"PAUL WESTERBERG"-PART THREE "BACK ON CAMPUS"

"PAUL WESTERBERG"

PART THREE: BACK ON CAMPUS

HEATHER

    What an incredible difference one week makes. Leaving campus, there was a flash blizzard and now, returning to campus, it is a whopping and humidly warm 77 degrees. Just walking back to Witte from the Union—not even remotely a long walk by any stretch—made me break out into a healthy sweat. If my Mom were here, she would say to you that, “Women don’t sweat. They perspire.” Well, regardless of what she thinks concerning this subject, I was SWEATING! By the time I got to my floor and finally my room, I was, shall we say, um…of unkempt scent, so I decided to take a shower.

    The first thing I noticed when I walked down the hallway to my room was the extremely unfamiliar and rapturously surprising sound of absolute silence. I mean—aside from my footsteps and my own breathing, there was a complete absence of sound, something we are certainly lacking in supply of. Even in the middle of the night, there’s always some semblance of sound from either someone’s stereo or someone typing a last minute paper or someone’s romantic howl or broken hearted yowl into the telephone on the other side of my less than paper thin wall.

    I was especially grateful that my roommate wasn’t back yet either. Not that I have a problem with her or anything. She’s fine. She’s nice enough. But I wouldn’t call us “friends.” Despite our living arrangements, we are acquaintances at best, which does house its own level of eggshell tension.

    Having the entire floor to myself is a rarity and whenever I am able to covet this level—or ay level—of solitude, I try to grab it. For instance, I LOVE football Saturdays but not for the games. I love football Saturdays for the peace and quiet around here because…nobody’s here! I can write a paper quickly and without distractions. I can do all of my laundry without competing for washer and dryer space. I can listen to whatever music I choose…and without headphones. Or I can choose to not listen to anything at all. Being with the company of my own thoughts and the pleasure of not having to feel that I need to be “ON” for anyone else, I have realized is a necessity for me. I guess it’s like recharging a battery for myself to use once football season inevitably ends and everyone, and all of their friends, are back here all of the time. I hate to admit it but I tend to fall into a bit of a depressed funk when football ends. There’s no gradual shift in the increase of people. It’s just…BAM! They’re back and I have to be “ON” instantly whether I wish to or not and I typically don’t want to be but if I shut myself down, I’ll be designated as the resident basket case. I’ll try to go for walks or find a quiet hideaway in the upper part of the Union but then, I feel frustrated at having to make any adjustments to have some peace of mind here and there. Certainly counterproductive, don’t you think? Last year, when this happened at the end of football, I was scared that I was having some sort of a mini-breakdown or something. I know now that’s not what it was but even right now, knowing that my floor will be wall to wall with people again very soon, I can’t help but to feel anxious.

    I decided to hop into the shower and get myself clean, all the while listening for any footsteps or door creaks and squeaks signaling that my floor mates had returned. Thankfully, there was not a sound. Anticipating someone arriving soon and not wanting to be caught off guard, I quickly found a T-shirt and my favorite camouflage cargo shorts and took off for the Union to have some popcorn by the lake.

    I sat by the lake for hours. I sat until the sun had almost set and it was too chilly for me to sit there any longer in a T-shirt and camouflage cargo shorts. All I did was watch the boats and the ducks and ate my popcorn slowly and I spoke to absolutely no one the entire time and it was heavenly. If I could find a way to preserve this moment, this feeling, I would do so in a heartbeat because this afternoon was the best possible way for me to transition back to school, classes ad just being surrounded by…everything, and nearly all of the time. It’s not that I don’t like people. I do. It’s just hard to get a true fix on what people want, need or expect. Which actually leads me to Tracey Wolf.

