Don't want to close my eyes, don't want to fall asleep, cause I'd miss you baby ...
... and I don't want to miss a thing.

This song always struck me as vaguely silly, and it still does, but at the same time it makes me want to cry for nostalgia; because there isn't a person associated with this song, for me -- it's not a lover's face that comes to mind -- I just think of Simon's Rock.

It keeps hitting me how little time I have left here. A month. A month. Almost nothing. It feels like so little time to take a last walk around the lake, or sit by the frog pool watching white flowers fall on the wind. And every time I think it's like I get hit by a deluge of memories -- like a blow that knocks the breath out of me, I remember. Everything.

I remember meeting Vinny. Sitting by the rectangular pool, in the sunlight, looking down at the water lilies and laughing. I remember dancing naked in the rain with Joy. Joy talking about how pretty wet breasts are, and teasing Nathaniel while he looked embarrassed and said that someday he'd recreate us through film. Walking into the snack bar, asking, "Does anyone have a dollar?" and watching the shocked faces turn towards me in a single static moment, while Joy and I look at each other, giggle, and wander off. Joy's thesis performance, Gilana's amazing acting abilities, and at the end, Joy screeching offstage, then coming outside and spitting stage blood at the audience and giggling. I remember the dinner we went to at Pearl's my sophomore year instead of attending the AA dinner, and walking afterwards, in the night, wandering into the churchyard and out again, while Cate and I put white lilacs in our hair. The starry blossoms against the darkness of her hair, and the scent of the flowers, and four of us walking down the street in town, and I felt so euphoric, I couldn't stop smiling. Sitting in the Dolliver hallway on Daylight Savings Night for an hour after parietals, in one big group, telling passing RDs it was okay because Daylight Savings Time meant I could stay an hour extra, and Wolf perching on the railing of the stairway like a gargoyle with dark glasses. Making ridiculous signs for Glacial Erratic, headed with fun things like "Hot Greasy Llama Sex" and "Vigorous Anal Probage", and standing in Dolliver watching through the glass doors as people reacted to them ("Oooh! Vigorous Anal Probage came second!") Standing in the Crosby stairwell dressed in lace-up leather and lots of makeup, with Cate standing at the top as I laughed and panicked over going to Rocky and seeing Dustin and Jake in the same place, and she, amused, called after me, "Drama queen!" Seeing Delea and Tayo Painting At Midnight in the Student Union, and stealing the tradition my sophomore year, with Hannah, while we took inks and boards and brushes into the Union and sat around giggling and talking to passerby and painting whatever we thought of. Playing Vampire on the pool table in the Student Union, and standing outside watching Adam consider whether to choose Caine or Lilith, laughing hysterically at the psychotic look on his face as he clutched an inflatable ball and glared. Standing on the cafeteria balcony with Dustin and looking down at Gabe, while we talked about a way to preserve the NPC Amourice's life, who Eva had gotten attached to. Playing D&D at a Freshman Seminar Lecture with Vinny, trying to minimize the sound of the dice, and ignoring the nasty looks being given us by serious students while my monk sparred against his monk; that was the troupe with the anarchist, the monk, and the anarchist monk. Stealing all the study snacks during Reading Period to fuel our roleplaying binge, a nicfitting Danny coming in and crying, "You should all smoke! All of you!" and stalking out. Playing Exalted in the centre room of the Student Union, wearing my vinyl dress and jumping up and down, laughing, because I was so pleased to have summoned a demon. Sitting in the flowery field, wearing a long skirt with my hair down, weaving a flower chain, and having Gabriel pass me and say in his deep voice, "You are like a picture!" Sitting outside the Student Union with my computer in my lap, under the tree with Ed, with him telling me that it would all be okay. Singing "Hallelujah" on the porch of mod 2, and saying how much I loved everyone, and looking up at the stars, and Dustin looking at me and saying, "And we love you." Aaron saw me once looking sad in Dustin's room, and he took me back to his mod and gave me a little stuffed panther and told me about his plan to inundate the campus with stuffed animals so that no one would ever be sad.

