Travel back in time with me if you will, to Northern Illinois University. Once upon a time (aka, my junior year) I was working as an RA for the second year. RA stands for Resident Assistant - basically the one student who slaves away for unending hours keeping an eye on all of the other crazy college kids on his or her residence hall floor, all in exchange for free room and board and very little pay. RAs are the ones who have to console broken hearts, write up the trouble makers, and always have a supply of free health service condoms outside their door for the residents to pillage. I genuinely loved my job and the people I worked with - being an RA is what introduced me to some of my closest friends and those bonds have only gotten stronger with time.
But anyway, we had a really excellent staff and despite it's quirky little cliques, it was a tight group. After all, when you spend the majority of your time working with the same 20 people instead of going out to the bars and doing beer bongs at the frat houses like any other self-respecting college kid, you kind of develop a bond.
One of our staff members had just left us mid-year to go to a different position within the building. It was an unusual situation, and we were all curious about who the new replacement RA would be. So there we are, sitting in our staff meeting, talking about university business and bulletin boards and all sorts of uber-exciting stuff, and the door opens. Staff meetings are a closed affair, so it could only be one person. Mr. Replacement RA had arrived.
I immediately sized him up. Partly because I was a well respected member of the staff and I took a lot of pride in being one of the people that other staff members came to. I frequently won awards for my programs and attended leadership conferences regularly. In other words, I sat pretty far up on my own high horse. I kicked ass, and at the oh-so-grown-up age of twenty, you'd better believe I knew it. And I wasn't about to let anyone saunter in and usurp my spot.
Now the other reason I sized him up is because admitedly, I was just a tad boy-crazy in college. If I could have had a second major, it would have been the opposite gender. It was dangerous ground, considering that inner-staff dating wasn't exactly encouraged, but I usually didn't let little things like that stop me. It didn't matter in any event, because I could tell right away that he wasn't my type.
He smiled nervously, and then our boss introduced us to Skippy.
More to come - I have to go do some laundry.
2 comments:
You, boy crazy?! Hmmm, remember the phrase "I like boys. I like boys...A LOT!" ;c) That became your mantra for awhile there I think!
..always leaving your readers wanting more... HeHeHe...ya know I miss our late night quick whisper girl chats
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