    I would say that for the most…oh well…I’ll be honest…just about the entire time I was sitting by the lake, I was thinking about Tracey, about me and Tracey and the day of the blizzard. It’s so odd to me that even after all of the time we were together that day, I was struggling to piece together a concrete memory of his face in my mind. It was hazy and more of an impression and it frustrated me that my memory could recall some and even unwanted things from the recent and distant past with crystal clarity but with an image I really wanted to have at the ready, to study and hold so closely, it was something more elusive and shimmery. Thankfully, what did return to me in crystal clear clarity was the feeling of that day, that bus ride and my time—that amazing time—with Tracey Wolf. As I walked through the Union and was about to leave by the front entrance, I stopped cold and just took in the memory of that long afternoon as fully as possible. Time just seemed to stop while I was lost in thought. And it just made me laugh to myself when I think of how I actually spoke that day! It never occurred to me that I could even have that much to say! It never occurred to me that I could ever be so confidant because it’s just not like me at all to be so forward. God knows I liked Tracy. I really liked him. But, I really liked myself that day, even though it almost felt like there was another person inside of me filling me with wit, vigor and zest—three qualities and characteristics of which I feel that I am sorely lacking. Yet, on the other hand, they were there that day and it was indeed me.   

    I can’t believe I sent him a postcard! Ahh! Who knows if he even got it. And if he did, did he even care?

TRACEY

    I swear that I must have read Heather’s postcard 1000 times or more. I know that sounds gushy as hell and I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you felt that you had heard enough from me by now but I can’t help it as that is what I did. I never really thought that she’d send one but I am not ashamed to admit that I hoped that she would. And then, to ask if we should “get together” at school…man, that was more than I realistically could’ve wished for, especially after only having just met her. But isn’t that how people do this anyway? Friends have told me many times that I move too slowly in situations like these but I hate never knowing when the time is right. I hate to guess or assume anything but…and I know, I know…no guts, no glory. Even so, I’m glad that Heather opened the door and in doing so, how could I not walk through?

     I was practically drowning in my own sweat lugging my stuff plus winter coat from the Union down Lakeshore Path back to Tripp. After cleaning myself up and getting myself settled in again, I grabbed the student directory to find Heather’s number. I found it, called and her roommate told me that she hadn’t seen her since she’d gotten back herself but she would leave her a message.

    And so I waited.

    It was easy at first. I mean—you never know what anyone does or what they’re busy with once they get back to school. Usually, I tend to heads straight to the Gatehouse, grab the latest Isthmus and find a movie to check out. But today, and even though I did grab the Isthmus as I’ve always done and  did want to see this new movie again (“The Adventures Of Baron Munchausen” if you must know…), I didn’t want to take the chance of missing Heather’s call.

    Now, not wanting to really advertise my true intentions to my roommate, I feigned frustration and a need to stay on track with my Chaucer class readings when in actuality (and I realize that I sound like some lovestruck school girl), I just wanted to wait by the phone.

    She never called.

    Now before any of you call me out for really embodying the spirit of a lovestruck school girl, I feel the need to explain…or rather, clarify. In my most rational, logical way of thinking, I know all the way into my bones that Heather not calling me back was not personal. But, I just couldn’t convince myself. I couldn’t shake these nagging thoughts that maybe she just didn’t like me as much as I liked her…and that felt like every single high school dance that I ever went to. The times where I would once again fill myself with some misguided hope that “She” would walk in and magic would happen, but over and again, “She” never arrived, magic never happened and I went home lonelier than I was when I first went in. Yeah, that’s was it felt like and no matter how much I try to stay logical about it, it just still feels like I lost something before I ever really had the chance to have it.

HEATHER

    It’s my own fault. I knew I just couldn’t bring myself to do it with everyone around. When I got back from the Union, my plan was to call Tracey and just…see…you know? I do realize that privacy is the rarest form of currency in the dorms but that is indeed what I wanted—at least to make that first phone call. But…everybody was around and it just felt like ears were coming out of the walls each time I even thought about picking up the phone.

    I wish I knew what was wrong with me. I wish that I could understand why I always freeze up or shut down or do the very thing I would rather not do in the precise moment I wish to do the opposite. I wish that I understood why I am like this and then maybe, I could figure out how to be different. I wish that I could be like any other girl who liked a guy and if she wanted to call him, she just would! I wish—I wish I could be the girl I was the day of the blizzard—and just all of the time. And I wish that Tracey just holds out just a bit, a very little bit, because I do want to see him again.

