Happy Birthday, to Me!

My twentieth birthday was an interesting day.

I woke up in the morning and realised that I could not get out of my room, as there was a balloon taped to my handle and to my room plate, streamers, and a Happy Birthday sign hung low down, so that I had to shrink into myself to leave the room. This was actually really cheering, and I set about my day with renewed vigour. 

                           

I met Hannah to lunch at eleven, as is usual, although that day I was rather late. On Thursday we go to lunch at Fisherwick, which is my favourite student lunch, as they offer tea, water, caramel chocolate, apples, and a full, warm sausage. On free lunch on Tuesdays you get fed less than half of a sausage. But this is a fair lunch for a student, and as Fisherwick is full of welcoming people and lots of space, I can relax for an hour and eat. One of the Americans there came and visited us and asked what we were doing for Thanksgiving, and we talked politely about that for a bit.

Then Hannah went off to class, as she has Creative Writing at one, and I returned home to do some errands. We were to meet again at 3 in front of the statue dedicated to those who died in the Great War and World War II. 

At three I appeared there at the statue. I met Hannah, passing through on the way to the Welcome Centre to buy a new pack of tissues, and hung out there for a moment longer when I heard a boy say, “Hello, milady!”

At first I was like, Who is this person and why are they saying hello and did they just ‘milady’ me is there someone behind me but I turned and saw Catboy.

Catboy is my nickname for Michael, who is a fresher in my 18^th Century Literature Tutorial. He’s tall, with curly blond hair and a badly grown mustache that may simply be him forgetting to shave. I call him Catboy because the first time I really noticed him was as we were leaving class the first week, and he jumped up on a wall, walked the entire way on the wall, and then leapt over it and ran off into the distance. Within three seconds, he was gone. Since then, he really has not failed to disappoint; he says hilarious things, he whistles happily for no reason, and Catboy is generally kind, accepting, and makes everyone welcome.

“Oh, hi,” I said. He had a ukulele in a bag across his back, which was partly unusual, and partly Yes, Michael would play the ukulele.

We talked for a minute about why I was standing like an awkward penguin in front of the Lanyon Building. I told him I was waiting for some friends, and that we were going to Victoria’s Square (but I left out the bit about Build-a-Bear).

“Oh, fun. Are youse going to the Continental Market?”

“Yes, we are,” I said.

“Cool. I’m going there later this evening myself. It’s good fun.”

He had started inching away, so I said goodbye, and then he bowed—he actually bowed—and said, “Well, goodbye, milday.”

I watched him bound off, and saw Hannah emerge from the Welcome Centre, just in time to see him turn away from me, jump over a hedge, and vanish from sight.

“Rebekah,” she said, “Was he talking to you?”

“Oh? Yeah. That’s Catboy.”

“He was just gone.”

“Yup.” I explained to her about Catboy, and about what had just happened, and she hit me on the shoulder.

“You didn’t keep him around?!?!”

“Um, no?”

“YOU SHOULD HAVE KEPT HIM FOREVER! HE HAD A UKULELE!”

“He was probably off to class,” I said. “That was the direction of the music hall he just disappeared towards.”

Victoria appeared then, and stopped us from fighting over Catboy, and we went to Victoria’s Square. On the way we saw a man with one of those Labyrinth-style balls, which balance on your hands, and he was kind enough to ask where we were from and show us some cool tricks. I love the movie The Labyrinth, and his being kind enough to engage us in conversation made my day.

The Square is decorated with lights for the holiday season. There are Christmas trees everywhere and lights hanging from the ceiling. We went to Build-a-Bear first, and after debating between a leopard and a hipster bear, I got the hipster bear. I had thought Victoria was going to join me with this silliness, but she abandoned me, and in the end, I was the only one getting a bear. 

I made my bear, and after I looked at it and tried to name it. Hannah wanted to called it “Jeremy” because the tag had “Bearamy” on it (which reminded me more of “Bury me” than “Jeremy”) and after we had decided that yes, my bear was a boy, I named him Patrick. This is partly because of religious politics back home, which will take another blog post, partly because Patrick is Irish, and partly because I can abbreviate Patrick with “Rick,” which reminds me of Owl City…but that’s another long story.

We tried to find my hipster bear a sweater vest to wear, but unfortunately the store did not sell one, and so I got him a little t-shirt that seemed hipster-like, with a fake tie, and then we wandered around Victoria’s Square for a bit. When it started to get dark we went to the Continental Market to see the Christmas lights and look around at the stalls and buy a few Christmas presents.

When it had gotten dark, and we were through shopping, we went down to Crescent Church for our Thanksgiving Dinner. Those of you who know me realise that Thanksgiving is my least favourite holiday, but I put on a brave face for Hannah and Victoria and actually had fun. Laura hosted the event, and she had invited her whole floor, so in the end it was a group of Americans, a Chinaman, two Chinese girls, a Northern Irish girl whose mum was American, and a French boy. I helped decorate the room we had dinner in, and after I went to Gilgamesh for my own dinner.

In the course of all of this, I had forgotten that Thursday is party night in Northern Ireland, and when I returned I saw Chelsea, who looked exhausted but very pretty in a green sequin dress. I told her  thought she looked nice, and she looked at me and said, “No, I don’t, look,” and pointed out what looked like silly putty stains on her dress. “Jenny threw up all over me, in the taxi. I didn’t notice. I had to pay seventy pound. I’m so frustrated.”

The rest of the night was interesting. I went to bed early, as I had to presentations the next day, but I could hear Chelsea, the Northern Irish Hannah, and Jenny in the hallway.

I looked over at Patrick and said, “Welcome to Elms, love.”