I just want to write for a bit. I need to record memories here because I know for a fact that I will forget them and this post will be one of those things that I will rediscover years from now and be really happy that I wrote it all down. This past week--well, since I last posted more like--has made the thought of me moving on after college a lot more real. It's more real because I am seeing its implications a lot more clearly. I can't even begin to think about what life will be like a year from now. In the middle of a book, you know what's coming: more pages with words on them that you read. At the end of a book, you're looking down an abyss. You know there will be a sequel because life is good at that--it always goes on. But what is going to happen, exactly or even generally, you have no clue. And ideally, if the sequel is already out, you just move on and grab the next book and read some more. But in this case, there is no sequel yet. It's not out yet. So you can't do much but wait. Maybe you're online reading fanfiction or theories that fans may have about the next book, but you can't do that with life--can you?
The biggest imminent change that I'm feeling the most at the moment is the fact that I may not have the friends I have now around me anymore a year from now. We decided to do a Friendsgiving last week Sunday because people were going home during actual Thanskgiving and with a group of 10 people, it's always hard to figure out a time where everyone can make it--you should see our Doodle polls. So most of the time, it becomes like hanging out "in shifts"--if that makes sense. Brandon and I were not able to be there until after 2pm because of GK, the band people had a hotel party scheduled the night before so all of them (minus Brandon) would be dead in the morning. Kai was at home but was scheduled to be back in the dorms after a Costco run around the same time Brandon and I could get there. Anyway, the idea is that our times overlap with each other's at different times but the goal was to find a sliver of maybe an hour or two during which we can all sit down and have a meal. And we did!
The plan was to buy $100 worth of groceries from Safeway so that we could get a free turkey. So Bryson, Nicolyn, and Quintin went and did that in the morning. Problem was that the 24-pound turkey was frozen inside and out, completely. And most people allow ample time to let their Thanksgiving turkey thaw out. But we're not most people and we had scheduled dinner to be around 6:30 or 7:00 that night so Nicolyn, Quintin, and Bryson were not having it. So they filled up the bathtub with hot water and let the turkey hang out there. That wasn't working quickly enough so they stuck the turkey in the oven to thaw it out. They also started working on the ham at that point. But because the oven was a little occupied with the turkey, they stuck the ham in Bryson's oven across the hall instead, which was dynamite by the way. It was delicious. So by the time Brandon and I got there, Quintin was under the table catching up on Naruto, and Nicolyn was on her computer, and Justin was also conked out in his room, not to be seen until dinner time because you know, life. They informed us that they were all napping and watching over the two ovens in shifts; Bryson was currently taking his nap shift in his room. But he shortly joined us and he took out the turkey from the oven and soaked it in more water in the sink. At that point, Kai called and requested that some people go downstairs to the parking lot to help him out with Costco stuff. So I went down with the three other boys 'cause you konw, I have the strength of four men. Kai bought pumpkin pie (of course) along with other stuffs from Costco for the week. When he saw that the thawing of the chicken was unsuccessful, he started, um, excuse my language, fisting it because he said it thaws out the turkey a lot faster. His words, not mine. There was this whole "2 hours vs. 4 hours turkey" debate of which I definitely made sure I was not a part because kitchen fights are usually lethal even when you have recipes to back you up 'cause you just never know about the turkey and the oven and everything else. So we went to glaze the honey in Bryson's oven. Kai seasoned the turkey and put in the oven without us which meant we had to ask him to take it out again just so that we could put strategically placed butter chunks on the breast-side down slash upside-down turkey. So we stuck it in there and planned out the rest of the cooking stuff that needed to be done. Nicolyn was on mashed potato duty, Quintin was assigned stuffing, Bryson had to keep watch on the ham, Kai was letting the turkey do its thang, and I was doing dishes intermittently 'cause you know we're college students and we don't have enough forks to cook and eat without washing anything somewhere in between. There was some sort of debate about whether we should cook rice because we're all Asian, even the non-Asian ones, but there was mashed potatoes. Anyway, Team Mashed Potatoes won that battle because there ware peole who didn't want to commit to either one of the starch choices just for this particular dinner. Brandon was a floater and Justin was still safely in bed, snoring (metaphorically because I don't really know if he was snoring...he was sleeping soundly enough that if he was a snorer, he would be snoring). At some point we decided to clean up because this was a special occasion goddamit and we are not going to eat in a messy living room. After much debate about how we were going to move the furniture around to accomodate everyone (you get the picture, we have lively discussions about a lot of things when we're all in one room), the boys moved one of the couches to the hallway across the bathroom, rotated the table (which, by the way, the boys built together over the summer for specifically the purpose of having dinners like this