CHAPTER X: A WHOLE NEW LIFE/WORLD/WHATEVER

STANFORD:

Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, adjacent to Palo Alto and between San Jose and San Francisco.

Dylan, Zach, and several other assorted and sundry carbon-based life forms of the human variety descended on Palo Alto and the city changed forever. Film at 10pm if it doesn't disintegrate in the meantime.

It is a BEAUTIFUL campus and from the first day we were taken by the surrounding magnificent scenery.

What can I say? It was not what we were used to. No loving caring even doting 'rents to smooth the way, along with a small cadre of teachers and counselors...and of course our friends. NONE of that, and boy were we lost.

Registration was a seeming nightmare and I am still not sure we did it all all right, but I guess so. Nobody threw us out of any classes, nor booed as we traversed our way through the endless sea of buildings. We had ONE back home. There were THOUSANDS here or so it seemed and they all looked alike except inside they WEREN'T.  I did get lost a couple times or twelve thousand and Zach was right there with me as lost as I was and we knew SOMEDAY we would laugh about all this but for NOW? Nope. Nada a chance.

The fall came and came seemingly ENDLESSLY and then burped and spit us out to go home for the Holidays and boy were we ready for that. It would also be the first time since August we would see Alex and Tony and the oft-times disposable sibs and the 'rents of course, and we could hardly wait. We had begun talking about and looking forward to this escape from HELL we had decided it was for weeks and came to feel it would not come soon enough.

We all flew home thanks to the folks in charge of finances at ye olde homestead and once there we vowed we were home FOR GOOD. NOT GOING BACK. NOPE. NOT A CH...yeh, ok. At least for 3 weeks anyway. We were SETTLED back into the rooms of our post-birth and intended to stay. I do mean settled. I immediately began a plan to remodel and expand our bedroom and it would cost thousands if not millions and then of course WE COULDN'T go back to Stanford. OH HELL N...

NO? Pfui.
Other plans began to gestate in my college-scarred little brain such as it is and none seemed any the more promising logistically, and I felt disheartened until Zach decided he was horny, and well...

Yes we unpacked and made love and unpacked some more and made love some more and have I ever mentioned Zach is the horniest dude AWN THAH PLAN ET BURP? Well, he is and cause of HIM I am a close second so it all works out. HEHEHE.

Then dinner was called for and we were hungry but vowed to beat it back to bed as soon as possible to commence a period of years of total debauchery which would mean we had to stay put and Stanford could send our things and...and...ok maybe not.

The first night after a MASSIVE dinner of thousands in attendance and cheers and balloons and clowns and cotton candy and ice cream sundaes not to mention a collection of surf and turf to DIE for and all that, we and our sordid assortment of misfits friends and sibs settled in down in the rec room, and well...REC...ED...tified. Oh yes we did.

"Hey shortstuff," Alex grinned at me.
"What, skyrubber?" I grinned back.
"How goes your experience at the skuul of hiah learnin'. You conquered yet?"
"Ummm...NO. Would be the short answer. You?"
"Naw. You wanna know a secret baby?"
"Sure."
"It is all SCARY AS SHIT," and he turned to Tony who nodded.
WHEW, I thought I was the only one in the world who thought that.
"Really?" Zach asked.
"Yeh. God yeah."
"Me too. SHIT. I feel SO lost. Hell, if I didn't have my sweet baby Dylan, I don't think I could do this. Hell, some days I want to just curl up in a ball in bed with my baby and never come out."

Then Tony piped in...
"Yeh yeh, me too. Shit. I got Alex and HE knows everything. I just tag along and hope I don't get too lost. MAN, it is HORRIBLE."

"Yeh, and Alex? Knows everything? REALLY?" I grinned.
"Hush monkey," and he leaned over to me and hugged me good. Then he kissed the fuck out of me, yes on the mouth. WHOO.
"God I have missed you you know that?" he said grinning.
"Really?"
"Yeh, for real."
I had to admit I had missed his sorry ass too, God knows why, and told him so which was definitely a mistake I knew but oh well...

The rest of the evening went on pretty much like that, each of us telling our own horror stories of life in Adultville and none of us liked it much and all of us felt the same. LOST, kinda. We wondered how anyone did this freshman stuff and felt like all our fellow plebes knew stuff we didn't and how come that was and boy was this tough and stuff like that. NONE of us had really made any friends NO TIME, and felt really isolated and alone except for our spouses. Oh yeh, we talked about that too. Compared notes. Zach and I had discussed the future and so had Alex and Tony and we were surprised and amazed (and not) that we had all decided we had found THE ONE, and intended to make it permanent as soon as possible and even decided we would confront our parents and tell them we wanted to get married ASAP (BEFORE COLLEGE KILLED US OFF), and wondered if they would pay for the nuptials and if we could have a joint ceremony or smoke joints AT the ceremony and really adult stuff like that as the evening progressed and we got drunker and sillier. LOL.

About 11:00 pm the long day of travel and greetings and dinner and the excitement set in and I was the first to nod off. LOL. SOOO embarrassing, but Zach was next and then so I am told the rest folded. About 2am I woke up and saw the room had cleared and it was just the 8,000 of us left, us plus the twins and the rest of the sibs and I almost laughed out loud. 

