The item / gossamer gold

Chris B. is a woman I met in college. (Well, with 300 or less students you have the chance to meet everybody if you want to.)

She was two or three classes behind my friends and I.  But Kim noticed her immediately.  "Did you see that baby dyke in orientation?," she cooed.  I hadn't.

The truth is I had also scoped out the newbies and had my eye on a different gal.  (No, we weren't "recruiting," just looking for others of our kind.)

It took me a while to recognize Chris.  She had black hair and blue eyes.  She was just a wee bit shorter than me and had a brash and somewhat butch appearance.  She was tough, smart-mouthed and street smart.  Well, she was from NEW JERSEY, after all. (And don't you DARE make any cracks about New Jersey around her!)

Having said that, she was also clever, witty, sensitive, talented.

She had this crusty exterior.  Sort of rude and challenging...  a survival mechanism, no doubt.

You might not get the impression that she liked you.  But there was just something about her that kept me curious.

She kept moving from dorm to dorm as I recall.  I think she was not every roommates cup of joe. She was in my dorm for a while, but it was in the red brick "Wood Hall" that I remember her most.

I would get a yen to visit and go knock on her door.  If she didn't want to talk, she said so.  She had a kind of push-you-away manner but I still wanted to spend time getting to know her.

One night (I think I already told you this.)  I climbed the outer wall up to her window, which was just above the top of the boiler room.)  It freaked her out to find my at her window, but she let me in... or maybe she made me climb down and go around.  I can't recall.

Anyway, we spent some time just talking.  I don't remember what about. I do remember that she was always kind of authoritative about everything, like she knew everything and you were wrong if you thought different.

There was something there.  Whatever she said, I just liked her. 

It was in these moments in her room, mostly, that we connected.

We were never intimate at all. I doubt that we ever even hugged each other hello or goodbye.  Doesn't matter.

She dated a "townie" that I had also dated.  That woman broke her heart.

And then she shared her singing/songwriting/guitar-playing skills in the tavern a few times and that was very cool.  She also did some comedy shtick that was fresh and uproarious.

She is still one of the coolest and most fun people I know.

I found her on Yahoo! IM a night ago and we gabbed for two or more hours about school and work and women and children and house pets.  Then she switched over to AOL IM and we talked a while longer.  It was quite enjoyable.

Then I found out she has an online journal, too.  How cool is that? 

Unlike me, though, she rants and raves about the state of the world. (I do care about the world, but I focus on the things I can help change more directly and try to avoid the news.) 

I'm so happy to have long-time friends.  It's nice that people know you half your life (or more) and still like ya!