SUUSI report, Day 1.
Jul. 18th, 2006 02:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivkaHaving a wonderful time. Wish you were here.
Well, okay. The first few hours of our SUUSI experience were not so wonderful. And getting Alex to sleep in a strange, exciting place has been difficult. But the rest of it is great.
I had been dreading the drive down, but it went really well. We made good time - there wasn't much traffic on a Sunday morning, and except for a bad wreck that slowed I-95 down to a crawl for a while, there weren't any problems. Alex took a two-hour nap and was easy to entertain for the rest of the time. We had lunch at a friendly, relaxed little cafe in Buchanan, VA, an almost insanely picturesque little village about an hour and a quarter north of Blacksburg.
Then, as we were pulling onto the Virginia Tech campus, Michael asked me, "Where's Alex's toy phone?"
"In the diaper bag," I said.
"Where's the diaper bag?"
Oh shit.
We had left the diaper bag on the sidewalk outside the cafe, while we strapped Alex into her carseat. There we were, without any snacks or toys or easily-accessible diapers, less than an hour before SUUSI registration closed, not sure of where we were going or what to do.
After some blundering, and increasing anxiety on my part, we found registration. Loud, exuberant, helpful people at the newcomer's table descended on us, heard our tale of woe, and helped us figure out a plan. Michael was to race ahead and get his photo taken for the directory, and then we would leave without finishing registration to unload the car. Then he would drive back to Buchanan while I returned to register and, somehow, moved our things into our room.
We drove around to the unloading zone for our dorm and emptied the car in five minutes flat, piling everything in a heap on the grass. I put Alex in the stroller and walked back to registration. SUUSI Amazingness #1: A couple of elementary-school-aged kids were stationed at the entrance to the registration hall, giving out Hershey kisses and bottles of ice-cold water.
I had mailed in a check for the balance of our registration. They couldn't find it. I got shuttled around to the Registration Problems Person, who looked and looked for my check and came up with nothing. Alex was fussing. My father, who was supposed to have arrived that morning, was nowhere to be found - and I had been counting on him to help me with Michael gone. Hot, tired, overwhelmed, frustrated, and worried, I started to cry.
SUUSI Amazingness #2: The Registration Problems Person looked at me kindly. "What do you need?" she asked. I couldn't even think of anything that would help. She asked a few cogent questions and came back with another bottle of water for me, a snack for Alex, and two extremely kind men whom she tasked with leading me through the rest of the registration process and then helping me carry our things to our dorm. Everything got better very quickly. The two guys made gentle, pleasant conversation as they threaded me through to the youth table, the childcare co-op table, and the photo directory. My dad showed up. We all went back to find the pile of our stuff, and hauled it across a very hot quad to our dorm.
We're living in a suite with two other one-child families: grandparents and their six-year-old granddaughter, and a young couple with a two-year-old boy who instantly became Alex's best friend. We share a living room and an absolutely appalling, mildewy bathroom. Our bedroom is nice, though - very big, and plenty of storage space for our vast quantities of stuff. Alex played happily with the other kids while I did my best to start putting the room in order.
Michael returned with the diaper bag at last, just in time for a quick dinner at the dining hall before Ingathering. We went back to the room to pick up our church's banner, a big white pennant-shaped thng with streaming red, gold, and black ribbons, an outline drawing of the church building, and the words "First Unitarian Church of Baltimore, Since 1817." Then we followed the sound of drumming to the spot where the Ingathering banner parade was assembling. At the last minute, Michael dashed back to grab the camera and Alex's jingle bells, so she could join in with the drums. Then about 900 Unitarian-Universalists (and one or two others, like my currently-Presbyterian dad) strolled across the campus, banners waving, drums pounding, little girls dressed up in princess costumes... the works. It was an impressive sight.
We paraded across the drill field to a big auditorium. The drummers and banner carriers lined the entrance plaza as the rest of us went in, and then came in at the end to great applause. Then came an opening hymm - and it turns out that UUs actually can sing, if you get 900 of them together - and an hour-long program with music, readings, and introductions to various SUUSI staff and programs. Alex spent the whole Ingathering toddling up and down the aisles at top speed, stopping only to smile and flirt with the other attendees. Her recent shyness dropped away as soon as we arrived at SUUSI - she's treating everyone here as though they're her long-lost family, and they're reacting in kind (SUUSI amazingness #3). It's very sweet.
Ingathering finished with an opening circle on the drillfield. All 900 of us spread out into two concentric circles, facing each other. We held hands and rotated our circles in opposite directions, greeting everyone in the other circle as they passed. It was a powerful experience, even though virtually everyone was a stranger to me. I can only imagine what it must be like for people who have been coming for twenty years.
We poured Alex into bed and then enjoyed our first taste of Childcare Co-op freedom (which probably also qualifies as SUUSI Amazingness #4). We gave our names, destination, and cell phone number to a guy sitting in the hallway, left him the baby monitor receiver, and went off to hang out and drink wine in the suite of friends from our home church. We had a great time getting to know them better, and then I went to bed early while Michael followed them over to the Cabaret for some music.
That was our first day.
