Beginning of Sophomore Year

     Things are beginning to get back to the same order as they always are around here...

     That means all the usual things; rain, chilly temperatures, important things being closed when you need them, fire drills, that sense of solitary-ness in a sea of thousands of people  It also means a severe vacuum of noise, nasty food and studying textbooks because there's nothing else to do.

     Ran into a couple people I know; Darrell the janitor, Mallory, and Andrew S. My annoying ponytailed neighbor Drew is gone, apparently, which is a very good thing. I'm in room 520 now, over from 521 last year. Steven F. is in my old room, he's an all right sort of guy, Stephen is on the other side, Zach two doors down.

     Woke up yesterday morning at eight, immediately went to go get my books, bought them. Dropped off my TCC transcript at the registrar's office, which has been added to my transcript here. Then mapped out my class routes, two of the classrooms I'd been in before, the three others were new.
     All that done, my day's tasks were finished in an hour and fifteen minutes. So I played guitar a little bit, watched Andy Griffith, studied the opening chapters of most of my textbooks, and then went for a walk nowhere in particular. Just needed to move somewhere, act like I doing something interesting. It started raining halfway through. While waiting to cross the street, I going one way and this old lady the other, she randomly says "I won't bite ya." I smile a little, not sure how to react or if I'd heard right. "What?" She grins. "See? That's better. You was thinkin' too hard, needed a smile. Have a nice day!" That's why I like Tahlequah as a town, things like that. People are friendly. One of those unexpected small brightnesses of encouragement God sends us through the middle of the darkened stretch of road we're traveling on at the moment.

     The Greeks are beginning their campaign season, and the student government too. I don't really understand either of those things. Sports haven't started just yet, not sure how often I'd go to games and stuff anyways. And if I did I'd more than likely want the other team to win. I don't know, I just don't absorb "school spirit" very well. More of a Chameleon than anything else, with effort I can appear to be a bunch of things: Bulldog, Demon, Dragon, Eagle, Golden Eagle, Knight, Pirate, Trojan. But not a RiverHawk.
     In the first place, it looks strange written that way. Shouldn't it be split into two words as "River Hawks" (like UMass-Lowell) or simply "Riverhawks", without the unnecessary capitalization? In the second place, I don't the river all that much. I don't really even like water. In the third place, I'm scared of heights. And whatever bird-name I identify  with is the orange and black of Morris High's Eagles. Also, just the phonetics of the name itself. Stretch out "Hawks" and you get "Hawkkkssssss"; which is harsh and grating and unpleasant. Compare that to "Eagles", "Cardinals", "Ravens" or "Falcons", all of which stress the first syllable, which just sounds better. "Penguins" doesn't, exactly, but it's fun to say. The sounds of "Seahawks" and "Blackhawks" tend to flow easily throughout the entire word. "Blue Jays" works well, because that last syllable is one of those pleasant-sounding types, and it rhymes with a bunch of things. And another thing is there aren't really any hawks in town...guess "Blackbirds", "Sparrows", "Skunks" and "Squirrels" wouldn't work too well.

     As part of the remodeling of the Fit, they tore down one of the volleyball courts to use as a storage space for the huge piles of dirt and things. Hoping they don't need the other for the same purpose.