“Parents weekend, always a joy,” said my bud Laura, almost in tears, as she watched the 20 people sitting with us begin to eat. In a quaint little restaurant in town, the craziness of parents weekend 2001 caused the waitress to completely forget about her meal, whoops. We all know things can get much, much worse than a mere hungry stomach during this wild weekend.
Parents weekend is sort of like move-in day, only somehow more chaotic. Everyone’s dressed up, there’s screeching, there’s a football game, people are shopping. You all know what I’m talking about-you’ve lived it. And freshmen, you will soon live it.
I’m not saying it isn’t nice to spend some quality time with family, that’s always welcome. There’s just something about the reality of everyone’s parents getting together, in the same exact time and at the same place. It’s sort of warped.
After parents sign in, they can opt to participate with their lucky children in any of the planned activities. Personally, my little pow-wow has never partaken in these activities; we sort of do our own thing. Then, there’s dinner, which is usually reserved by one of my friends about a week into the semester. Dinner is a fiasco. The party is enormous, but no, we aren’t alone. The streets and restaurants of Fairfield are crawling with families ready to have some all-American fun. The tables are so large that everyone usually ends up just talking to their own families anyway.
The end of dinner does not mean the end of the nuttiness. Venture to the dorms, apartments, townhouses, or beach and you will find that (gasp) parents party with us?!? Ahhhh. Now you see, we are temporarily living in the twilight zone.
Parents weekend. There are parts of all of us that hate it, but we do it because we love our parents. Last week, my mom and I were discussing the exact plans for Saturday. I wasn’t in the mood and my mom promptly ended the conversation, saying, “You know what, Lynn? (Sigh). We really don’t need to come at all. (Sigh).”
Needless to say they’re coming in two days. The truth is I’m excited. Sometimes, we all need to suck it up and realize our little worlds here at Fairfield need to be turned upside down every once in a while. It keeps us grounded.
Bring on the cars, bring on the crowds, bring on the chaos!
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