Darcy worked until her very last day of summer. Then she spent three days traveling back and forth from college for job training. That meant that it was up to Mom to haul out the belongings from the nooks and crannies where I stashed everything in May and up to Dad to load the van. Darcy packed the rest in the late evenings after training, and we set off on Thursday morning in two cars packed to the ceiling.
Tom: "You really don't need all this stuff. I mean, your room is probably going to be small."
Darcy: "This isn't even all I'm going to need. We still have to go shopping when we get there."
Tom: "I don't know what for. This is plenty of stuff."
Initially, he wasn't going to accompany us on this trip, but Darcy wanted him, so she guilted him to take a day off. I think at times she regretted that decision--mainly when it came to shopping.
This year Darcy is in the dorm for students in deaf studies. This dorm was one of the reasons she chose this school out of the other Florida schools. As of her move-in day, she didn't have a roommate, so moving was easier without another crew of people.
It went much smoother than last year. Darcy had scoped out the dorm during her three days of training and knew the back way to bypass the road closures and move-in day crowds. We parked in a lot behind her dorm, and we were there early enough to have three college helpers with a cart. While Darcy and I went off to retrieve her keys, Tom and the kids loaded up the first cart and were alone on the elevator.
It took two cartfuls from our van and one from Darcy's car. Three trips. We were unloaded and working on the room before the first hour of being there—a far cry from last year's debacle. Darcy and I immediately got to work unpacking and hanging her clothes. We lofted her bed and arranged and then rearranged her side of the room. We made lists as we did for our shopping trip. We discovered that her outlets weren't working, so Darcy got her RA, who had a maintenance man in our room within fifteen minutes. Whoa! Last year it took three days for the maintenance guy to show up to lock the door!
Darcy was the only one moving in on her floor that day. It was eerily quiet. Even the television was on mute with a closed caption or people talking in sign language. We were pretty much moved in and ready to shop by one o'clock. We spent a leisurely lunch and then hit Walmart, where we filled the cart until it was overflowing.
Tom: "This is ridiculous. Why do you need all this shampoo? All these bottles? What is all of this stuff? How much laundry are you planning on doing? It only takes a little bit of detergent to wash nowadays."
We ignored him as much as we could, but we had to suffer when it came to buying the microwave. The man insisted on lifting each one in the aisle as if Darcy were going to be doing the same each time she heated something. Then he read everything on each box as if by doing so would tell him the best one. We spent longer in this aisle then we did in the entire store. Eventually, Darcy and I wandered off to pick up dishes and flatware. He joined us after making his decision based on...ready for it...color.
Tom: "You're buying forks? Why are you buying forks? We have a million forks at home. You can get those on your next trip home. Don't buy forks. Are you buying spoons? Why would you do that? You don't have a lot of room, you know."
We fed her, kissed her, and said our goodbyes. Cheers to another great year!
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