It began with a meal pass
Yes, this will be another post based on history. My history, because this is my story. A lot changed for me, a half century ago.
I went from living, at home, with siblings. To living in an old style dormitory, with a lot of people that were not my siblings. There might have been a cousin or two in the mix, but that is incidental to my story. As high school wound down, I had a couple of incidents that forced me to rethink some long range plans. Not a lot, but my choice of school and hence residence were interleaved. At the end of the summer, I packed my bike and my packsack. Overpacked a steamer trunk. Caught the train to the coast.
Trains to my destination were dodgy. Intermittent. And so I retrieved my bike from the baggage car, and hit the road. Destination, a ferry terminal.
The ride required two afternoons. A night in my tent, under a driving rainng. Finding my aunt’s place, in the city, because I was arriving before the start of campus life. Another visit to my grandparents’. And then arrival on campus, where I had a room waiting.
To be fair, I had no idea what that even meant. There was a bed, in a shared room. A lot of strangers, who had the comfort of their football jackets and a support population (school chums). I had a meal pass. Unlimited hot food, as long as I made it to the queue in the right time period.
And so it began. Five years, at the end of a noisy corridor. A window that served as a very cold refrigerator. A shower room and toilets, at the other end of the corridor. A warning to lock my door any time I could, because others took joy in rearranging your life. Finding the bed beside the shower wasn’t convenient. I locked my door.
