Arrival and the Search for an Omen

It rained on my first day in State College. Threatening skies all day, a few drops out on I-80, and a couple afternoon and early evening downpours. Nevertheless, move-in went well. The wonderful parents came to help me get settled, and now I'm the only tenant in a large Tudor-style cottage just north of campus. The others will move in by late August, but for now it's me and the landlady. The place is beautiful. Built by an English professor in 1937 and used as a bed & breakfast for the last couple decades, my new digs look like a cross between a museum and a Cracker Barrel (in a good way, not in an everything-smells-like-bacon way [which is not necessarily a bad way]).

I'm very far away from my usual circles in DC and Lansdale. It wasn't until my folks left that I realized how much of a stranger I am in this place. As much as I like to think I'm an independent person, it's a frightening feeling to know that most of your friends are a couple hundred miles away. I'll be spending this week trying to reconnect with some old folks from high school, though. If anything's going to help me get through the next couple years, it will be the loving support provided by lots of friends.

On a recommendation from the gas station attendant, I took dinner at the Eat'n'Park. Perhaps not my first choice for food, but I was hungry enough to eat just about anything and the Eat'nPark served up a burger and a flat surface on which to write my grocery list. All the same, eating alone in a chain restaraunt doesn't do a whole lot to abate feelings of loneliness. I exit the restaraunt feeling kind of low, only to be greeted by the following:

I'm no augur, and I put as much stock in omens and horoscopes as I do in fortune cookies, but it comforts to know that the weather can be on your side once in a while.