Billy and Griffy were up and showered and dressed at 7:30am, ready to go! I let them do the registration without me, as I enjoyed a solo eggs & bacon at The Williams Inn, pondering the life-change that was about to come upon me.
Before long we were on our way to the dorms. Griffy is on the 4th floor (walk up) of Armstrong Dorm, which is in the Mission Park Complex. There are 2 dorm quads for freshman, and Mission Park is the newer one WITH the cafeteria located within the building. The dorm room was sooo nice - carpeting and plenty of storage, and 2 nice windows with a view of Greylock Mountain.
My mind drifted back 3 years ago to when I helped Lulu check into her "forced triple" dorm room at Boston College in 100+ degree weather. At the time, we could not find anyone on the floor who knew how to assemble a vacuum cleaner (least of all the 2 of us!). If only Griffy had been there - you should have seen how quickly he hooked up his laptop, put together the chair, the lamp, and even the computer printer! Duly noted, Armstrong dorm has it's own designated new vacuum cleaner, which I tested out several times. Griffy has his own room, as do most of the kids on his floor. In the room next to him is a nice young man all the way from South Korea, and down the hall we met kids from New Orleans, the Bronx, Bedford NY, and Raleigh NC.
We enjoyed a campus wide lunch outside on the lawn in front of the new student center. Afterwards we walked around various tables advertising the local churches, some grocery services, and the school newspaper. The student editor explained to us that their newspaper "The Williams Record" is totally student produced. I proudly shared with him that Griffy had been a photographer for his high school yearbook, and they exchanged emails. Then I said, "Oh I occasionally write for our local newspaper hahahha do you need somone to write a "Dear Abby" type column?" and the editor looked at me blankly. Then I said, "You know...Ann Landers?" Still no response. Then the editor and Griffy both said "Who are you talking about?" Bill nudged me away saying "Dollie, you are dating yourself".
Bill and I headed over to a parent's meeting where the president, various deans, the head of security, and the nurse assured us that our children were in good hands. Then we got the message "Time to go home guys...we take it from here"!!!
So we headed on back to the dorm to say our goodbyes. Oh me oh my...I did not cry like a baby, but I acted like one! It seemed only yesterday that Griffy was at nursery school, clinging to my pants leg and whimpering "Don't leave me mama, don't leave me mama". This time I had to hug him, and then hug him, and then hug him again. It was bittersweet as we headed to the staircase and he hurried down the hall towards the common room where all the students had their first get-together. An hour later he sent us the nicest email thanking us for everything.
Bill and I headed to NYC and stopped on the way at a small local restaurant where I had a delicious meal of comfort food - grilled pork chops and a baked potatoe & gravy - delicious! The GPS lady gave us excellent directions and before you know it we arrived at The Mandarian Oriental where we went to our room, dropped the suitcases, and collapsed. We reflected how lucky we were, and how blessed we are with great friends, a loving family, and our wonderful children. And then we thanked God for each other.
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