secret garden

there's a spot on campus that we refer to as the secret garden. considering temple has 36,000 students, it's probably not that secret. but we like to think it is. it's tucked away behind the 7/11, next to a banquet hall used for various campus events and, unlike the grassy area by the bell tower, there's hardly anyone ever there. you have to descend a few steps to get there and the sloping hills surrounding the secret garden are covered in greenery. it's a pretty sweet spot for a city campus.

it's also a pretty sweet spot for impromptu picnics. we've been trying to squeeze in as many activities as possible the past few weeks, before our lease is up at the end of june and everyone leaves. 'everyone' isn't really 'everyone'. but it's some major players. and the end of june isn't even our real expiration date. beth is moving home june 18th to work at camp, then moves to austin in august for grad school. keiran's starting to shuffle her stuff back home the second to last weekend in june. christine is slowly pushing things into trash backs from her move back to new hampshire. even though the people are still here, watching the packing happen is sometimes enough for me to start to feel sad.

i'm no better though - i took home my first load of stuff last week, including the saggy bean bag will all love to hate. it's literally like sitting on the floor, the beans are so smushed. our downstairs walls were covered in posters and paper since the first week we moved in and when i took them down on Monday, you could see clear outlines where the pictures used to be, protecting the wall from the slight sheen of dirt found elsewhere. the house is starting to come apart. pretty soon it won't be ours.

so we're filling our remaining time with picnics and bike rides and spontaneous brunching and wine'n'wigs nights. which i think is the only option. because the other options are solo wine-drinking and crying to episodes of 'cheers'.