With a smile as wide as the Pacific

Have you ever felt that you’re living someone else’s life?

Have you ever been swept away by some feeling, some event, that seems beyond the realm of possibility, breaking the back of the proverbial camel in the best way possible, and landing you with a smile that normal circumstance cannot explain?

I hope you have, because the feeling is wondrous. And today, for Buddha-deemed reason, was my day to claim that feeling.

Not simply Greg-Oden-finally-recovering-from-surgery wondrous, for that was to be expected; rather, wondrous with a four-leaf clover, rare-as-a-drunk-Stephanie-Rice atypicality. A sense of uniqueness that arises only in Disney movies or Mariah Carey music videos. A sentiment that arises with aligned cosmos, hemorrhaging of rabbit’s feet, and just a pinch of Gilda dust.

Something that blows your mind.

The other day, Tracy let slip that Norwood was sending me something in the mail. (As you may recall, the day-to-day tragedy of an unfruitful mailbox has beset me since the days before Katy Perry “Kissed A Girl” — for those non-Gen Y’ers, that means it’s been a while.) Before I had a chance to ask the little bro what he was shipping my way — not to mention how he figured out my address is 59/122 Culloden Rd, Marsfield, NSW 2122, Australia — I got an email from the Admin office, the holders of the keys to the postal service kingdom, that I had a parcel in need of my ownership.

After a full day of kebab-eating and resume-printing (and as I secretly expected, I’ve only realized how much I omitted after spending 45 minutes waiting for a library computer), I trekked over to the West Side of the Macquarie University Village, where the previous Sunday I’d reveled in Domino’s pizza and a projector screening of Iron Man (“Yeah, I can fly”) to ask the friendly hostess for my mail.

She brought back a thin, flat envelope, and it only took one look at the return address to realize that my girlfriend was a liar….but only in the best way.

You see, the package wasn’t from my Big-Sky-livin’ brother — it was from the cosmopolitan (no pun intended) who goes by Miss Dansker.

I somehow made it back to my bedroom without spilling its contents. Sprawling on my bed, I poured the papers out of the container, and it quickly dawned on me that I may have again been mistaken. You see, this envelope wasn’t just from her — it was from all of the best mates a boy could ask for.

Yes, the feeling was wondrous.

There was the scrawled, scratchy handwriting from Matt and Mark; there was the colorful collage of ’stache-laced football players Liang Embie used to remind me how much I was missed at the Thresher; there was the burrito-stuffed, googly-eyed guy Peter must keep mistaking me for; there was Mollie’s letter with news on Brown sports and our new, Casey-will-eventually-dominate-this-like-only-Sam-Bowie-knows basketball hoop; there were Chris’ edits to Mollie’s article — “After giving up on another Indian’s playoff berth masturbation, I settled for a .500 season and ruining other teams’ playoff berths Tracy” — and notes on an improved beer pong game; there was Jazzle-Dazzle’s reminder that I refer to him as a terrorist (which I’d let slide in recent months); and there was Tim’s autographed wang, not necessarily life-like, but a valiant attempt nonetheless.

And there was the signature of the enabler, the one whose ideas never cease to amaze me. (Again, not Norwood. Still waiting, little buddy….)

After reading, pondering, and re-reading these miscellany, I tacked them on the board next to my desk. (Unfortunately, that meant I had to remove my “Oregon Voting Stipulations” form, which I never got a chance to comb through…hopefully I filled in all those vote-bubbles correctly!) See for yourself:



Before I opened the package, I knew the end of my semester was arriving a bit quicker than I had anticipated, and I was tinged with distress. But after I remembered what I get to come home to, I can’t help but count down the days until I feel the States under my feet.

I’m a lucky guy.

Video of the day!

Courtesy of Ferras Vinh, the future Rick Davis:



(Watch till the end — it is worth every second.)

News story of the day!

Oh tear of tears, oh shame of shame,/It’s safe to say the drinking world will never be the same: Goodbye, Zima.

(I’m a poet, and I don’t even know it.)