Thought I better not though and tried quietly waking Zach to go up to bed but then Alex woke up and then he woke up Tony and the four of us went wearily upstairs to our bedrooms. OUR BEDROOMS, and boy did that sound and feel GOOOD. We slept like babies full of milk and love and oh yeh. It felt wonderful. I for one wanted to stay here forever I thought as I drifted off...and knew I wasn't the only one. GOD please make this 3 weeks last LONG TIME, and knew He wouldn't and it would be over all too soon and didn't want it to be and OH PLEASE GOD, and I wondered if you could play hookey from college and thought probably not. Pfui.

I began to vacillate between I DON'T WANT TO ADULT ANYMORE to thinking that as long as I have Zach I can do ANYTHING. Ok, anything but this and let's just revert to childhood and tell everyone to leave us alone and don't ALL 1st graders have husbands and sex and you know....NO? Fuck.

I wondered if I would still fit in those little desks and chairs and figured probably not so we would have to bring our own furniture and would we have to take it home every night and how would that work when we DRIVE a new Escalade to 1st grade and all. OH I was just a plethora of pithy and ideas and questions none of which made any sense, but that's me and fuck it. I of course kept all this to myself just in case anyone would think I was a prime candidate for the funny farm which is nuts because it is NEITHER, as far as I know and then our 2nd day home came to an end and the only saving grace was going to bed WITH ZACH, and...YEH.

Sigh. I will get through this I kept telling myself and btw I am a PISS-POOR salesman...to myself anyway. FUCK.

I kept looking at Zach and Alex and Tony for encouragement but they seemed as gloomy and poised for the guillotine as I, which DID NOT HELP.

3rd day and it was too cold after breakfast to go out to the pool which was a bummer, even enclosed...and I turned the heat out there up to incinerate and hoped for the best, so Rec room it was. Fortunately everyone else was otherwise occupied so it was just the four of us and we could be and act as MISERABLE as we wanted and no one else would be the wiser.

We complained, whined, caroused whatever the fuck that means, pissed and moaned and I for one was REALLY getting into it. HEY, I got a new calling and I don't need COLLEGE to be whiny and HEY that might work and everyone else went NAHHH, and oh crap.

How long can we keep this up I wondered?
NOT LONG ENOUGH, I feared...and got all pissy again.
Ok, College avoidance plan #247 maybe not, but DAMN I'M GOOD.

CRAP.

Has anyone else found college freshman year just a bit much or is it just the four of us?

We did have Luke that was true, but we had no classes together and that was a bummer, and we didn't live that close either, sorta, and well...it just wasn't working out as any of us had thought it would. We were so busy all the time, and then there is the Zach=horny button which seems to get pushed a LOT, lol, and Vinnie? All the way up in Berkeley and we had thought we would be seeing him all the time, but in truth we saw him ONCE, all fall. ONCE, although we talked on the phone a lot but even that faded after awhile and I was for all intents and purposes BUMMED...about both of them. But I had Zach and well, love does do a lot for life in general and God knows I love that stud. Geez...and btw, neither Luke nor Vinnie came home for Christmas. I had assumed we would all fly home on the same plane but no. Luke went to grandparents in Florida where he and his family were going to meet up and Vinnie was going to Long Island to be with family there. So, not even at Christmas. FUCK.

"You thinking of not going back, shortstuff?"
"Yeh, well, no, well HELL. I don't know. God I am so not getting into this."
"Yeh, I know. Me too. Tony and I hate Harvard and it is so big and so...I don't know."
Tony nodded and so did Zach, and the gloom in the room deepened to a whiter shade of pale.

"Thought it would be great and fun and...but no IT IS SO NOT," we all said in unison sort of.

Not the last time we would do this either and frankly it is a wonder any of us went back. But, go back we did and well, things...eventually...improved. Don't know how or why or exactly when, but in time we kinda looked at each other and decided it wasn't so bad after all, and Alex told me on the phone he and Tony had had the same thing happen.

Still we all wanted to go home and all during the spring it lay before us like candy to a baby and when we did finally get home, it felt SO good, but DIFFERENT. This was kinda I think the beginning of ADULTHOOD settling in for real. Anyone who has been through this and there are millions who have will know what I am talking about. It is a BIG deal, and one no one I don't think is quite prepared for and it seems to happen far too quickly. You feign and falter and then suddenly you get your footing and voila. Adulthood it is.

FUCK, I want my teddybear, but no. Oh well.

Zach and Alex and Tony and I all worked our jobs at the country club as usual, and it was the last summer we would for next summer Zach and I were going to Europe for two months, and Alex and Tony to Japan and then China. We wouldn't hardly see them at all. That hadn't sunk in yet but it would. We worked our asses off and made a ton of money, ok pocket change, and then too soon it was off to California and Massachusetts and our new life as adults.

Hmmm...

As I look back on it all, it seems almost surreal and almost as if it happened to other people and not us.

Is it always that way? I wonder.

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CONTINUE ON TO  CHAPTER XI: