Graduation, Manny and Mexico

"If you want to catch beasts you don’t see everyday,
You have to go places quite out of the way.
You have to go places no others can get to.
You have to get cold and you have to get wet, too."
~Dr. Seuss

Graduation came and went. It was good and very interesting. Saturday bright and early I graduated from the Journalism school at 8:30 in the morning. It was a good ceremony and I sat in between Terena and Niki. My parents were there, along with Darry and Dulce and my aunt and uncle from my father’s side of the family. After the ceremony there was a small reception which we went to for about 10 minutes. After graduation we went to brunch at one of my favorite restuarants. It was nice and afterwards everyone went their seperate ways for the day.

Sunday was the day Darry graduated with his law degree. My grandmother, two aunts, and great aunt were able to come for that day, Dulce’s family was there as were my aunt and uncle and my parents. It was neat to watch him get hooded and see where all the kids were in his graduating class. There were a lot of international students graduating from law school.

After that Darry and Dulce,  Dulce’s parents and grandmother, my parents and I all went to lunch at a small barbecue restuarant on the Avenue. We had just enough time to eat lunch and get back for the real commencement ceremony. There is a legend at our university. We have a beautiful campanile (bell tower) on our campus. It’s our World War II monument and dedicated to all the students that lost their lives fighting in WWII. The tradition on our campus is that on graduation day, you walk through the campanile. However the legend says that if you walk through the campanile before you graduate, you will never graduate. I’ve been in the campanile before, but I’ve never walked through it, until graduation day.

Well on graduation day, the entire graduating classes walk through the campanile. All the schools line up and each person walks through the campanile. I walked with Niki, Terena, and Vinnie. Vinnie is an engineer and he was running late and his school had already walked by the time he got there, so he walked with me. It was an incredible experience and I can say that the walk down the hill and through the campanile is definitely worth the wait.

The commencement ceremony was nice, but hot. The chancellor gave his speech this year and since it was his eleventh year to give his speech, he did Chancellor Bob’s Top Ten Commencement Speeches. He hit the highlights of each speech and tied them into this year’s speech. He even sang for us, it was really cool.

After graduation Darry and Dulce had a party at their place for Darry and I and our friends. It was a small come and go graduation reception. A bunch of Darry’s friend’s showed up to their small apartment. Tricia, Gina, Julie, Vinnie, Manny and Harvey showed up for me. My old boss popped in for a bit and it was very nice to see him and his little girl. She was adorable.

Afterwards, we all headed home with plans to get together and hang out for the evening. I went home and showered, cleaned a bit, had a small bite to eat and Gina showed up. We played cards while we waited for the guys. Eventually Manny and Vinnie showed up. We all sat in my roommate’s old bedroom and drank. The guys sat near the window to smoke, I sat on the desk and Gina sat on the bed. My roommate had moved out so the room was empty and it was easier to sit back there and smoke than to go outside.

Manny had made be a CD of Hindi music as a present so we listened to that and took the piss out of one another. We all joked and had a good time. Manny complained about his shoulder’s, so I ended up giving him a shoulder massage. Well later, he ended up giving me one. It was great and during that, Gina and Vinnie left the room.

Well, Manny and I talked for a while. He was sitting on the bed rubbing my shoulders and I would just look up and stare into his eyes. I had to go to the bathroom, but when I returned he was laying down on the bed. I kneeled beside the bed and we continued to talk. It was nice and he knew that I was nervous about leaving school. Our heads were close to one another and we just talked. Eventually I curled up beside him on the bed and we laid there, just talking.

Well, it wasn’t long before he kissed me. It was nice, but I interrupted it because I didn’t want us kissing to mess up our friendship. I asked him if us kissing would mess us up and he said yes, but kissed me more. It was nice and it was really comfortable to be back in his arms. We were making out pretty hard when he stopped. He said we needed to stop, so we did; for about two minutes. Then we went back to making out. We lay there for a while and he had his face buried in my neck and he could tell that I wasn’t ready to leave. It might have been because I was crying. He asked what was wrong and I told him it was because I wasn’t ready to leave. He didn’t look at me, but his face was still buried in my neck when he told me that he wasn’t ready for me to leave either.

This threw me, I had no idea what to do or say. Is there still feeling there or is he just going to miss his friend? I asked him if he wanted to talk about it and he isn’t a talker. He just lay with his face buried in my neck and we held onto one another. After a while we started talking about other things and I asked him if he would come visit me and he said he would. So that made me feel a bit better.

Evenutally it was about 5 in the morning and he knew I had to get up at 7. He decided he should leave and we should find Gina and Vinnie. Well, we walked into the living room and they had headed over to Vinnie’s to pick up some cigarettes. They showed up about 2 minutes later and the guys headed back to their flat and Gina was going to go with them. I knew that her and Vinnie were going to hook up.

Well, I turned off all of the lights and curled up in my sleeping bag and cried a little. My last night in town and I had a wonderful time but the Manny thing threw me and I was so confused, excited, and exhausted. I lay there for about two minutes when there was a knock on the door. I got up, wiped the tears from my eyes, looked through the peephole and say Manny standing there. I wiped my face so he wouldn’t see that I cried and answered the door. He could tell that I had cried and he was upset. He had left his phone, but he wouldn’t leave until I told him what I was crying about. I told him I was fine, but he wouldn’t believe it and I told him how I was nervous and scared. He kissed me  and then he kissed my forehead and held me. He told me that I needed to sleep, so we parted ways and he told me that I wasn’t to cry anymore. He wouldn’t know if I cried, but he would be upset if I did. I walked him to the door and we said goodbye.

I curled up in my sleeping bag once again and lay there for about two minutes when there is another knock on the door. I look and Gina is outside my door. I let her in and she tells me that Manny was worried and thought that someone should stay the night, but it wouldn’t be a good idea if he did. So Gina ended up staying the nightin the back bedroom, which was probably good so she didn’t make out with Vinnie. Those two are going to get in trouble one of these days.

I woke up at 6.50 the next morning and cleaned my flat and drove three hours to home town by 1 in the afternoon. Thre my luggage in my parent’s car and we were off to Mexico. I will write about Mexico in my next entry because I have things I need to do today, but I’ll write soon.