I am back at Wellesley! This break was long, but it went by fast, and now that I’m reuniting with friends it feels like I never left.
I could easily respond to “What did you do over break?” with “Nothing,” but that’s not exactly true. I applied to a bunch of summer internships, followed the crew training plan, listened to audiobooks while walking around my town, and did a bunch of cooking. I made whole wheat bread, challah, sushi, oat milk, vegan lasagna, and a whole bunch of little things. I taught myself the first half of my Portuguese textbook and started writing a new short story.
On top of that, I spent more time in the attic this week than I had in the rest of my life combined. In April, I brought a hammock chair back from Ecuador. It’s basically a giant sponge. My suitcase, which weighed 51 pounds on the way there, was only 47 pounds when I returned, bursting at the seams because the chair took up so much room. My mom and I drilled a hole into a ceiling joist in my bedroom, and I used the chair for about six weeks, until a bulge appeared in the ceiling and I decided not to take any risks.
Finally, months later, we got around to making it more secure by drilling through a 2 x 4 in the attic to distribute my weight across three joists, rather than one. It took four trips to the hardware store and countless ventures across the floorless part of the attic, but the chair is now secure. I won’t be home to use it for any length of time until May, but at least it’s up. That’s one thing checked off my to-do list.
It’s chilly up there!
Classes start tomorrow, and I’ll be up early for 7:00 lift. (My definition of early changes with the seasons, but after getting ten hours of sleep every night for the past six weeks, 7:00 is early.) The weather is so much better than it was when we left here in December, and I felt silly bringing back my heavy winter boots, but winter is far from over. I’m looking forward to learning new things, meeting new people, and putting the effort in to make new friends and grow closer with ones I already have. It’ll be good to be busy again, and to weigh the pros and cons of going to bed early or staying up with friends. I’m excited for Shabbat dinners and Shafer house council. It doesn’t feel like tomorrow is the first day of school, but it’s the first day that the pieces come together again and we keep rolling.