This was originally published on a website called, “Off the Page,” that was wonderful, but is unfortunately no longer, so I’m archiving it on the blog. Enjoy!
What she loved about her desk job in her college dorm was the to-do list that greeted her at the beginning of her shift. Design this month’s bulletin board, write events on the calendar, fold or staple programs for dorm chapels. She loved to staple; loved the satisfying clack the paper made when she tapped the sheets together; loved the ch-clink the Swingline made when it clipped the stack together. At each task’s completion, she crossed it off with a satisfying black strike, which she reserved her ultra thin Sharpie pen for. The thin line made it clear she completed the task, but she could still read what she’d accomplished.
It was the mail that brought trouble. At the beginning of each month came a stack of magazines the residents subscribed to, and it was her job to put them in the correct slots. Except some of the magazines were Playboy and Penthouse, and she didn’t think boys at a Christian institution such as the one she attended ought to be looking at Playboy and Penthouse.
“This is so fake,” she’d mutter as she slipped a dirty magazine into its owner’s spot. “Disgusting,” she’d wipe her hands on her jeans after the deed was done. This was back in August when she’d first started the job, but now it’s December and Christmas music is playing in the lobby and there’s a great big Christmas tree with twinkle lights and it looks like it might snow and she refuses to place a spray tanned girl with fake everything into someone’s mailbox while “Silent Night” is playing.
So she decided she wouldn’t, but throwing the magazines away didn’t seem like enough, so here’s what she did: She looked up each of these boys’ home addresses, and, with the black Sharpie she used to cross off her completed tasks, she blackened the dorm address, and wrote the home address with the boy’s mother’s name at the top. The dirty magazine would go to the mother. She chuckled as she ran a finger down the alphabetized list of residents’ addresses. She was like the Grinch; only good.
“Oh my goodness!” she imagined the moms all saying. “Are you kidding me? We send you off to a Christian school, and this,” and here they’d wave a rolled up Playboy, the cover on the inside so no flesh is accidentally seen, “is where our money is going?”
Surely she’d win some sort of award, she thought as she wrote each address in her incredibly neat handwriting. She was very proud of her handwriting, and each September the skin on her index and middle finger broke and bled and blistered where she gripped her pen making sure each line was straight or curved appropriately. Neat handwriting, she believed, came from a neat person. An organized person. Someone who knew what they were doing.
When she finished with the magazines – there were about twenty of them – she tossed them in the white bucket market, “US MAIL.” They landed with a thick thump, and she paused at the permanence of the sound. She looked at the “US MAIL” officially stamped on the side. She imagined a mom at home in the afternoon. Maybe she was wondering about her son. Maybe she missed him; the noise he made, the activities he participated in, the homework he completed at the dining table while she made dinner. She’d hear the mail drop through the slot in her front door, and she’d walk to fetch it and find this.
She took a step towards the mail bucket and then stopped. No, she thought. What these boys are subscribing to is wrong. It’s not real. Their moms should know, she assured herself. I would want to know, she thought, and she twirled the diamond engagement ring on her finger and her stomach did a flip flop when she thought of her fiancé in South Bend, and their future together.
She gave the US MAIL bucket a shove towards the door where a student would pick it up. She pivoted towards the desk and picked up a J.Crew magazine and began to flip through its pages.
She studied the models carefully and wistfully. She loved the girls’ messy hair and no make-up look. She loved the way they wore the clothes – haphazardly and joyously it seemed. They weren’t nonchalant like some of the more high fashion models looked. She imagined these girls were on their way to a party or a sleigh ride, or off to a cozy pub in Chicago where they’d sit next to the window and watch the snowflakes fall while sipping pints and laughing at the possibility of Lake Effect snow.
She wanted to look like these girls, and couldn’t for the life of her figure out why her bed head attempts looked more like she’d actually just woken up after a rough night of sleep. And no make-up? That was out of the question. How did these models do it? How come they were carefree and beautiful and drinking pints under the Chicago skyline?
A boy walked up to the counter with a pink slip of paper in his hand.
“I have a package,” he said, and handed her the paper.