Trevor's hair catching fire from the candle he held, and we walked down to the flowery field and sat in a candlelit circle and talked about how much we love Simon's Rock, and what we remembered. AA Graduation procession, wending our way down the dark-paved path in the unprecedented May snow, and turning around just in time to see Vinny spark a bowl in the procession, and laughing at the incredible ballsiness of it. And waking up that morning to Cate's phone call, her amused advice not to wear anything that shouldn't get wet, looking out the window to see snow on May 18, and saying, "Oh my god, Dustin, it's snowing." Dustin musing, as I vinyl'd myself for Graduation, "This is so surreal," and me thinking, Tell me about it. Mayfest, sitting on the lawn, with the sun on my back, surrounded by plastic ducks and Sharpies and bottles of nail polish, and naming all the ducks after porn stars. Standing in the rain with my hair back, in my beat-up old fur coat, my glasses spangled with raindrops which shone in the light of the streetlamp, and Dustin telling me how I looked like a girl from a Humphrey Bogart flick. Walking around the lake in the cold with Adam, talking about the stars and speculating on the purpose of the low wall near the Arc. Standing on the bridge over the lake, in the dark and the rain, and Jake saying, "I love you. I'm sorry," and giving me a hug, and walking away, while I felt myself, humiliatingly, break down into tears. But sitting in the Student Union looking up leather on eBay, laughing as he complained that I was distracting him while he took care of the exceedingly difficult task of stealing spare parts from the school's iMacs .... I really do remember him badly, don't I? It's a disservice. Our relationship had some amazing times while it lasted. Most of which are a bit personal ... so I'll change the subject.

The first time a non-fatherish male called me beautiful ... I was walking by the lake with Peter Bohning (best last name ever), my first week, and the possibilities and reality of coming to SRC sparkled in my blood, and the mist rose off the lake like a mystic natural ritual, and he said, "Well ... you're very beautiful," and I stood stock still and felt the shock hit me, like a slap in the face, unable to imagine that a man would ever tell me such a thing. And sitting across one of the snack bar tables with Dustin, the dark red walls and booths and black tables of the old snack bar, and the snack bar itself closed and dark in the lateness of the night, while he told me I should concentrate on playing chess, and threw the elaborately carved pawns at me when I didn't. Writing on the pool table in silver paint pen, with Joy and Vinny and Carson and everyone, and the finished slate slab covered in nail polish and silver script. Again, the centre room of the Student Union, with Sarah Mills-Derlam and I doing our final Colour projects at the last minute, 4 in the morning, listening to random music and giggling, and Ed mocking me for saying, "Imagine how rich I'd be if I sweated acid." The first time I got stoned I collapsed on the lawn by Crosby and couldn't get up, I was laughing too hard, and Vinny wandered up, looked at me, looked at Sarah, and said, "By God, what did you do to her?" Talking to God in the common room of my mod, Rachel wandering up and saying, "Lydia. Hey Lydia. The air is God," and giggling as I freaked out and tried to hide under a blanket. Finding Clara's True Name in a spring lake with ducks, taking a long journey to the Arc, painting "Reality IS the mind of god!" on the wall, and ranting and dancing about with Clara as Anna watched us in bemused fascination. Morning, leaving the Student Union with Dustin, watching dawn break over the trees and the Pizza Hut-shaped dorms, knowing I should feel penitent for having stayed up talking, but smiling instead.

I want to write them all down, get everything in some sort of permanent format, because I never want to lose any of these moments, and every day I feel the urge to see someone who's not here anymore, to call Dustin in Dolliver and sneak in after midnight to play video games, or to go down to mod 2 and see what they're doing, or to get dressed up with crazy eyeshadow and go to the snack bar and see how my evening develops from there .... It's funny how I'm not yet nostalgic for much of junior year (although I guess half of that was spent in Aberdeen), or for this year, but I'm sure it'll come once time has passed, the piercing glimpse of joyous memories that make me want to laugh and cry.

I remember once, sitting in the Student Union computer lab with Dustin, and asking if he regretted coming here, and he said with utter positivity, "No. It's the best thing that ever happened to me."

I don't know if SRC is the best thing that ever happened to me. But -- it was one of them. One of the most amazing experiences of my life. And I've met almost all the best people in my life here. I remember the first year when I left campus at the end of the year, the summer looked so terrifying because I couldn't imagine existence away from SRC anymore, and I thought I'd never see Dustin again, which made it worse. Driving back home, I couldn't get the Stabbing Westward song out of my head: "I don't know if I am real without you. What is left of me without you?"

I can't say Simon's Rock told me who I am, or pinpoint any specific epiphanies I had while I've been here, but it really is quite possibly the best place I've ever been (the only alternative is CTY, which I admit would give it a good run for its money). The thought of leaving inspires a kind of atavistic fear that makes me shiver. Like, I can't possibly be actually leaving, right? It's all a joke, right? I have years to go, right?

Memories will have to be enough. A campus suffused with love and nostalgia and the people that I dearly hope to never lose touch with, the friends I've made who I want to keep my entire life, as we stand by each other and protect each other from the harsh reality of the real world ... we can be each others' bulwarks against banality. (No Changeling jokes, yo.)

The end of an era.