So, not many people who have read this blog yet know a lot about why I'm here at ten to two in the morning writing about my life.

Well, I'm in Doylestown, right now. Going to a community college and working at the Cocaine Industry (hopefully I can get a better paying job and get the fuck out of there in time to get some cash for the holidays).

But last year, I was at Millersville University.

Now, if anybody knows anything about the Lancaster area they'd say "that's nothing to miss" or "do you need cows to moo you to sleep or something?"

Fact of the matter is, for the most part the first statement is true. Lancaster is a less than spectacular area, save the Amish school shooting every now and then, then it's the center of national attention. But it isn't the place I miss. It's the people.

Last year, I started off living in Bard Hall. I had a GA room that I shared with some guy I'd never even known, but we were the only room with air conditioning, a bathroom, and a walk-in closet. So I dealt with the possible serial killer sleeping about 10 feet away from me every night for about a month. However, after that something had to be done. So my best friend since middle school, Eric, kicked his roommate out and I moved into good ol' Gaige Hall.... where my college experience would begin.

I wasn't long after that move that I would go to my first TKE party. It wasn't much compared to what I'd seen, but I got to meet a few of the guys in the fraternity, including Scott Shenk, a liliputian-type man who took me aside and bullshitted with me about Politics for about an hour and a half, and then played me in beer pong. Needless to say, I went back the next night and got a bid to pledge the fraternity, and within a week I was initiated with 3 guys, getting ready to go through pledging for God knew how long at the time.

Within two weeks, Tom, one of my original pledge brothers had dropped, giving Liam, Dave, and I -- the three eventual survivors of the Alpha Beta pledge class plenty of doubts of this being the right thing to do.

Well when I felt that champagne touch my lips after getting in, I knew it was the correct choice. I now had about 20 extra brothers in my life at Millersville alone. Not to mention the thousands internationally who belong to the Largest Fraternity in the world.

Well that led to me coming back to Doylestown for winter break and realizing that it wasn't my home anymore. Millersville was. And that feeling would only grow stronger over the next semester.

Over the next 4 months, I would fall in love... be crushed, go to parties... come back happy, and watch 7 more guys go through what I had just done before them. And through that, gain 7 more brothers.

And that's before we even got to Dorm life.

Airsoft wars in the middle of the hallway, Madden Tournaments, the STOOP OUT FRONT! Good God, I don't know where I'd be without that stoop. It was the place where I could go at any given moment and realize just how right it felt to be at that school.

However, my brain was on overload, and with pledging first semester and the excitement of second semester, it was just too much to juggle my Social Studies Education major. And so here I am, back in Doylestown. Feeling more like a square peg being put into a circlular hole every day. And growing more and more frustrated that the damn four year old that's trying to make me fit there just isn't figuring it out.

...And what's worse is, I know he won't figure it out until next year. When I'm back at Millersville. This time as a Government Major minoring in Political Economics.

Once a month I get a chance to go up there and remember what it was like all of last year. And when I'm up there I get the vibe from those around me that it hasn't been right since I left. And it breaks my heart every time I turn onto route 30 to head back east to the "home" I grew up in.

Sure I have two of my best friends in the world home right now. But with gas prices, and my shitty pay at Cocaine 'R Us, not to mention a 30 minute drive to Newtown and back every other day, I can't see them nearly as much as I would like.

So the best I can do is just grit and bear it through the next 10 months until August rolls around and I am packing my car to move back out to Millersville.

Back to where the cows can moo me to sleep if they wanted to.
Back to where I can be with my friends
Back to where I can feel home.

Love,
Chris

I think there are (or used to be) quite a number of members from the Lancaster, PA area.
» dave on 2006-11-09 03:26:14

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