Hungry For A Weekend At Home

Since Thursday, I have spent approximately 32 hours in Van Pelt. My breaks were for meals, sleeping, and meetings. Literally. As I read through my text books, made flashcards, wrote two papers, and prepared for presentations that should take me through the Monday after Thanksgiving, I acquired two tics: the instinctive looking up expectantly as I catch any tall boy in my peripheral vision, and--the more embarrassing one--impulsively texting boys from home in anticipation of a weekend of gluttony.

It started innocently with the love of my life from middle school. We have, for years, been in limbo with one another; one single, the other seeing someone, then it switches. Not since my bat mitzvah have I slow-danced with someone and really meant it. This text was an investment, on all accounts, since he’s in his first year at Goldman, and I am due to move to New York come June. Of course, being an investment big shot himself means he’ll be home for 20 hours. That led me to the high school friend with benefits.

The rugby player and I have averaged, since we were 15, one impulsive make out session every two years, and since I went abroad last fall, we are overdue. I was disheartened to discover, however, that he got a new phone and didn’t realize that the flirty text was from me. I moved on to my hypothetical betrothed.

The HB and I never dated because our respective best friends were unfortunately interested in him (my friend) and me (his friend). Apparently, he’s now dating a girl from Minnesota and won’t be home this weekend, which led me right back to the awkward dilemma: I had returned to my reading, which I realized went completely over my head. I do art history, not tax cuts. Not a soul in the Penn section of my BBM buddy list recalled the damn book, which lead me to the inevitable text message to my ex-boyfriend, a poli sci major at a school in the Boston area.

After smugly explaining the Tax Reform of 1986, he asked me when I would be coming home this weekend, and was I free "to watch a movie" Wednesday night. I realized the universality of the going-home-regression. “Oh…I have mono--you’re welcome to come over, though!” He respectfully declined.