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| Fiction, by Joe Selmont |
Okay. Introductions. My name is Lamont Harpe. My friends call me L. Ron Hubbard. I go to UAA. I work at UAA. I live at UAA. My love life is in shambles, but at least my cumulative GPA is above a 3.5. I’ve studied French literature at this fine university for four years, and am especially fond of Proust. And I hate nothing so much as scrambling to move into the UAA dorms on the same day as 900 other students.
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| Lamont ponders his options. (Artwork by Ted Kincaid) |
My family lives in Palmer, but I didn’t want to deal with that mess, so I spent the summer hopping from couch to couch and probably drinking too much. (But that’s what the Alcohol, Drug, and Wellness Educator is for, right?) While I undeniably had a blast goofing off all summer – bicycling around, obsessing over The Game of Thrones books, tipping too heavily to cute bartenders – I did not exactly “plan” for the upcoming school year. Let it suffice to say that my belongings were scattered across various apartments and homes in the Anchorage area, my parents STILL hadn’t filled out their section of the FAFSA, and I had enough money for books or food, but not for both. So let me tell you about my day…
I woke up groggy as all get out on my buddy’s lumpy couch with his obese cat sprawled upon my chest. This fine, good buddy (I won’t name names) promised to help me collect my belongings from the four corners of Anchorage and deliver them to my new abode, but when I shook him awake he mumbled a few impolite words and told me to figure out something else. Did I mention my primary mode of transportation is a bicycle? No? Well, it’s a bicycle. C’est la vie.
After I called up several other friends and each in turn expressed their feelings on the matter of helping me move, I knew what had to be done. I called my mom.
One ring. Two rings. Three rings. And then I hear it: “Hello, baby! You never call your mother. How are you, love?”
“Never better, Mom. Hey, can you help me move into the dorms today?”
“Oh, of course, honey bear. Mama would love to help her smoochkins.”
“Um. Thanks. Meet me at UAA in an hour?”
“Sounds perfect, Lamont-y poo. See you then.”
Cringing, I hung up the phone. What had I just done to myself? The heat was suddenly hotter, my heartbeat suddenly harder, the fires of Hell suddenly brighter… Okay. It wasn’t all that bad. But my mom stresses me out.
So I pedaled over to UAA via the Chester Creek Trail and it was a real lovely ride: birds singing, tourists in khaki shorts, the whole shebang. I pulled up to the Student Union/Campus Bookstore, locked up my bike, and found a cozy spot on the grassy hill to read my book and wait for my mother. UAA felt alive for the first time in months. The kids over in Tanaina Child Development Center were making a joyous racket and students were pouring in and out of the Bookstore like a human osmosis. All in all, it was a picturesque scene.
An hour later than agreed, my mom rolled up in her Toyota truck to the Seawolf Shuttle stop and honked at me. Thus ensued the most hellish moving experience of my life.
I love my mother, don’t get me wrong. But if I had to choose between six hours of driving through Anchorage construction and loading and unloading furniture and books and clothes – all with my mother, whose perfume is overpowering, whose voice is like a nail driven through my brain – or lighting myself on fire, I might offer myself to the inferno next time. Needless to say, it was no fun.
Upon arriving at the dorms, I knew the day wasn’t going to get any better. For whatever reason, the University decided it was a golden idea to close off half the parking lot over by the MACs while 900 students frantically ran from vehicles to dorms to Res Life to vehicles to dorms, etcetera, etcetera. At one moment I distinctly remember praying that a meteor might strike down beside me and release a horde of Viking zombies from the crater to crack my skull with an oversized hammer… But I had no such luck.
So things finally wrapped up around 9:30 P.M. My belongings were firmly stored in the correct dorm (after moving them twice from the wrong dorms), my mom was halfway back to Palmer by then, and I desperately needed a break from the waves of madness that continued to break upon the rocky shores of my feeble mental faculties, so I went for a stroll. And that’s where you met me, at the end of my stroll, sitting cross-legged in front of the Student Union/Campus Bookstore.
As I laid there, breathing in the evening air, my thoughts turned to the next calamity: Campus Kickoff…………… But more about that next time. -------
Want to keep reading? Here is the link to Episode 2: 'Lamont: Feeling woeful and dismayed'
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