Until last year, I only ever knew one woman named Georgia. We lived on the same dorm floor during my freshman year of college. She had shoulder-length black hair and almond-shaped eyes and boasted that 100 pairs of shoes were crammed into her dorm-room closet. She was one year further along than I, a sophomore who exuded a loud boisterous charm that was often fueled by mixed drinks, gin-and-tonics mostly if I recall correctly. When she had the money, she’d buy wheels of Brie but though I was happy to eat the cheese, she wasn’t in the money that often.
The dorm's social life seemed to gravitate around her, for she was something of a drama queen who demanded such attention. She complained about her weight, which wasn't bad, and then complained that every time she lost weight, she lost it in the wrong places. I was young and naive and my facial expression must have indicated that I had no idea what she meant, for she brought her hands to her chest and smiled, educating me into at least one fact that apparently all college women knew.
During the previous summer, she had visited another woman that also lived on our dorm floor and, after an appropriately long evening clubbing, crashed that woman's car. They laughed about it, both of them, startlingly me because I would have thought that a crashed car meant the end of the world.
Georgia's parents were in the process of a messy divorce and though she claimed she had been nurtured on Southern Californian wealth, her parents had neglected to pay her tuition. Which was something of a problem; by mid-September, the university was threatening to forcibly remove her unless she pronto-quick remedied her dead-beat status.
But Georgia had a plan.
The Who, those aging once-mod rockers who stuttered that they weren’t “trying to cause a big s-s-sensation,” had announced what might have been the first of their many farewell tours. They were scheduled to play two nights at The Capital Center and tickets were to go on sale shortly.
Georgia’s idea was to convert every last cent she had, which I gathered could have bought no more than ten wheels of Brie, into concert tickets. Then she planned to scalp the tickets for astronomical sums. The night before tickets went on sale, she celebrated her good fortune. She apparently drank quite a lot. Which was her custom. And slept it off for much of the following day, not arising until well into the afternoon. The concert tickets sold out within a matter of hours. Perhaps she knew the idea was futile.
After she left for the uncertain lifestyle that awaited her, nothing much was said about her. When I asked about her, everyone just shrugged, changing the subject to whatever campus party everyone was attending that night. Even the woman whose car Georgia crashed shrugged, but it wasn't until many years later that I thought that maybe my first impression was right: a crashed car did indeed mean the end of the world.
It’s strange what you remember about someone who you knew only for a month. Six weeks, tops.
I remember her closet, how it overflowed with shoes of every description. The shoes were brown and black and neon pink, some with heels and some not, and they were all jumbled together. No way could she ever pick out a matching pair without wallowing through that heap for at least ten minutes. Most of the time, she just wore a pair of purple Pumas.
The dorm's social life seemed to gravitate around her, for she was something of a drama queen who demanded such attention. She complained about her weight, which wasn't bad, and then complained that every time she lost weight, she lost it in the wrong places. I was young and naive and my facial expression must have indicated that I had no idea what she meant, for she brought her hands to her chest and smiled, educating me into at least one fact that apparently all college women knew.
During the previous summer, she had visited another woman that also lived on our dorm floor and, after an appropriately long evening clubbing, crashed that woman's car. They laughed about it, both of them, startlingly me because I would have thought that a crashed car meant the end of the world.
Georgia's parents were in the process of a messy divorce and though she claimed she had been nurtured on Southern Californian wealth, her parents had neglected to pay her tuition. Which was something of a problem; by mid-September, the university was threatening to forcibly remove her unless she pronto-quick remedied her dead-beat status.
But Georgia had a plan.
The Who, those aging once-mod rockers who stuttered that they weren’t “trying to cause a big s-s-sensation,” had announced what might have been the first of their many farewell tours. They were scheduled to play two nights at The Capital Center and tickets were to go on sale shortly.
Georgia’s idea was to convert every last cent she had, which I gathered could have bought no more than ten wheels of Brie, into concert tickets. Then she planned to scalp the tickets for astronomical sums. The night before tickets went on sale, she celebrated her good fortune. She apparently drank quite a lot. Which was her custom. And slept it off for much of the following day, not arising until well into the afternoon. The concert tickets sold out within a matter of hours. Perhaps she knew the idea was futile.
After she left for the uncertain lifestyle that awaited her, nothing much was said about her. When I asked about her, everyone just shrugged, changing the subject to whatever campus party everyone was attending that night. Even the woman whose car Georgia crashed shrugged, but it wasn't until many years later that I thought that maybe my first impression was right: a crashed car did indeed mean the end of the world.
It’s strange what you remember about someone who you knew only for a month. Six weeks, tops.
I remember her closet, how it overflowed with shoes of every description. The shoes were brown and black and neon pink, some with heels and some not, and they were all jumbled together. No way could she ever pick out a matching pair without wallowing through that heap for at least ten minutes. Most of the time, she just wore a pair of purple Pumas.
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