TRACEY

    Sometimes…well, usually, I really hate going in to B-Side Records. Don’t get me wrong. Out of all of the record stores on State Street, B-Side is easily the best just because that’s the only record store on the street where the clerks actually know about what they’re selling! And in a strange way, it is entirely because of that encyclopedic knowledge that makes the feat of even walking into the place akin to travelling to the moon via dust cropper.

    The store space itself makes it the perfect location on good ‘ol funky State Street to buy music rather than the chain stores. It’s wooden, rectangular shape makes me think of a treasure box—which is apt because with the massive amount of music and memorabilia surrounding you by its display, all you want to do is to dive into all of it at once, like an 18^th century prospector plunging his hands into a chest of gold. But then, there are those aforementioned clerks. It’s not so much that you are constantly under their watchful eyes. You are but the space is so small that I think even the skinniest person would have to suck in their gut to allow another person to pass them in the aisle and so, you are just naturally always in view. No, it’s not their intense gaze that unnerves me. It’s their intense scorn.

    The clerks of B-Side Records skulk around the store as if they are solemn, heavily burdened kings, eternally brooding over the state of music, a kingdom over which only they preside. Their disdain is in the room as much as you are, so if one had to ask these guys (there are no women on staff) a question, you had best come correct, unless face exile.

    What brought me to B-Side this time was “American Pie.” Well…that plus the fact that Discount Records, Rose Records Exclusive and even the used stores didn’t have it at all. It’s like some mysterious force was pushing me to step into B-Side and every time I tried to avoid it, the closer to B-Side’s entrance I found myself.

    Here I am, rummaging through the aisles and stacks in the “M” section, trying to make myself impervious to the Gatekeeper’s punishing view. OK…there’s McCartney and there’s McMurtry and let me go back a bit..and…THERE IT IS!! Don McLean’s “American Pie,” the very piece of music that I was least likely to ever purchase but have now developed an insatiable thirst to quench over and again. Steeling myself to face the Gatekeepers, I bring the CD to the counter in one hand with my money in the other. I paid without making eye contact and only issuing guttural grunts as a form of verbal exchange at the cash register, a tactic to feign an image of impenetrable coldness and a veil of being firmly unapproachable, when in fact, I was harboring an irrational fear of being turned to stone at their first look.  

    And then, as the ever mysterious and unknown “they” always seem to say, I took the CD and got the hell out of Dodge!

HEATHER

    My roommate is out for the night to join her History study group—at least that’s what she said. No matter the reasons, she’s not here which means that if I am going to call Tracey, it has to be tonight. No more waiting. Just do it. You know you want to and tonight you’ll have the privacy. Whoever you were that day at the Union, find her.

TRACEY

    “A long, long time ago, I can still remember how that music used to make me smile…”

HEATHER

    Here goes nothing…

TRACEY

    Even before I made it halfway down the hallway, I just knew that the ringing phone was for me. Don’t ask me how I knew. It was just…a feeling, I guess. It didn’t matter how many other rooms were active or noisy, I heard that phone and tried to get to my room either without being noticed. Or if I was noticed, how could I show that I’m in a hurry or not so obviously trying too hard to give someone the slip? How do I get to that phone without looking like it is the one and only thing that I have been waiting for since I set foot back on campus yesterday? And what if my roommate’s home? I haven’t even told him that I met Heather because with guys—most guys—they even catch a whiff that you’re even thinking about a girl, they just hover around, waiting to check her out, all the time wondering if they might want to take a crack at her too and if they did, what if she liked someone else more than me? What if I didn’t measure up to someone else? That whatever kept her talking to me that day is worthless at the mere sight of someone better looking—better everything compared to me?

    In the twenty seconds it probably took me to get to my door, all of those thoughts plagued my brain. But, it was all for nothing as no one paid me any nevermind and I entered my room—sans roommate—and answered the phone.
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