what went on while i didn't have the internet

Vivian in Edmonton

September 2, 2007

11:00 pm

Having successfully negotiated the rugged highway she found herself in a strange new land. Traffic lights hung the wrong way, avenues and streets had three digit numbers, and worst of all her private room had more than one bed in it. The air was clearer here, free of the wireless signal that connected her to home. Fearing that she had been cut off from the world she new panic rose like a knot in her throat and the pressure behind her eyes became almost unbearable. However, the bubbling conversation of an uncannily similar roommate calmed the storm about to break through the surface and after rearranging the furniture in the single turned double room the land that had recently seemed so strange held an attractive glow.
Of course hastily made dinner plans and party invitations still weighed on her mind but those fears could be stored away for the morning and with the exhaustion of someone who has finally reached the mountain summit she fell into bed unbothered by frantic dreams for the first night in a long time.

September 3, 2007

3:50 pm

An afternoon bike ride seemed like just the thing now that her awkward lunch with the girl down the hall was complete. 23W Avenue lead past herds of growling motorists and multitudes of row housing but it was the least unfamiliar so she followed it to see where it might lead. After several harrowing intersections her arrival at the south common shopping centre should have been as if entering a safe haven from the motorised beasts of the main transit arteries. However, the internal combustion powered wilderness only gave way to the perhaps more daunting jungle of urban humanity. It amazed her that she made it in and out of Superstore and Staples alive so great was the crush of bodies inside she had feared that masses would swallow her whole. Buoyed by her successful hunt and the possibility of wireless communication with home the return trip, now familiar, sped by as only a well traveled road can.

11:02 pm

An improvised dinner and a missed movie later she found herself chatting with a noisy group of returning students, her hesitant roommate hanging back. Conversation turned into an invitation to Boston Pizza and with several blisters on her feet and a cup of hot chocolate in her belly she returned to a dimmer and more intimate campus. A self professed head-case introduced himself seeming friendly and just interesting enough that she decided he might be worth knowing. Later he offered her pizza in the parking lot and mistook her inability to eat wheat for meat and called her a vegetarian.
Afterwards, an inquiry into her roommate’s Christian background led to a long discussion on personal revelations of Christ and a baring of souls. Finally though they slipped into sleep and she was pleased to note the anxieties of her old life had become even dimmer, all but one. But that could be left for another day.

September 4, 2007

2:27pm

Exhausted from the morning orientation and career fair she flopped as gracefully as possible onto her bed now a fully fledged member of the women’s Futsol team and an itinerant cartoonist for the school newspaper. The pressure to commit to extracurricular activities had born down like a wave as soon as she had entered the gym, fortunately though, the desire to track down second hand textbooks overpowered the urge to join student council and she made it safely through without too many added commitments. Now lying on her bed, the wind singing through the trees outside her window, she contemplated the coming semester; what had seemed so daunting and strange from the confines of Prince George now offered a welcome respite from the frantic socialization everyone seemed to be set on cramming into the first few days on campus. Textbooks whispered soft promises of solitude calming her frazzled social nerves. A snack seemed like just the thing to get her back on her feet for the rest of the day so she headed for the kitchen in search of an apple.

September 5, 2007

9:38pm

Entering the gym late she found herself in the middle of group prayer and the foreboding sense that even here she wouldn’t fit welled up inside her for a moment. Her relationship with God seemed too casual for the heads bowed in reverent contemplation. An annoying wasp, the word “just” leapt from every phrase stinging with its audacity. She wondered why we have the compulsion to ask God to “just do this” or “just do that” when if we had the gumption to demand that mountains be moved He would shift the continents for us. It came as a revelation to her that though her body had outgrown its awkward adolescence her faith was only just entering this pimply, confused, and peer pressure ridden phase of life. In high school she had hardly ever submitted to the in crowd’s social demands however, here being cool seemed to carry with it the ticket to being tight with God. Authentic or not it was something she longed for. She wished God would move mountains for her yet she lacked the courage to ask for fear of the earthquakes it might cause.

September 6, 2007

7:55am

Her aunt had given her a flip book of devotional type quotes, thoughts and scriptures. After dragging herself out of bed at the insistence of her kids Timex alarm clock she flipped the page on the book to September 6. It read “If you have a serious problem in a relationship, ask God to...heal it... Every time you think of that person, praise God for him or her. Thank Him for bringing them into the world and for all the good things you can think about them... Praise Him... and thank Him that He can redeem anything... even the words you shouldn’t have said or the damaging and hurtful things someone did to you.” Moments from a dream the night before flooded her mind. She had crossed mountains to get to Edmonton so perhaps it was she and not mountains she needed to ask God to move.

9:27pm

9:49pm

10:14pm

She had decided a trip to Starbucks was necessary. Inviting whoever wanted to go with her, a group of 15 Taylor students had descended on the unsuspecting coffee house of corporate evil that she loved so well. The field trip was considered a success by all though some scoffed at the rainbow viewing on the way back.

A Prayer for Diana
Your body is a temple.
This is not a restriction but a celebration of beauty and strength.
You were built by God for God.
His creation
of unique and dazzling beauty.
Know this with your mind
and he will write it on your heart.

September 8, 2007

1:59am

Her first trip off the island of faith the Taylor community seemed to create, was for a very auspicious occasion – a frat party. Entering the house she felt a relieving sense of anonymity sweep through her. A face in the crowd there were no offers or expectations she had to decline. It was as if a pressure she hadn’t known was there lifted itself from her shoulders in this staggering, beer-bonged environment. It was exactly what she needed after the social intensity of residence orientation. Nobody cared who she was and she returned the favour.