Well, okay. The first few hours of our SUUSI experience were not so wonderful. And getting Alex to sleep in a strange, exciting place has been difficult. But the rest of it is great.
I had been dreading the drive down, but it went really well. We made good time - there wasn't much traffic on a Sunday morning, and except for a bad wreck that slowed I-95 down to a crawl for a while, there weren't any problems. Alex took a two-hour nap and was easy to entertain for the rest of the time. We had lunch at a friendly, relaxed little cafe in Buchanan, VA, an almost insanely picturesque little village about an hour and a quarter north of Blacksburg.
Then, as we were pulling onto the Virginia Tech campus, Michael asked me, "Where's Alex's toy phone?"
"In the diaper bag," I said.
"Where's the diaper bag?"
Oh shit.
We had left the diaper bag on the sidewalk outside the cafe, while we strapped Alex into her carseat. There we were, without any snacks or toys or easily-accessible diapers, less than an hour before SUUSI registration closed, not sure of where we were going or what to do.
After some blundering, and increasing anxiety on my part, we found registration. Loud, exuberant, helpful people at the newcomer's table descended on us, heard our tale of woe, and helped us figure out a plan. Michael was to race ahead and get his photo taken for the directory, and then we would leave without finishing registration to unload the car. Then he would drive back to Buchanan while I returned to register and, somehow, moved our things into our room.
We drove around to the unloading zone for our dorm and emptied the car in five minutes flat, piling everything in a heap on the grass. I put Alex in the stroller and walked back to registration. SUUSI Amazingness #1: A couple of elementary-school-aged kids were stationed at the entrance to the registration hall, giving out Hershey kisses and bottles of ice-cold water.
I had mailed in a check for the balance of our registration. They couldn't find it. I got shuttled around to the Registration Problems Person, who looked and looked for my check and came up with nothing. Alex was fussing. My father, who was supposed to have arrived that morning, was nowhere to be found - and I had been counting on him to help me with Michael gone. Hot, tired, overwhelmed, frustrated, and worried, I started to cry.
SUUSI Amazingness #2: The Registration Problems Person looked at me kindly. "What do you need?" she asked. I couldn't even think of anything that would help. She asked a few cogent questions and came back with another bottle of water for me, a snack for Alex, and two extremely kind men whom she tasked with leading me through the rest of the registration process and then helping me carry our things to our dorm. Everything got better very quickly. The two guys made gentle, pleasant conversation as they threaded me through to the youth table, the childcare co-op table, and the photo directory. My dad showed up. We all went back to find the pile of our stuff, and hauled it across a very hot quad to our dorm.
We're living in a suite with two other one-child families: grandparents and their six-year-old granddaughter, and a young couple with a two-year-old boy who instantly became Alex's best friend. We share a living room and an absolutely appalling, mildewy bathroom. Our bedroom is nice, though - very big, and plenty of storage space for our vast quantities of stuff. Alex played happily with the other kids while I did my best to start putting the room in order.
Michael returned with the diaper bag at last, just in time for a quick dinner at the dining hall before Ingathering. We went back to the room to pick up our church's banner, a big white pennant-shaped thng with streaming red, gold, and black ribbons, an outline drawing of the church building, and the words "First Unitarian Church of Baltimore, Since 1817." Then we followed the sound of drumming to the spot where the Ingathering banner parade was assembling. At the last minute, Michael dashed back to grab the camera and Alex's jingle bells, so she could join in with the drums. Then about 900 Unitarian-Universalists (and one or two others, like my currently-Presbyterian dad) strolled across the campus, banners waving, drums pounding, little girls dressed up in princess costumes... the works. It was an impressive sight.
We paraded across the drill field to a big auditorium. The drummers and banner carriers lined the entrance plaza as the rest of us went in, and then came in at the end to great applause. Then came an opening hymm - and it turns out that UUs actually can sing, if you get 900 of them together - and an hour-long program with music, readings, and introductions to various SUUSI staff and programs. Alex spent the whole Ingathering toddling up and down the aisles at top speed, stopping only to smile and flirt with the other attendees. Her recent shyness dropped away as soon as we arrived at SUUSI - she's treating everyone here as though they're her long-lost family, and they're reacting in kind (SUUSI amazingness #3). It's very sweet.
Ingathering finished with an opening circle on the drillfield. All 900 of us spread out into two concentric circles, facing each other. We held hands and rotated our circles in opposite directions, greeting everyone in the other circle as they passed. It was a powerful experience, even though virtually everyone was a stranger to me. I can only imagine what it must be like for people who have been coming for twenty years.
We poured Alex into bed and then enjoyed our first taste of Childcare Co-op freedom (which probably also qualifies as SUUSI Amazingness #4). We gave our names, destination, and cell phone number to a guy sitting in the hallway, left him the baby monitor receiver, and went off to hang out and drink wine in the suite of friends from our home church. We had a great time getting to know them better, and then I went to bed early while Michael followed them over to the Cabaret for some music.
That was our first day.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-07-18 07:44 pm (UTC)-J
no subject
Date: 2006-07-18 10:46 pm (UTC)Wait til I get to the sushi-making workshop. :-)
no subject
Date: 2006-07-19 01:37 pm (UTC)-J