“this whole email is a secret.� i know you’ll tell ben, becca, mark,
ross, jamie, tamar, liz, and ilana, but i would appreciate if that was
it.� NO matt rubin” says becca. she’s hilarious. she entertained ruby and i, who trained into the city to see her and her close friend emily who’s also ruby’s close friend (they grew up in scarsdale together.) the four of us, plus emily’s bunny josh, partied on her roof after wandering around the city through the “there’s no place like penn” festival at which persons dished out free junk food and studiously ignored some jam band on a makeshift stage. the original plan had been to eat someplace decent but we couldn’t agree and just ended up in a small ghetto-y pizza parlor. a tv was on in the front of the place and becca stood with her back to it, determined to be cheerful and wacky regardless. we were all rather cheerful and wacky; that was the charm of the nite.
ruby and i made it back to campus in time to see memento. after, i met up w/ ben and he and i went back to his room, in the process crossing thru rob’s Den of Iniquity. the scene as i saw it was: marc splayed out on the futon, wasted and melancholy; jocelyn, all glammed up in a magenta wig, tight black clothes, platforms, and blue glitter galaxies around her eyes, pulling the letters out of a keyboard and placing them in a bowl; and rob, whose pupils were dilated to the size of teacups, e-baying.
this morning i returned to the barn to a scolding from ross, which i deserved, for departing suddenly and disrupting plans. then (swat)becca and joel and i chilled in the common room, alternately singing “the fox went out on a chilly nite” and talking sex. there has been much of that recently. the title of this last conversation, we decided, would be, “would you go down on jesus?” i’m sorry you missed it. really.
also a less pleasant conversation w/ my brother adam who declared that if america goes to war, he will enlist. he’s picking me up tomorrow on his way home from co’nell for the holidays; i imagine we’ll fight the whole way.
it reminded me of a discussion i had recently w/ ross: “what would you die/kill for?” ourselves, we decided; our friends and family. but a country? i hope it doesn’t come to that. for anyone.