and also 'cause who wants to do homework all alone in their room), and set up enough chairs for everyone in the group plus one. This was because Heide brought Tyler to dinner. At first it kind of made us all like "Wait, we have a guest? Do we need to be decent and appropriate?" but those who knew him assured us that his presence required no such thing because he was on the same level of inappropriate as we were but that we should be really nice to him anyway, which we always are, come on now. So back to cleaning. I vaccumed (Brandon also vacuumed the hallway outside the elevators because he is a child and threw uncooked rice all over the place the night before) and Nicolyn put away some stuff in people's rooms. The stuffing, mashed potatoes, and ham were done. Nicolyn and I decided to divide and conquer the genius dessert idea that she came up with: baked apple cider doughnuts with comforting apple pie filling, topped with rich cream cheese frosting, and drizzled with warm caramel sauce. If there was a plausible way to die happy with dessert, it would be this. It was going to happen tonight. We were going for it. It was real. This was all real. Yep, we all died that night after dessert. Anyway, logically of course, because she's made the apple cider doughnuts before, we decided that I, Jen, doughnut n00b, would make them. And because she's never made homemade apple pie filling before, it would be fitting for her to make that. We're just really practical like that. Except we weren't. Because we're really rebels and we like danger that way. Then when our duties were done, we combined forces to tackle the frosting. We didn't take the butter or the cream cheese early enough to soften them and get them to room temperature but it was okay because I had Baker Tricks up my sleeve which earned much approval and praise from Nicolyn (YASSSS SHE LIKES ME). So we did that and then the moment of truth came for the turkey. It was done! It was gorgeous too. Now we had to take all of the drippings and stuff for the gravy. That took some coordination and teamwork because it was a small kitchen, we only had four burners for everything, and the doughnuts needed time to bake once the turkey comes out, and also cool, and also because we only had one pan, we needed to do two batches total. All good, it just meant we needed people to do things when they needed to do them and how everyone wanted them to do them so that nobody got screwed over. Not that hard. Ok go! And they happened. There was some yelling, but hey we got them done. Alex came home and was very diligent in setting up the entire table with knives and forks and napkins. He also chose a Christmas playlist and set up his laptop by the TV so that we could enjoy how our voices and laughter were clearly louder than the music. We set the foods one by one to the table. We remembered that Brandon and I brought drinks in the cooler we used earlier that day so we took those out and we chose drinking glasses--the wine glasses are always a favorite because you know you can drink milk in that thing and you'll feel classy af. So at one point everyone was there then I yelled for someone to wake Justin up because we are not going to eat without him so he woke up and we were complete and Tyler met everyone he hadn't met before and he was really nice and he gave me a hug. Then everyone sat down and we all wondered if we should pray or something but we opted to smile for selfies instead for the sake of posterity and then we started to eat. Which basically just meant a bunch of guys with knives cutting into two types of meat--the turkey and the ham--and people asking others loudly to "pass the potatoes" and "yo gravy me up" throughout. There came the point when everyone had a full and complete plate of food and we were actually eating and talking and drinking and being merry and such. It was good. It was really good--the food, the people, the feeling of not dying of kitchen-related accidents. The fact that we pulled off a turkey and that it worked and the ham was glorious was immensely satisfying. Then it came time for dessert. We put together the doughnuts and the pies and we had whipped cream handy and it was good. It was just really good because of all the laughter that was in that room and all the jokes and the near food fight triggers that didn't happen and just everything about it. From our tiny Christmas tree in the corner of the room, to the colored Christmas lights around the window, to the open door that carried our voices and laughter out of the room and into the entire floor which happens every night anyway. It was good and it was the perfect thing to be thankful for in that moment.
It was a good way to start the short three-day week which was kind of the longest three-day week ever. But actual Thanksgiving was good too. I baked some ribs because we don't really have turkey for our family Thanksgiving dinners. I got a lot done in terms of papers (thanks to an extension whoooo!) and also applications. Big whoo!
I've been talking about this to Brandon a lot lately but I generally believe that time doesn't really move faster when we're older. People say that high school goes by so quickly, and that college is so much quicker. I think that's misleading because the rate of change is really constant throughout. It's just that as we get older, we become more attached to the people around us. We realize the weight of the present and see the importance of living. We learn how to love and to hold on to the things worth cherishing. And so it seems as if time moves more quickly because we don't want to part with the good things, the people and places we've built our comfort zone around. It's a bit scary isn't it? And I'm sure everyone feels it, which ought to make you less scared of it all, but that's easier said than done, as are most things.
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