thought to myself, “one day they might be taking her far, far away off to college.”
It was grey and drizzling out. The perfect setting for move-in day. I got back to our rental house and showered. Our check-in time for move-in was 11:20. We were running late. We drove over to Piggly Wiggly to grab something to eat. Maly hadn’t yet been to a Piggly Wiggly in Charleston. “No dawdling” was our orders. My made a quick pass through the store and opted for a 4-pack of lemon poppyseed muffins, a carton of blackberries and a carton of strawberries.
We got to campus at around 11:00 a.m. and had to check-in. Maly had to check-in with the athletics department and confirm her physical at 9:30 a.m. on Sunday. We had to check-in with the Student Services and Financial Aid offices. All the boxes had been checked except for the tuition balance box. I had a healthy “negotiation” with the billing manager. I was previously misinformed and had expected to pay tuition in early September. They wanted money today. We walked out of the billing office with everything smoothed over.
We drove over to Maly’s new dorm and everyone grabbed two armloads of her stuff. I went up to her room and found her roommate, Jazz, and mom, Bridget, already there, rearranging furniture. The girls were behind me shortly after. I left it to the girls to decide where furniture would land and who slept where. I went back downstairs to start hauling in the loads. The football team was there to help freshman move in. I came back upstairs with five of my newest Division II college football player friends who were also carrying all of my daughter’s bags, appliances, and other personal effects.
The following six hours were kind of a blur. There was a lot of going up and down three flights of stairs. We put together cubbies and carts and drawers. We unboxed things. I moved more boxes and bags of trash than I can remember.
At 3:00 p.m. Tim and I made a trip to Home Depot to buy 1×3″ strips of common board so we could fabricate mounts for Maly’s bed’s headboard. We only had a screwdriver and a hammer, so now I have the blister on the center of my palm to prove that elbow grease is still a way to get things done.
There was a lot more moving, shuffling, assembling, reshuffling, unboxing, unpacking, putting things away, and organizing until we called it at 6:30 and went to the dining hall for dinner with Jazz and Bridget. It was “Fiesta Night.” Lyle Lovett says, “never eat Mexican food east of the Mississippi or north of Dallas.” Dinner was fine, but I have a feeling that Maly is going to miss some very certain foods in the not-too-distant future.
We went back to the dorm and there was more shuffling and assembling and putting things away. Maly was organizing her stuff in the bathroom and I figured that was as good a time as any to say my few parting things her. It wasn’t the scene that I would’ve scripted or imagined but, again, life isn’t scripted. I told her I wanted to tell her a few things so I pulled out my phone and opened my short bullet list. And that’s when the frog jumped into my throat and I valiantly tried, and failed, to fight back the tears. I don’t know if she retained much of what I said because I can be a quiet and bumbling emotional wreck when I get to that point. But I said most of what I thought was important, and what I needed for her to know as she starts this new college life on her own. And I don’t think anything that I imparted of the philosophical nature was anything that she didn’t already know and heed in her present young adult life.
She and I found ourselves sitting on the floor, just outside of the door to her dorm room. There’s a little placard hanging on the wall just across from her room that is a tribute to the Hesse family, who donated to the university and funds were used to construct the dormitory in which she’ll reside for the next two semesters. I told her that my high school girlfriend’s last name was Hesse. I told her about how my girlfriend was a year older than me, and moved away to college when I was starting my senior year. And like most that I would assume, the relationship didn’t last. At the time we both wanted it to, but I messed that up and fate and luck and whatever else had other plans. That story that I told her as we were sitting side-by-side on the dirty floor took longer than I’d set out. But it was fun to recount that time of my life. And Maly listened. And because of that fate and luck and whatever else, it came out to be the story of how I’d met Maly’s mother. And because of that luck, and many years later, now I was sitting there with my daughter, late at night on the day that we moved her into her dorm room at college.
Maly decided to rip off the band-aid and stay in her dorm, even though we still our rental house for the family. It was hard leaving her there, but we left it to her to decide, and I think it was the right decision.
