Thinking about Amherst

Look at this: I was sleepy and looking forward to my book, and then wooow ! (a Rachel-ism) I read all these lovely posts and am compelled to write. Plus I missed my day due to traveling/interviewing/celebrating Rachel in beautiful birthday fashion. Selena: I miss you too, terribly. And Megan, Hannah, Rose, Julian. I miss our different personalities together. Saw the rest of us this weekend, in bits and pieces, which I loved.

Here are some pluses and minuses (or petals/thorns, in Selena lingo) of recent days:
(+) Rachel (and her birthday! Yay that she was born!), Carmella, Becky, Cait, Jess, Scott, Sarah and Sarah, Dan, lots of others I am forgetting to write including Zu folks
(+) Sleeping under the beautiful full moon on the glorious Zu roof -- wonderful in its own right, plus a great story to tell the kids I babysit
(+) Saturday morning Amherst farmers' market. Yes!
(+) Delicious pastry for breakfast as if in Paris. Yes!
(+) Bumping into extra good people on the street, ie Jess first and then Cait. Yes!
(+) Seeing Hong (aka the Val stir fry lady), my former ESL student and dear friend. I missed her.
(-) Hong asking me, "You when have baby? Now!" (this is actually a postive because it was hilarious, but still a little scary)
(+) I have a job! In Holyoke! I like the people I'm working with and am all around excited about it
(-) Said job will not begin until November because there are no AmeriCorps orientation trainings I can attend before then. (Selena, what do you think of this?) I am advised by random adults to push my way into a training anyway. We'll see.
(-) Said job pays even less than I expected
(+) I can still survive on limited funding for a year with help of food stamps et al
(+) Said job does not require that I live in Holyoke so I can, in fact, rent an apartment in Northampton (was a concern but not anymore)
(+) Decision made to move to Northampton/the Pioneer Valley soon anyway so that we can spend more glorious time with glorious people. I start looking for apartments and part-time jobs today.
(+) My mom supports this decision so I am guilt-free.
(-) Missed Rose and Megan in Amherst this weekend. Hope I see you guys soon.
(+) Yard sale shopping with my mom today, channeling Selena. I find a table and a lamp/table thing for cheap. Planning to spruce up the lamp/table thing, channeling Megan. Looks like I will turn crafty in my newfound adultness.
(+) Camping with Monty this week, a planned quick return to Amherst on Thursday for apartment searching, and hopefully a visit from Rachel, Sarah D-Z and maybe Carmella next weekend
(-) Missing news of Megan on the start of nursing school, Julian on the start of work, more from Rose on the start of classes, Hannah on the start of English teaching school
(+/-) Though eager and glad for what's ahead, am already nostalgic for the year behind.

On that last note: Here is a quote from Proust's Swann's Way that made me think of our Chapman House. It felt particularly pertinent after this weekend, after being about Amherst but Amherst not being exactly the same for lack of certain important personalities. For Selena, because she's missing it:

"what a contradiction it is to search in reality for memory's pictures, which would never have the charm that comes to them from memory itself and from not being perceived by the senses. The reality I had known no longer existed....The places we have known do not belong solely to the world of space in which we situate them for our greater convenience. They were only a thin slice among contiguous impressions which formed our life at that time; the memory of a certain image is but regret for a certain moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fleeting, alas, as the years."

Thus, my memory of Chapman House is but regret for a certain year living with you.