Waiting for California

Now, I am getting back to the memory part of my blog. I do so desperately need to write on my novels, so I will borrowing my past in my journals. I will post them in italics, I will make some corrections from, ekes, thirty five years ago! but basically, these will be what an almost eighteen year old thought in 1979:

January 25, 1979

In the morning, laying in my soft warm bed surrounded by the dark cold air, I wish we didn't have school. My body rejects the idea of getting up. My mind says, "It's snowing hard, the streets were covered last night, we shouldn't have school."
But I get up and slowly trudge to the radio. My school isn't canceled and the ritual of getting ready for school is performed. I don't feel at all like dressing and putting on my make-up.
Whiteness is a mist and again the sidewalks, ground and roads are covered by snow. Buses are late on the slippery highways. Home room is extended five minutes.
Now that I'm in school, I'm glad I'm here. I have my eye on the week vacation at Easter and a trip to California. I can suffer the worst blizzard in this school, if I be basking in the sun in only three months. Some things are worth the agony.
P.S. We got out of school early. 

February 24, 1979
As I pierce the gray skies, I have the sudden urge to hold Tim, to hug him and kiss him. I need him here for companionship and his smile and kind eyes. But all I feel is emptiness and loneliness. A pit enlarges in my stomach and nothing relieves the pain on this dreary late winter day.

February 26, 1979
It's confirmed, I'm going to California! I leave March 29 at 6:15PM from Pittsburgh and I won't be home till 5:08 PM April 17. I'm looking forward to my break. I've never been that far west and I know Diane and Herman will take me to neat places.
I'm ready to pack and leave already and the worst part is I have to wait a month.

February 27, 1979
Memories live like they happened only last week, but when you look back, you find it was a month, two months or even years when it actually happened. So life floats along, each of us making our memories. Some are mistakes we'd rather not look upon; and other memories bring spring to a cold dead winter evening.
Memories put us in "movies" and always take us to another world. The plots move, and you meditate the endings and all along you know you have been down that road before.
Memories are for you and me to share together, so we make one more memory before we part.

Yes, you can see why my writing teacher gave me a "B" on my journal by these samples. I seemed to love "and." I tried to write creatively, not so much concisely. I fell in love with Tim, as he was on my paper route in my freshman year. Tim moved to Florida, that summer. He came back to visit his sister in January of 1979, so his memory was fresh in my mind. We had rekindled our relationship. I love how the finalization of a trip to California made me forget about Tim. At least for a day. A cold, dead winter's day. Don't forget dreary.