I have a small home in Florida in St. Augustine. The home is in the city and I pay a local real estate company to keep the lawn mowed and the flowers tended. While I'm in THE FACILITY, I don't really spend money at all, so everything I have in terms of liquid assets just continues to accrue. I was able to book a flight back east, and drive to my humble little Florida home.
I like coming back here. The only real decorations I've put inside the house are books. I have shelves filled with every book I've owned since I was a child. All of my college text books are there, with my copies of The Savage Sword of Conan. I love just walking through the door, flipping the lights on, and seeing the shelves lined with all the old friends of my youth. It's very comforting, and it's a great way to start a vacation.
On the first day of my vacation I fixed a small breakfast of bacon, eggs, toast and coffee with orange juice. Now it was time to catch up on my mail, and to look at my correspondence. My property manager was kind enough to stack the letters on my desk in my office. There wasn't much. I spent probably an hour discarding junk mail when I saw an envelope addressed in a very familiar hand. I open the letter and eagerly read the latest news from my roommate from Miskatonic U. Larry Cranz was my friend and confidant as I struggled that first year in college. I was never an eager student. I was eager to learn, but I wanted to learn EVERYTHING at once. That hindered me from focusing on one thing at a time, and thereby more easily passing the various exams. When a professor would mention a book in passing, I would make my way to the library, and spend the next several hours reading and making notes, missing a class or two along the way. Larry was able to help me see that my over-eagerness to learn was a problem and help me to develop self discipline. With the tool of self-discipline, I was able to work my way through the University System and complete my freshman year. I kept up the discipline and was finally able to finish my undergraduate work with honors.
I was never an ambitious sort, I just knew that I wanted to be able to study biology, and eventually be paid to work in the field. Larry wanted to be a professor at Miskatonic U. It was a tradition in the family as long as they had been in the United States. His father was professor in the Mathematics Department, but Larry was interested in the mechanics of the human soul, not in the workings of numbers. Larry wanted to be an anthropologist as was fascinated at the way human societies worked. Larry loved the rise, interplay, and decline of cultures. He was studious, but also social. He would tarry along the sidewalks and observe the different groups that would gather between classes. When he finally would make his way back to our dorm, he would immerse himself in his studies, making notes, and reading. He had an alarm set to go off at 5PM every day. At that time, he would rise from his studying and visit fraternity houses, the library, club meetings, and just crowds of people gathering on the campus. He would talk and listen to people. He would find out what was going on, and then go there just to listen and watch the people go by. At 11PM every night he would return to the room and write for half an hour to 45 minutes. He would tell me what interesting things he had seen, and we would laugh until we were too exhausted and then fall asleep. That went on for 7 years. By then I had finished my Graduate work, and was accepted to the University of Georgia to begin work on my doctorate. Larry was going to remain at Miskatonic, and had already been working as a teacher's assistant during the normal school year, and working with an archaeologist in Mexico during the summers. He would come back from expeditions burnt by the sun, but radiant with the news of old temples explored, burial sites excavated, and ancient mysteries uncovered. Those were wonderful times.
I like coming back here. The only real decorations I've put inside the house are books. I have shelves filled with every book I've owned since I was a child. All of my college text books are there, with my copies of The Savage Sword of Conan. I love just walking through the door, flipping the lights on, and seeing the shelves lined with all the old friends of my youth. It's very comforting, and it's a great way to start a vacation.
On the first day of my vacation I fixed a small breakfast of bacon, eggs, toast and coffee with orange juice. Now it was time to catch up on my mail, and to look at my correspondence. My property manager was kind enough to stack the letters on my desk in my office. There wasn't much. I spent probably an hour discarding junk mail when I saw an envelope addressed in a very familiar hand. I open the letter and eagerly read the latest news from my roommate from Miskatonic U. Larry Cranz was my friend and confidant as I struggled that first year in college. I was never an eager student. I was eager to learn, but I wanted to learn EVERYTHING at once. That hindered me from focusing on one thing at a time, and thereby more easily passing the various exams. When a professor would mention a book in passing, I would make my way to the library, and spend the next several hours reading and making notes, missing a class or two along the way. Larry was able to help me see that my over-eagerness to learn was a problem and help me to develop self discipline. With the tool of self-discipline, I was able to work my way through the University System and complete my freshman year. I kept up the discipline and was finally able to finish my undergraduate work with honors.
I was never an ambitious sort, I just knew that I wanted to be able to study biology, and eventually be paid to work in the field. Larry wanted to be a professor at Miskatonic U. It was a tradition in the family as long as they had been in the United States. His father was professor in the Mathematics Department, but Larry was interested in the mechanics of the human soul, not in the workings of numbers. Larry wanted to be an anthropologist as was fascinated at the way human societies worked. Larry loved the rise, interplay, and decline of cultures. He was studious, but also social. He would tarry along the sidewalks and observe the different groups that would gather between classes. When he finally would make his way back to our dorm, he would immerse himself in his studies, making notes, and reading. He had an alarm set to go off at 5PM every day. At that time, he would rise from his studying and visit fraternity houses, the library, club meetings, and just crowds of people gathering on the campus. He would talk and listen to people. He would find out what was going on, and then go there just to listen and watch the people go by. At 11PM every night he would return to the room and write for half an hour to 45 minutes. He would tell me what interesting things he had seen, and we would laugh until we were too exhausted and then fall asleep. That went on for 7 years. By then I had finished my Graduate work, and was accepted to the University of Georgia to begin work on my doctorate. Larry was going to remain at Miskatonic, and had already been working as a teacher's assistant during the normal school year, and working with an archaeologist in Mexico during the summers. He would come back from expeditions burnt by the sun, but radiant with the news of old temples explored, burial sites excavated, and ancient mysteries uncovered. Those were wonderful times.
No comments:
Post a Comment