Time Machine

Last week I had the awesome opportunity to hang out with a bunch of kids ten years my junior for a day and a half. What prompted the shift in combined age was a visit from my youngest sister, Meredith, to Provo. I made the 3-hour drive early Thursday morning and spent the majority of my time hanging out in her friend's BYU Approved housing. For those of you unfamiliar with the good ol' BY-of-U, there are certain rules regarding housing including curfews, whether boys can be in bedrooms, along with BYU's dress codes and morality clauses, it can be a rather clean environment in a million ways. I spent June-November of 1999 in BYU housing and there were things that were wonderful about it and other things that were disconcerting.

Aside from the awesome time with an awesome sister, I had several thoughts as I was taking my three-hour ride home. First of which, I completely and absolutely miss the culture of friends and neighbors just stopping by. In Alabama it was so frequent that we would leave doors unlocked and people would walk in and join in the activities whether it was just watching movies or playing games or having a meal. I completely and absolutely miss that aspect of college life. Perpetual friends and family hanging out whenever they feel so inclined. I have to admit, I'm not super great at carrying over the Southern hospitality of people just "stopping by". Before we moved to our new place, it was a hassle for US to stop by our own place, so we didn't dare request anyone else go through the tortures of finding a parking place, battling tourists, and climbing the stairs. Now, the habit is already there. We are walking distance from pretty much everyone in our ward and we haven't been able to make ourselves hospitable. The other part is...I have an insane schedule. Add to it the fact that David is taking night classes and I'm covering group two nights a week, you're lucky to catch us if you DID stop by! Maybe people are stopping by all the time and we're just...not there! Regardless, one of the great things about BYU.

I got to help Meredith's friend with her diagnostics for her Social Work masters. I'm a nerd. I really am. The fact that I had the day off and I preferred to be diagnosing theoretical kids is hilarious to me! I miss learning. I miss everyone sitting around and studying PAPER books! Oh, I would read every day for hours if I could get away with it. College is great. College was great!

It was great to get to have a few hours to remember who I am. There are times that my roles of being a "director" or a "mom" or a "wife" interfere with who Holly is. I recognize that I am the only one who gets to decide who I am in any instance. I'm still sorting through why some people get the real, authentic, completely flawed and broken version of me while others get the Must-be-seen-as version. Don't ask me, still figuring that out.

I loved that an innocent question as to whether the yoga pants a girl was wearing would be admissible on campus due to modesty (or lack thereof). Those questions don't happen in the world I live in. The fact that an underwear line was prominent is often the purpose in wearing tight clothes, not changing them. Only in college do people sit around and talk about things like a first date, homework, the upcoming activity, or who is going to teach at church on Sunday instead of birth stories, budgets, disposable vs. fabric diapers, etc. The life is different, the content is different. It somehow became a surge of my own youthfulness, hanging out with 20-somethings instead of a reminder of my age. I love where I am right now in my life. I enjoy my toddler time and my spouse time and yes, even figuring out the silly things like having self control to manage an ever-slowing metabolism and budgets and saving for a house. It is a whole new perspective and I'm really glad that I got to have that one before I got this one.

And the best thing about a BYU campus is that only there will someone (not naming any names) get stuck in the snow drift and ten random BYU students stopping for almost an hour to push/pull them out so they can return to their wonderful family. What a great time machine for me. :)