A Face in the Crowd

All last year as I was walking around campus, I would see people that looked so familiar. But I knew that I had never met them before, because I was so new to the school. Then, I started to put a name to the face. I kept seeing people who looked like those I went to high school with. It was as if I was trying to make something familiar out of a totally different environment.

Too often I saw someone that really resembled that one kid that I took biology with my freshman year in high school. Or like the one girl I worked with on an English project. It was weird that most of the people who I thought I saw were not even close friends of mine. I probably only talked to them maybe once or twice.

But now that I’m home, I’ve noticed that I’ve started to see people from college when I’m walking through the mall or waiting in line at a store. And, just like before, these are only mild acquaintances. I’m not quite sure what it means exactly, but I’m starting to think that something in my brain is making it seem like I’m surrounded my familiarity wherever I am.

I’ll be curious to see what happens when I return to school for my second year. Maybe I’ll stop recognizing people from home because I haven’t been in high school for a while; haven’t seen those faces in a while. Maybe I’ll finally be able to call my college the familiar.

Cross Country Venture

Last year at school, upon telling people I’m from California, quite a few would ask “Did you drive here!?” I smirked at them and scoffed, “Of course not, we flew”.

Well the joke’s on me now. My mom and I have decided to drive my car across country. The ever-classic way of getting to college.

I’m anticipating our trip to follow the lines of “insert epic road trip movie here”. At first we’ll be very psyched and the first day will be full of adventure. Somewhere along the lines, one of us (possibly both of us) will snap for whatever reason. But, in the end, the trip will have brought us closer and the camera will pan out with us crying and hugging on campus.

Ok, so maybe no camera—but it will be a miracle if one of us doesn’t go mildly crazy around the 1,736^th mile.

Looking at the positives, my mom and I are really excited for our 3,146 mile journey. I’ve been doing a lot of research on some of the places we’ll see along the way. Sadly, the World’s Largest Ball of Twine is in the middle of Kansas and we’ll be taking a more northern route—through Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota and ten other states.

But, there are a lot of other cool stops along the way:

1. Mount Rushmore – This will probably be the first and last time I’ll see this impressive carving. We pretty much tailored our trip just so we could visit it. And plus it’s motivation to get through Nevada and Wyoming.

2. Independence Rock - If you played Oregon Trail you’ll know exactly what this is. I won’t lie when I say I’m super excited to go here!

3. Wall Drug Store - So apparently it’s just a drug store…but they have a really good advertising company. They have signs lining the highway, declaring how many miles away you are from it. There’s even one in the South Pole!! Check out the picture.

They may not be “cool” in the traditional sense, but I’m a geek and honestly can’t wait!

So that reminds me, the whole reason that I decided was to start a blog was to write about my 7-day journey across the United States. My mom is going to be writing her own as well (when she finally starts one, I’ll post the link). It should be really interesting to compare the two.

We leave in 11 days and counting.