She turned to match the paper to the package. This time of year numerous packages were sent from parents to encourage their kids in their last days of finals before Christmas break. His folks sent him a box of clementines. She picked it up and placed it on the counter.
“Here ya go.” She pushed it toward him and the tangy citrus fragrance wafted between them.
He smiled.
“I love these,” he told her and ripped the netting open to get to the fruit. “Especially at Christmas,” he said and scooped a clementine into his palm. “The flesh is so easy to peel.” He barely pierced the skin with his fingers and it came right off. “I eat these things like candy.” He popped a section in his mouth, and the fragrance mixed with the Christmas tree needles stung her eyes and “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” was playing but she couldn’t remember what “Emmanuel” meant. She knew it was Jesus the choir was singing about; calling for, but she forgot the meaning behind “Emmanuel,” and she should know because she’s in a Christian college and Christians should know this and what was this boy doing still standing here?
“Want one?” he asked, passing her the fruit.
“No, thank you,” she said and she didn’t know why she said it. She loved clementines, especially at Christmas, like this boy. Her mom puts them in a big red bowl every year and when she is home on break she will grab them and snack on them mindlessly walking in and out of the kitchen and dining room or outside to check on the sledding hill she and her brother make every year on their front steps.
The boy nodded then walked around the corner to the mailbox, leaving the clementines in front of her. She turned a page of her J.Crew magazine. If she were a J.Crew girl, she would’ve taken a clementine.
“Did you finish putting the mail in?” the boy asked.
“Yes,” she told him looking up from her magazine. He had thick curly blond hair. And he was tall.
“All of it?” he asked, leaning an elbow on the counter so he was close enough to see the J.Crew magazine. He looked at the catalogue and she watched him look at it, a couple holding hands, laughing in the snow wearing snow boots and flannel and plaid scarves, all artfully mismatched. He looked at her and grinned and she remembered.
“Yes,” she said slamming the magazine shut. “All of it.”
He shrugged, picked up his clementine box, and walked away.
She didn’t know why she was rattled, but she was and the J.Crew pages were getting puffy from the sweat on her hands.
“This is ridiculous,” she muttered. She threw the catalogue in the trash.
She stood and began straightening the area. Her shift was ending and she liked to have it set up for the next person. She remembered a sign she read once in her church kitchen when she was a little girl: “Leave a place better than when you arrived.” That’s nice, she thought. She was helping her dad, who was an elder, clean up after Communion that day. Reading that sign, she carried the grape juice cups a little more carefully, to the sink and dunked them gently into the sudsy water.
She zipped up her jacket, pulled on her mittens and slung her backpack over one shoulder. She took one more look at the Penthouses and Playboys in the US MAIL bucket. She looked at the thrown away J.Crew magazine. She looked at her watch. She had an appointment in 15 minutes. She locked the door and left.
Her appointment was with her guidance counselor. This afternoon she was meeting him to discuss the results of a personality test and what that has to do with her career choice. She was going to be a teacher. She only had student teaching to go and she’d have her BA in Education. She would be a teacher and her husband would work on hurricane storm surge at the University of Notre Dame. They’d go to football games on Saturdays in the fall.
Her counselor pulled out her results and slid them across his desk towards her.
“You’re studying to be a teacher?” he asked.
“I’m going to be a teacher,” she said, and she didn’t pick up the results.
He nodded. “There’s a couple of statistics on this test that I’d like to address.”
He explained that the test revealed she had high scores in introversion, something she’d known since she began taking these personality tests.
“I know that,” she told him, annoyed.
He nodded again. “It can be difficult for an introvert,” he explained, “to manage themselves when they’re in a classroom with children all day.”
She leaned back in the chair, crossed her legs, and waited for him to continue.
She was sick of hearing about what introverts had difficulties with. To her, it just sounded like an excuse to not try anything. She knew she was shy. She knew she preferred one or two friends to several. She knew she hadn’t taught before, but she liked the idea of teaching: of reading stories with her class. Maybe they’d act them out sometimes. Of kneeling next to a student’s desk and helping him find words for a story. Of posting work on walls and having class meetings. Couldn’t she at least try to be a teacher even if it didn’t fit her personality?
