I dreamt last night that I had a run-in with my ex's mom.
I drive a big-ass Lincoln Town Car, so one of my biggest fears is hitting someone as I'm trying to back out of a parking space. Well.. in my dream, I was trying to get out of some tight lit'l space, it was very tight with, like, ditches on either side. I ended up tapping someone's car with my back end as I was trying to get out. There was a woman sitting inside. She started honking like crazy. I just waved her off, like "yeah, yeah, I'll get back to you when I get out of this fucking tight space." So I finally got out of the tight space, then got out of my car to deal with the woman, and she got out of her car to confront me. As she approached me, we both did a kind of gasp as we recognized each other. It was a damn strange coincidence.
Just like it was a damn strange coincidence that my ex was at Celebration Station with his friends the exact same day when my brother and I decided to go with our grandparents. And how it's a damn strange coincidence now that we're both living in Orlando, go to the same university, and now both work for the same company, if not the same store. I swear to god I'm not following him. If we had never met, would we still be living these strangely, somewhat parallel lives..?
Probably not. I wouldn't have gone to Miami if it weren't for him. I wouldn't have even heard of FIU. Which means I never would have met Aaron, and consequently, I wouldn't be here with him in Orlando now.
If I hadn't met my ex, god, who knows where I'd be? He's still living his same path, going to the university he wanted, being with his friends and all that, but I'm here all fucked up in my plans. I originally wanted to go to school up north, preferably New York. I was thinking of Syracuse University, NYU, or the all-fitting Sarah Lawrence College. But going to school out-of-state is damn expensive, I soon realized. So I nitched that. Then there was concentrating on schools in state, in Florida. And soon I came across Flagler College in St. Augustine. I so wanted to go there. I had so much material on them sent to me, even a tape, and everything sounded wonderful. When I visited, the campus was absolutely fucking gorgeous, save for the front courtyard with the fountain that reeked of sulfur. And the main building, big beautiful old hotel. Then I found out that the girls' dorms, not the guys' for some reason, have no air conditioning. And that.. would be an unfortunate thing to deal with when living in Florida. The dorms were strictly not coed, too. A guy can't even walk by the realm of the girls' dorms. Or so I was told. But.. Flagler's expensive and you gotta write an essay to apply so I never did. Then there was University of Tampa, another beautiful college, but.. same deal with the private colleges.
Now, I'm not one of the lucky kids who have parents that pay for their kid's college education (but for some reason would pay for high school education), so I had to resort to the cheapest alternative: public education. Which left me with the options of either USF or the local community college. Both weren't too appealing. And.. the big Florida state schools (UF and FSU), they just weren't my style either, being so sports-oriented, not to mention huge an' everything..
But Flagler was so fucking gorgeous. And that's what I really wanted in a campus. Because, for me, with beauty comes inspiration. And, my god, UCF is so fucking ugly that I can't even begin to deal with it. They can't even keep the grass green, not to mention there's those eye sores that they call buildings standing around everywhere. Those big, brown ugly buildings. At FIU, I didn't particularly like the south campus too much, especially it being in the area it's in (hispanic ghetto and dirty), but at least, as I was pushing through all the annoying people there, trying to get to my classes which I was always late for, or cursing and cursing about trying to find a place to park the dang car, at least I could find some consolation in walking around campus and admiring the beauty. They had all these lit'l ponds with lit'l fountains flowing, unlike the huge, very loud and annoying fountain between the administration building and library at UCF. Omigod, and those seats?? Those concrete seats?? What kind of back can sit comfortably in those seats??
But.. it was beautiful at FIU. Grass was green, lit'l soft ponds, lit'l cute gazebos every so often, ducks would often be walking around or playing in the water.. the buildings were nice to look at and had some personality. Maybe that's the thing at UCF, with all the buildings looking the same and being so damn ugly. They don't want much personality there. There even seems to be some sort of implicit dress code there: wear your abercrombie shirt and a pair of jeans. I hate that. People all looking alike. You didn't have shit like that at FIU. Instead, you'd be meeting people from all over the world. Once, when I attended a mass at the smaller FIU north campus, in a group of maybe 20 people, there were people from 11 different nations. You actually start feeling like you could be part of a minority down there. It's a wonderful feeling.. The north campus was even more beautiful, being on this lit'l bay inlet. And at night, you'd have cats and foxes running around. I used to go for walks often, just for some refreshment and inspiration. It was wonderful. If I could somehow go back.. I really would.
And I never would have experienced any of it if it weren't for my ex.
LJ