1.11.05

in scotland. it took two solid days with very little sleep and a distinct lack of showering, but i made it. i was welcomed by the opportunity to share a hotel room with a very messy girl from georgia. i didn't like her eye make up.

upon attempting to move into my flat, i got my key stuck in the door on the first try and was presented with a tiny, frigid room lacking a lightbulb. i got a bulb from the RA downstairs and was then confronted with european light sockets. it took me a solid half hour to figure out how to get the damn thing screwed in. a very depressing, cold, and lonely half hour.

this place started out feeling very empty to me. the halls in my building are cavernous and unheated; the wind literally howls around the corners day and night. it feels like i'm living in a castle with linoleum floors. the sky is gray and foreboding with weather that changes more frequently than maine's. the sun finally comes up at about 9 am and is set by 3.30. they tell me this will change soon, which will be good. strangely, the city is filled with lawns that are all verdant green. all the trees are covered in a thin sheet of velvety moss the same color as the grass. it makes me think it's early april.

three of my roommates are from england and one is from america; san diego. they're all friendly and, i think, happy that i'm friendly as well. there is a cap to the level of personal relationship i will be able to have with each of them; it's disheartening and adds to the empty feeling.

i miss my parents. i miss jon. i miss karina and sarah. these are givens. they aren't pleasant.

i'll be drifting in this city for the next few months, scavenging things. scavenging information, internet time, food, and personal contact with other humans. things are tenuous. i need to buy some vitamins because i'm not eating very much. i need to scour the kitchen so i can stand to cook in it (a task that currently seems insurmountable). i need to buy sneakers and more warm pajama pants.

the city's sucking me dry, but it's beautiful and dramatic. yesterday, for instance, i was walking up the royal mile (the camden of edinburgh) in futile search for the new college (built about three hundred years ago) and the sun was bright in an apparently cloudless sky. rain was blowing horizontally into my face in a gale force wind. it is impossible to guess the weather in the morning and, just like they said, i've stopped caring what my hair looks like.

no one appears to take academics at all seriously here. i have a hard time believing that it's actually the case. very basic things don't happen, like shutting up when the professor starts talking. if class has technically ended, people will leave regardless of whether or not the professor has stopped talking. no one buys course books because no one reads them. there must be a variable i'm missing.

things are not gut-wrenchingly terrible, but they could be a hell've a lot better. i'm hoping the emptiness gets filled.