She uncrossed her legs and sat up. She nodded. She would play the “concerned about being an introvert” card so he could give her the tips to managing it: journal, prayer, walks in the woods. She would pretend to be grateful for these suggestions. She wouldn’t tell him she hated walking in the woods.
“The other thing I’m concerned about,” her counselor said, “is the ‘judging’ aspect of your personality test.”
“Judging?” she asked.
“It has to do with a few things, one of them is the importance people place on having a plan.”
She looked at him blankly.
“You know, to-do lists, schedules, setting goals. Your score reveals that having a plan is of utmost importance to you.”
“Why is that bad?” she asked. What was wrong with coming up with a well laid out plan? It’s how you got things done.
“What happens when your plan doesn’t go the way you want it to in your classroom?”
“Why would that happen?” she asked.
If you have a plan, you follow the plan. Simple.
“What concerns me,” he said, and picked up her test results, “your scores show that when a plan doesn’t go the way you think it should, you perceive a moral or ethical flaw.”
She crossed her legs again and waited.
“You think it’s sin,” he said.
She said nothing, but nodded, once.
“What happens when a child doesn’t do what you’ve planned? What happens when a kid asks you for the one hundredth time what the directions for an assignment are? What happens when a kid says, ‘Reading is stupid.’”
They’ll be punished is what she didn’t say, but she was thinking it. This meeting was not going the way it was supposed to. Her guidance counselor should’ve prepped her for this. A simple email would suffice. He was lazy for not sending a memo to her. He was mean to shock her like this.
Her counselor was supposed to sign off on this personality test so she could drop it off at her advisor’s office and be ready to student teach in the Spring. It’s all she had left – student teaching and planning a wedding that semester. She had planners for them both.
“Your students are works in progress,” he said. “We are all works in progress.” He stood and walked to the corner of his desk and sat down again. She took this as a cue that the meeting was over and stood abruptly. She walked behind the chair she was sitting in and placed her hands on the back of it. She would not slouch. She would not lean on this chair for balance because that would show weakness and she refused to show him she was infuriated and afraid because things were not going as she thought they ought to go.
“I’d like you to retake this test after the break,” he said and handed it to her. He stayed where he was, but reached toward her, extending his arm so that he could pass the results to her. She stayed where she was for a moment, then grabbed them.
“Thank you,” she said and left his office.
She crumpled up the test and threw it in the trash before she left the building.
Outside, the sky was grey and low and the air smelled heavy. It would snow soon. She should head home to the house she shared with her three roommates. They’d have Christmas music going, and they’d be at the old kitchen table the four of them foraged in the summer when they moved in. Books and coffee mugs would be all over it and there’d be a place for her to study for exams. She should go home.
The first flakes fell as she got into her car and turned the key in the ignition. They sparkled red, she noticed, as she reversed out of the parking spot. The road out of campus began to look like powdered sugar was sprinkled on it. By the time she was on the highway driving towards the University of Notre Dame, she had to turn on her windshield wipers because the snow was coming down thick and fast.
She should go home but she hated her counselor for telling who she was and how she acted. She didn’t have to stick to a schedule. She didn’t have to follow all the rules all the time. Those boys back at her dorm who ordered the dirty magazines didn’t.
And she punished them for it, she thought as she turned up her radio and accelerated. She thought of the boy who offered her a clementine. She tightened her ten and two position on the steering wheel. You cannot be good and be bad she thought as she drove over the St. Joseph River. She didn’t know exactly how to get to Notre Dame, but she knew she’d cross the river a few times and as long as it was there, she knew it would get her to campus.
The snow was steady and she thought about Lake Effect as she got near to the south bend of Lake Michigan. She passed Benton Harbour and knew she was in the danger zone now: snow could fall from the sky like a down blanket and this is what goes wrong when you don’t follow the plan. Did she have a shift to work tomorrow? Which classes would she miss? Come to think of it, which building did her fiancé work in? She’d never been to Notre Dame without him, and unless she navigates a place by herself she’ll never know it.
She crossed the river again and remembered the night she got engaged. They were standing next to Lake Michigan behind the Museum of Science and Industry. It was November. He wanted to ask her to marry him here, he explained, because this was the first place she took him when he visited her one weekend, and it was that day he thought she was adventurous and funny and he wanted to be around her all the time and see the world the way she sees.
