CHID potluck last night – I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many people smooshed into one area. But it was fun, and a lot of “that’s inappropriate behaviour for a PF and student!” commentary; oh, if they only knew.
I think one of the things I value about CHID the most is the closeness, not just mentally and emotionally, but physically. You are almost always guaranteed at least one hug while in the CHID office, and often many. Last night, it was like swimming through arms; everywhere you turned, someone was touching, holding, hugging. Several times over the course of the night, I had people sitting on my lap, across my lap, leaning against me. I spent equal time draped over other people. Nothing overtly sexual, just comfort and contact.
You don’t realize how much you value that, I think, until you’re not around it for a while – then you realize it’s been a while since you’ve touched someone.
Which is not to say the evening was sunshine and roses. Some of the awkward dynamics of 390 reared their ugly head last night, and in front of enough witnesses that it’s going to make the rest of the quarter interesting. I really need to recenter myself on at least one issue; it’ll probably involve being more aggressive than I normally am, but such is life, eh? (And yes, Virginia, there is such a thing are more aggressive…)
Stayed in the UDist again last night (two nights in a row), just to make sure a good friend got herself to bed okay. There’s a lot knocking around my head right now, about roll and authority and power and dynamics, friendships and being a student and a lot of things that I’ve honestly never experienced before, leaving high school early and having that whole non-traditional student thing going.
I’m spending so much time with people this quarter – normally it’s me and my computer and contact with people that way. Not so this quarter; I’m often away from the computer for a day or more at a time. And the social contact is with a lot of people new in my life; yet, I know things about them and they about me that suggest a much longer connection. (Hell, they know things about me some of my closest friends don’t.) Maybe some of it goes back to that CHID blurring of lines and boundaries, and that blur happens to physical as well as emotional.
I don’t know. I’m not making sense, and I realize that. Guess it’s still knocking around in my head, and I’m not terribly sure what to do with it or where to go, yet. But I suspect that it, whatever it is, is part of that nerve and awkwardness and irritation. I need to get that sorted out, at least for me, by Monday.