things away.
"I've got all evening," I said. "I'd like to be able to find stuff."
"You always have to be so blasted independent!" Mom started up, an old, old song.
Twenty minutes or so later, Dad trundled in behind a final cart full of boxes. “Here's some powdered doughnuts for you to share with your roommate, Buddy," Dad said, slapping the package into my hands. "The two of you behave now!"
At last, he and Mom were gone, leaving us to make tentative passes at getting acquainted.
"What do you do for fun?" Duncan asked.
"Oh," I said, "I drink a little beer now and then (meaning every chance I got), and go on dates when I have time."
"Going out with girls?" Duncan asked.
“Well yeah," I said. The subject seemed to drift then.
"Do you smoke?" Duncan asked next.
"I used to smoke cigarettes," I told him "but I pretty much gave it up when they started costing too much."
"What about pot?"
"Never really have," I told him.
"Oh--” he made a disappointed noise.
"Not as if I've never had the chance," I added as if that mattered somehow. "I've probably had my share of second-hand smoke." This wasn't exactly adding up to a scintillating conversation.
A little while later another boy arrived whom Duncan obviously knew.
"An L-shaped room,” he gushed in what was a surprisingly girlish voice, at least so I thought at the time. "How do you rate? an L-shaped room!"
Our room was one of the two larger in the cluster. It sort of wrapped half-way around the elevator shaft which served our end of the building. Duncan and Tom talked for some time in near whispers until the later took leave, having some prior engagement it would seem. Moist sounds were exchanged between them, then Duncan said "Well, goodnight girl."
Later Duncan went out, saying he needed to check out the undergrad library. That left me alone in the room so I decided I should use part of the evening to familiarize myself with the immediate surrounds.
Grabbing my cane I went first to the nearest door, walking around the U shape of the cluster to the other side, the door nearest the bathroom, checked out the facilities. Two showers, two sinks, a toilet stall and a urinal. I reemerged, crossed through the rec/common room, slid open the glass door stepping out onto the balcony. It was damp but fresh and peaceful this time of evening. In a couple days muscle memory would take over I knew and I'd be able to move pretty much on automatic. This place would start feeling like home. For now it just felt sort of lonely. Coming back indoors I let myself out of the cluster into the hallway. First I made sure I knew the location of both stairwell and elevators, then did everything over again. On my second return though, a door was open just across the hall from me.
"Well hello," a sweetly solicitous voice trilled. "Are you searching for something?"
"No. Just looking around a little."
She giggled as if I'd said something funny. "Getting oriented to the building?"
"Yeah," I agreed. "Practicing up for tomorrow."
“Good idea," she enthused. "Do you know your way down to the lobby and the breakfast place and all that?"
"No," I admitted, "but I figured I'd best learn up here first then I can go on."
"Well," she said, "My name's Ellen by the way, I'm going down to do some laundry and I'd be glad to show you around a bit--if that wouldn't interfere with your self-orientation plan I mean?"
"That would be nice," I said, because this building was more complex than the one I'd lived in Spring Quarter and I'd gained relatively little on my way up with my Mom. Then I added
"You've got laundry to do on the first evening?"
Again she laughed. "Oh, I stayed here through interim break (the week between Spring and summer quarters) so I'm already moved in. My roommate is arriving tomorrow and she's kind of a neatnik."
"You've met her before then?" I said.
"Yes, we were together over in McCarty Hall last year. Her name's Janice."
"Oh," I said. "By the way, I'm Dave."
"Nice to meet you Dave. Do you take my arm? I'm not really sure how this works."
I took her right elbow in my left hand, so my thumb and fingers wrapped the arm from behind. That way you can feel the other person's body movements as she walks slightly ahead of you.
"There's Braille in the elevator," Ellen told me, moving my hand to the double row of buttons each with it's dotted identifier.
"I must say it's totally amazing how you people get around on this big campus."
"You mean engineering students?" I asked.
"First we'll go down to the lobby," Ellen said, ignoring my little jibe, "and I'll show you how to get to the front door. How's that sound."
"Great," I said. "I know this building is right across from Communications so I should be able to get where I need to go tomorrow morning."
"And where's that?" she asked. "The CMU Building?"
"Electrical engineering," I told her.
"Good heavens!" Ellen expostulated. "Okay (as the elevator door slid open). We're in the lobby now. The front doors are pretty much right across from us but there's a tricky thing about this building. It's built in two parts, towers they call them so there are two sets of elevators. One goes up to one tower and one goes to the other so if you were to go up the wrong elevator you'd end up in the wrong part of the building so you might think you're going to your room but--”
"Got it," I laughed. "I can see the problem."
"I guess you just need to feel the wall to the right of the elevator you're using to make sure you're going up the correct shaft."
We walked to the door, opened it, stepped across the walk to the curb. "Communications building," Ellen announced. "is a straight shot across the street from here but the entrance is a little off to the left." I acknowledged the observation.
"I'm standing here with my laundry bag under my arm," Ellen remarked. "Mind if we go downstairs and put in my washing then I can show you where the dining room is?"
"Of course," I said having nothing better to occupy me this evening and still feeling new and frankly anxious. We returned to the elevator going down two levels.
"This is the basement," Ellen said. The laundry rooms are down here and it looks like a lot of utility stuff for the dorm too." A washer door creaked open on it's hinges and I heard clothes plump in, then a second machine' now a third. Obviously a gal who separates her fabrics I reflected. The scent of detergent powder wafted into the air. Water hissed filling washers.
"That'll be about fifteen minutes," Ellen told me. "Let's go look at,
