Morgan Mania

It is that time in the semester when it seems that the only purpose of those once beloved Christmas carols is to taunt me.

Somehow, amidst all the last minute projects, finals and those two people that keep parking perpendicular in the parallel parking in front of Brown Hall, the last thing I feel is Christmas spirit. (By the way, just as a warning, I am double parking you in tomorrow - it will be worth the ticket).

But the one place that I can find Christmas spirit is the place you would least expect.
I believe that there is a feeling amongst students this time of year, unique to a university. I attended community college before arriving here and didn't expect for anything to be different - and between the classes, homework and all the walking, nothing really was.

Then one day, the difference jumped out at me. It is the feeling that you get when you realize you are no longer going home for the Christmas holidays, you are instead leaving your home here at school.

It amused me the first time I saw it. It happens to all of us - last year, I witnessed so many fellow students, even grown men, calling each other, asking when one another would be leaving for the holidays, each waiting around on the other to leave first. And when you add graduation to the equation, it makes the entire ordeal even worse.

We as students arrive here for a multitude of reasons. Most of us just got our fill of flipping burgers while we were in high school. Some of us had our parents push us into it, some just came here to party and some arrived here with dreams and bright eyes hoping to actually learn something.

What few expect to discover here are is the true meaning of our first home away from home.

This is what Christmas spirit is for me now. Looking beyond the classroom and taking a step back to reflect on the life lessons we are learning here.
Friends, family - they are one in the same. These are not only the people whom we visit over the holidays, but also the people we leave behind.

The people who are there for you during the semester to help you cram for that last minute test, the people who are there to help you break into your car when you have locked your keys in, the people who are there for you when you go through your big break up and the people whom I will require a lift from tomorrow when I go to pick up my car after it is towed for double parking that stupid car in.

"The difference between school and life? In school, you're taught a lesson and then given a test. In life, you're given a test that teaches you a lesson." - Tom Bodett

"You will notice that the juice is already packaged with the bread as you receive it ..." the pastor announces ... each little plastic cup of grape juice had what appeared to be a wafer inside of aluminum and plastic wrapping attached to the rim of the cup.

My family and I looked at each other in curiosity of this new pre-packaged idea of communion. Highly creative I must admit - rather high tech - reminds me of something you'd get at a fast food place ... you know, like a McFlurry, with the sprinkles and M&M's packaged at the top ... communion: the quick and easy way.

Communion is defined as "a Christian sacrament in which consecrated bread and wine are consumed as memorials of Christ's death." Most Christian denominations, if not all, each have their own form of communion, which usually takes place during the course of a church service. Some use real bread, some use wine, others of us end up with cheap wafers and grape juice.

Basically, communion usually consists of each person in the church congregation receiving a piece of bread/wafer, then dipping it into a cup of wine/grape juice, and finally consuming it in remembrance of the body and blood of Christ. In any case, it is a short yet sacred ceremony that is to be practiced with deep respect and reverence.

The church congregation began to slowly pile into a single file line, where one by one, we took these communion cups, and kneeled at an altar to pray.

However, once we sat down with our high tech communion cups - I started to realize that actually acquiring the quarter-sized wafer and removing it from it's packaging was going to require a bit of skill. I peered over at the people beside me - all whom appeared to be equally, yet politely puzzled as we delicately and quietly tore away wrapping.

My sister leaned over to me after a few seconds - showed me her wafer - and asked if it looked like she had all of the wrapping off before popping it in her mouth apparently determining that it would probably be safe.

I desperately looked around at the other wafer packages left behind by the previous families - hoping for a sign that perhaps I was not the only one contemplating just completely forgoing the wafer in its entirety.

The saddest part about this whole thing is that there was an actual loaf of bread sitting at a table above us. Why we were all risking our lives with these highly advanced wafer packages, I did not know. Time was running out. The next group of people was moving in for their turn at the altar. My wafer finally slipped free of its packaging - I popped it in my mouth - and out of all the panic, downed the grape juice and swallowed the wafer whole.