“It’s so dark,” she said to no one as she drove down a two-way road. She worried about black ice. She worried about missing class tomorrow. She didn’t even pack an overnight bag. What was she thinking? She can’t stay the night with her fiancé! Could she? Did Notre Dame have a rule like that? It doesn’t matter; she knows better.
She thought again of that November night when her boyfriend slid the diamond ring on her left hand; her fingers splayed apart in anticipation of what sparkled in the night. Was he right? Was she adventurous? Was she funny? She couldn’t remember.
She remembered a time, though, when they went to Gino’s East for pizza and she told him he could write on anything. She pulled out permanent markers from her purse and handed him one.
“Anything?” he asked, and he was suspicious, but he popped off the cap from the marker. She picked up her water glass and wrote, “Anything,” on it, then slammed it on the table so the word faced him.
They shared a deep dish pizza with a cornbread crust and pepperoni and they wrote on their booth, on the table, on the wall next to them. He drew Calvin and Hobbes, her favorite. He could draw anything. She could draw hearts and stick figures, but she didn’t dare draw a heart because she didn’t want to scare him. She thought he was pretty great, though. He was like a buddy that she always wanted to steal kisses from. She tested her breaks as she saw the exit sign for South Bend coming closer. Around him she felt energetic and good and they had fun together and she wanted to see the world with him.
She parked at the football stadium and got out of the car. She slung her backpack over her shoulder figuring if she couldn’t find who she was looking for, she could get something to eat at the Huddle and maybe do some studying.
She remembered that the Golden Dome – the top of the Basilica – was across from The Huddle. As long as she could see that, she’d walk towards it and eventually find warmth and figure out what to do next.
She hugged her jacket tightly and shivered. She remembered her fiancé told her it was rumored that in the Basilica there was an actual piece of the cross. Thinking about how close she was to an object that Jesus took his last breath on scared her and made her sad. “It is finished,” he said and hung his head, and all the world’s sins were forgiven. Nothing more to be done. Order dirty magazines. Fantascize about looking like a J. Crew model. Get flustered by a boy who is not your fiancé. Try to do something that you’ve been told will bring you endless frustration because you aren’t created to handle it.
She was frustrated and crying and the campus was beautiful where she stood now, on the quad, the sidewalks criss crossed and some students walked towards dorms, their shadows so tall in the streetlights.
She sat down on a stone bench and stared at a sculpture of a man and a woman, with a well in front of them. She gasped. This was Jesus and the woman at the well. She stood again and walked closer to them.
She didn’t like this story. Hated it, really. How come we don’t know this woman’s name? Plus, we know Jesus was tired, but what about her? Both of them came to the well when they knew no one else would be there. Jesus to be alone, but surely she was there at that time so she wouldn’t be the object of gossip. Or maybe she made that errand up to get out of the house. She rests her empty jug on the well’s edge and there’s Jesus telling her all she’s done wrong.
She circled the sculpture and looked at the woman. She didn’t look tired. She looked strong. Her back was straight and her shoulders were back. Her hands rested gracefully on the jug she carried and set on the well. She didn’t look ashamed, she looked beautiful. Like a ballerina. The only part of her that looked agitated was her face, but it was an interested agitation; a joyous agitation. Like Jesus was telling her what she was but that it was OK, and she craned her neck to hear more.
She looked at Jesus. He was leaning towards the woman – one leg on the well and the other on the ground stepping toward her. He had an arm extended and his palm faced up as he reached towards her.
She remembered the woman ran at the end of this story. She ran after she figured out who Jesus was. She ran to tell the rest of the town. A woman who has five husbands and one of them isn’t her own delivers the good news.
She looked at Jesus’ upturned palm again and thought about putting her hand on his but decided that was a weird idea and besides, the snow was collecting. It fell in the well and on their shoulders. It filled in her footprints that circled the sculpture.
She walked back to the stone bench and sat down. She was freezing. She stared at Jesus and the woman and wondered where the engineering building was. She tried to match the posture of the Samaritan woman as she wondered what it is she would do now, and where she would go.
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