On Wednesday night, my roommates called me into the living room to receive the previously mentioned special backordered gift. Wondering what it was had been driving me crazy for three days, but even more so, I was worried that after all the build up I wouldn't look excited enough. I'm not a great gift receiver, and never know how to properly show my gratitude.
In this case, I needn't have worried.
They had hastily wrapped it up in the cover of this weeks Flagpole Magazine. It was a small box, and I had no idea what it could be, until I cleared away the newsprint and saw the brand name on the top of the gift box.
I must have turned pale at that point. There is no way they actually bought that for me.
I opened the box, and they had, in fact, bought me the locket I had daydreamed about receiving for Valentine's Day.
Catie asked, “Jenna Tollerson, will you be our Valentine?”
It took just about everything I had in me not to cry.
Dear Apartment 6:
I don't know if I tell you enough, but living at Apartment 6 with you, my great friends, is the happiest I have ever been in all my 22 years. Not just the happiest, even, but the first time in my life I have ever been truly happy. The work and thought everyone put into my birthday is just one more reason I feel that moving into that apartment was the best decision I ever made. I love you.
I'm wearing that locket even now, as I sit in my sister's home office in Redmond, Washington. I've only been here 24 hours, and at some point there will be much to tell, but there has been so much airport-havoc-people-watching-meeting-people-and-dogs-talking-til-dawn that my head is spinning as I attempt to process all the details.
So I've been writing in a notebook for the past couple of days. Paper and pen, the old-fashioned way, and trying to jot things down, from my head, no self editing and none of the weaving into what would normally make it into the public domain. I'm doing this so I don't miss anything.
Details are, of course, what turns a series of events into a story. I continute to be, more than anything, in the business of Jenna Tollerson mythopoeia.
We at the House are not giving up cyberspace. You can trust that the stories will indeed follow. Soon.
