College Visits

You'd think, with my third kid, I'd be better at college visits, but here it is October and we are only on our 2nd visit. And he is a senior. He has to apply by the end of November.

Today we went to Pitt, University of Pittsburgh, about 3 hours from home. 

It's a gorgeous day, weather in the low 70s, sunny. Pittsburgh is built on a series of hills with some of the trees turning vibrant orange already. 

The campus is smack-dab in the middle of the city. I liked the urban feel. Cool architecture. 

Although the campus is big, 18,000 students, it feels fairly compact and sort of magical. Of course, the college campus near our house has 50,000 students, so everything seems small in comparison.

The cathedral of learning felt like Hogwarts.

And the ceilings looked like a cathedral too. 

We ate in a great little diner right downtown.

Tucker wants a big campus but isn't sure he wants to be in a big city. 

That's a tough request. Any suggestions?

She's Fine

I talked to my husband Sunday morning.
"So what are you guys going to do today?"
"Nothing," I said. "Same thing as last night. We're doing nothing."
I think this was a mystery to him. He probably pictured hiking and spending time delving into buildings on campus. Checking out the nearby rivers and locks.
My visit to Grace at college wasn't about sightseeing or shopping. It was only about spending some time together.
That's why when I picked her up at her dorm, after hanging out for awhile to meet some of the people, I whisked her away to a hotel where we plopped on the bed, turned on the football game and talked. She leafed through People magazine, reaching over to hold my hand occasionally.

Slowly, the good and the bad came out, covering the three weeks we had been apart.
We spent the 22 hours together just talking except when we slept. She doesn't have a television at college, so after the football game I let her surf. She put on Cake Boss and took out the knitting that I had brought to her. She started making a scarf in her new school colors.
We looked at the blogs of mutual friends and Facebook statuses. And we talked some more.
She has landed pretty well. She got a great roommate who makes her hot cocoa when she's melting down and brings her goggles over to the pool when she forgets them. She has some terrific friends who spend their weekends performing at the talent shows and keeping an eye on the drunk people who stumble in. She loves most of her classes.
She's just having a hard time leaving behind this group of friends, and family. Now, she admits, if she came home, she'd miss the group of friends at college.
Loving both sets of friends is how it should feel. Missing the old, but embracing the new.
In the parking lot, as I prepared to leave, she held onto me tight and cried. But she didn't cry as hard or as long as last time

And the Winner is...

This summer and fall, we've been traipsing around the Eastern United States trying to help Grace figure out which college she should go to. She has been resistent, insisting that she could just stay home, attend Ohio State or Columbus State, cuddle with her cats, keep her nice settled life.
But we've pushed and some swim coaches have pulled. She started out this summer at the University of Maryland for a national swim meet. She stopped in West Virginia and we made a day trip to a small liberal arts college in Ohio. Then we drove five hours to Indiana before she and Earl zoomed to the Adirondacks.
Mostly, I remember the pools and the schools' non-aggressive team names:
She started with the Cardinals and snuck in a pre-season swim:

We spent an afternoon with the Quakers, my alma mater:

We met the Aces at 5:45 a.m. and they gathered at the end of the practice to sing that Taylor Swift song: "Marry me Juliet we'll never have to be alone..."

Then came the Saints:

This weekend, on her long drive home, she called, and said: "You just know when it's right. This is it."
So she has chosen the most expensive college we looked at and one of the hardest to get into. Only 34% of applicants were accepted last year. Hopefully, the eager swim coach will be able to use his pull to get Grace into the college.
She chose the farthest away. A 10-hour drive. We looked at flights. With layovers and driving time, we could get there in 7 1/2 hours flying.
The real selling point though, is she's excited about going. They have a great biology program, they have tons of languages, and the swim coach says she can participate in theater.
Fingers crossed now. Thank you notes in the mail. Interview out of the way and applicant essays nearly finished, we'll wait to see if she gets her first choice. If not, some of her fallback positions aren't bad either and they're a little closer.

New Adventures

This weekend my family completed two firsts. And firsts can be difficult. More difficult for some than others, but I would have to say that both of my children who conquered new territory had definite butterflies for a few days.
First, my daughter visited a college, but this wasn't like my college visits where we sailed through three campuses in a day, following a tour guide. She had lunch with the swim team, went to a class, talked to guidance counselors, practiced with the swim team, went to the team dinner and then spent the night in a dorm room with girls she didn't know.
At one point she texted me that she was freaking because they were driving on the highway, the two hostesses and two male students, on the way to Walmart. Grace has not been comfortable riding on the highway with teenagers since her accident.
But really, I wanted to laugh because when Grace, a homebody, is hanging with her friends here in town, they usually sit around watching movies and at times will make candy runs or Wendys runs. So, it sounds like she was in with a similar crowd at college.
She was so nervous to go and spend the night with these strangers. She even begged my husband, staying at the hotel up the hill, to let her stay with him. He held firm and she came home saying this school in West Virginia was her top choice.
I texted her that I was proud. She did something she was afraid of and it paid off.
My 13-year-old, my youngest had a first as well. His band of four played at the town festival on Saturday. Every year the boosters hold a festival with lots of fund-raising pie sales and games. The high school garage bands all play, but this time, a middle school band got a chance as well. Tucker was a little ticked off that the newspaper ad listed the words "kid band" beside his band's name, but next year when they're freshman they can be promoted to "student band."
They played five songs and my favorite was "Free Falling" by Tom Petty, but they also did songs by Green Day, Good Charlotte.
My video camera picked that moment to revert to stripes on the screen, looking like an old pair of Dick Van Dyke pajamas. I did recover a few minutes of the performance, including Tucker's ripping solo at the end of "Wake Me Up When September Ends." But I can't figure out how to save it as a separate track and post it. You'll just have to take my word for it.