Ruby Slippers

So the big day was today. I moved into my college dorm.

The home/state-sickness is a deadweight in my chest. I can feel it, right behind the top of my sternum.

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I Left My Heart in San Francisco, by Toby Bennett

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Did I expect it? Yes. That's probably why I'm feeling it. I feel what I expect to feel, and it's ruining my first day of freedom from parents. I'm all by myself in my single dorm. I'm surprised, and so incredibly lucky, that I happened to come out at the same time as some other girls for dinner, so I didn't have to sit like a loser by myself at an empty table. I wasn't so lucky for the kick-off - as much as I like my RA, he's not very good at coordinating my floor into leaving at the same time. Everyone left before me, and I had to go to the field alone and sit in the middle of a crowd of strangers. Then it started raining halfway through - unpredictable weather already? - and I left with the crowd around me to avoid sitting in the bleachers, getting rained on, and surrounded by no one. I'm probably going to skip breakfast tomorrow too, because I have no one to go with. (*EDIT: I did skip.)

My new college seems to be exactly like my old high school, except I can't find anyone I consider to be "my people." All the guys look like popular jocks - I'm not even exaggerating when I say ALL - and all the girls look like the prep clique, just intensified. Approachable people (that is to say, people who aren't wearing expensive brands and lots of makeup; that's my definition) are nowhere to be found. I'm not even sure I can be classified as a minority in this student population, personality-wise. "I'm" virtually nonexistent. There are so few of "me" that I don't think there are more than 5% of "me" in the freshman class.

** I understand I'm supposed to go out and find them, and "of course there's more than 5%," but I sure can't find the introverts if we're all too shy to brave the ocean of confident cocky jocks and cheerleaders out there.

The awful thing is is that I've been feeling this way about my college for a long time. I felt like I had to settle for it, and I never really fell in love with it. My dad has been telling all his work friends about my choice of education, and they all say something along the lines of, "Oh, that college is a really good choice," or, "The campus there is beautiful, you're going to have so much fun." They all ask me what I'm looking forward to the most, and I have to BS some answer because I wasn't looking forward to anything other than freedom, and I can't say that in front of my parents. The atmosphere is exactly the opposite of the intellectual setting I wanted, but I can't do anything but suffer through it until I can get back to California.

All I want for Christmas...

I'm going to cut this post off early before it gets any more depressing. I should stop thinking about what I could've done, and focus more on how I can better my future. And I'd love to do that, I really would, but it's a bit late to change who I fundamentally am, and who I fundamentally am is not any good at approaching intimidating, out-of-one's-league people.

In other words, I'm screwed. Here's to a fantastic first year.

Big Girls Don't Cry, by Fergie