I must admit, it would have at least been an interesting way to go: choking to death on a communion wafer. Scary actually. It didn't feel too pleasant on the way down, but apparently God still likes me a bit.

After taking a moment to make sure that I could still breathe, I concluded that no Heimlich maneuvers would be required, stood up from the wafer and aluminum foil-littered altar, and returned gratefully to my seat.

It is all ironic in a way. Sometimes at certain events we take our selves so seriously ... getting caught up in the ceremony of things. We become so focused on graduation - taking on 36 hours of classes at a time, our jobs or even communion ceremonies that we tend to take on more than we can actually handle.
So what do we do? Just be careful I guess.

There's nothing wrong with setting high goals and expectations. In fact it is wonderful. I knew all those years of swallowing large horse-sized allergy pills would pay off one day. So I say go for it, take life by the plastic communion cup and see what happens. But just remember to slow down enough to keep your self in check.

The personal prayer that I prayed that day, and I believe that I will continue to pray throughout the semester, goes something like this: "Dear God, thank you for not letting me bite off more than I can chew. Amen."

Having recently moved to Johnson City as a transfer student to ETSU, I expected to be faced with a whole host of new challenges and obstacles to overcome that would most likely change my life forever.

Only too soon did I realize exactly what these obstacles would be ...

Amongst them included: learning what the other appliances in the kitchen are for (besides just the microwave), memorizing the numbers of all of the local pizza delivery locations (and, of course, committing them to speed dial), coming to grips with the fact that my new apartment does not magically clean itself the way my parent's house did - and the biggest and most confusing challenge of all - sorting out the dirty laundry.

I had avoided it for so many years. It doesn't look that hard, most items of clothing even come with specific instructions: "machine wash cold with like colors," "hand wash cold-iron if needed," "machine wash cold, gentle wash cycle," "lavar a maquina con agua tibia." - seemingly simple - until one actually does the laundry.

Take "like colors" for instance. If I actually followed these instructions and sorted my laundry according to color, I would have a pile for each color of the rainbow, and then some. That equals out to be about 10-plus loads of laundry every week.
Keep in mind that this doesn't even take into account the striped and multicolored clothing. What if I had a blue and yellow striped shirt? Wash it by itself? Buy more blue and yellow striped shirts? Take the shirt to my parent's house and sneak it into their laundry?

And what about the instructions: "gentle cycle." I don't know about most college students, or the laundromats, but my poor little cheap washer has about four buttons on it, none of which include gentle cycle.

We also have the light vs. dark debate to analyze. Deciding whether or not my neon orange shirt is light or dark keeps me agonizing for hours on end.

Often I have to present any articles in question to my patient roommate who tells me into which pile each should go. But no one has a clear-cut method to do this - it is mostly guesswork.

People have different opinions on what is light and what is dark. Both my roommate and my parents have assured me that I will get used to deciphering this on my own - but what am I to do in the meantime?

I do not think clothing companies should be allowed to sell clothing that could be so potentially confusing to the untrained eye. Perhaps a level of difficulty rating should be added to washing instructions tags:

Levels of difficulty rating
Level 3. Warning:professionals only
Level 2. Novice
Level 1. Helpless college student

Now having lived on my own for a few weeks, I am slowly starting to see the light (and the dark - ha!).

Even though I am starting to accumulate a colorful array of slightly discolored towels and washcloths, I have yet to actually ruin any significant item of clothing. In fact, lately I have rather been enjoying myself.

It is almost like a science project - how blue can I really make those white towels if I keep throwing them in with the dark colors? I am even learning to be more daring in my laundry excursions. Just last week, I learned how to use an iron on my successfully washed clothing, and only burned myself once. I am also hoping to start a new fashion trend.

What says "college student" better than discolored, faded, shrunken clothing?

I can tell that this new chapter in my life will be an important one; I will be learning new things everyday.

I have learned to keep these three important things in mind, and I have come to find that they not only come in handy when washing clothes, but for all other everyday obstacles in life:

Laundry Lessons
1. Always look for a chance to learn new things.

2.Stripes are bad.

3.When in doubt, call mom.