Orgasm In A Cup – Seton Hill Retreat Day 1
It’s Wednesday morning, 2:30 am specifically, I’ve woken up two hours early so that I can make it to Seton Hill as early as possible. Why? Because I was told by my friend, Elsa, that she and Paul would be doing their monster module that morning. As I did a similar module the year before, i want to be there as a resource they could count on if the situation called for it. So, I get the last things I needed packed and hit the road for a good five and hour ride to Greensburg, PA.
Now, I love the drive up to school. One, because I come from a family that just drives everywhere unless the cost and physical toll would be more that to take a plane or train. So, for me, that long a drive is like going to the store and back. Two, I have the long playlist that i play in my car and sing to on every trip. People like to say that music is distracting, but for me it keeps me focused. It gives me a rhythm to check my mirrors and gauges and it helps keep the blood pumping so I never get driving fatigue. Third, there is the great stretch of highway, it had all those turns that you hear Jeremy Clarkson and Chipmunks talk about as great driving roads. It also has this amazing feature on the Pennsylvania Turnpike where there are all of these dead trees that always get my mind going and stories brewing. That is what I love about traveling. Going to places that inspire words to arrange themselves in my head on their own. A lot of people love to travel to learn about places, and while I enjoy learning new things a great deal, traveling is about creating new reasons for things to exist.
What I hate, though, is that it is almost all on the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Or as my brother-in-law calls it, the road construction storage for the State of Pennsylvania. It’s ri-donk-ulous! There is never a moment there isn’t road work being “done,” even though sixty percent of it is never being worked on, but still staked out by troopers so you can’t just go the normal speed limit. If there is no work being done, let us go the normal speed limit!
Anyway, that rant done, I finally make it to Seton Hill at just after 9:30am. No one is there for me to get my key to my dorm room for the stay, so I go up to where all the classes are going to be held. I got to talk a bit with Tim Esaias before the classes were let out for an 15 minute break and I got to say hello to all my friends that were there for the Writing Popular Fiction Residency. It is also at this time that I find out that the module isn’t being taught that day, but the next. Doh! The people go back to class, I get my key, unpack, and have about a 30 hour rest until lunch.
Thus begins the time suck that is Seton Hill. By that I mean, there is enough going on that you don’t just loose track of time, but your are literately sucked through time in small intervals that that you don’t realize the universe has lost a hold of the space-time continuum. One minute is it lunch, the next other alumni friends are arriving, the next it is dinner, then the thesis readings (all of which were amazing, especially the dark fiction writers. There is a lot of new talent coming into the horror/dark fantasy/dark sci-fi field this year), to the mega gathering of SHU students and alum at Red Robin. If you haven’t been a a very large table with 20+ writers, most of them getting sauced, you haven’t had a fun night out. It always a night of memorable quotes, like the title of this post (my reaction to the watermelon/raspberry drink I had about 5 of that night. I know, I’m a drink skank.). Many of which referenced a fellow member of the Kassadaa Empire who couldn’t make it that year, Chris Pence. It was a good time for all, and only a taste of what was to come.
In the end, I managed to get to sleep somewhere around 12:30am, a full 22 hours since I woke up. Most of the Empire was in attendance and ready to conquer more territory in light of the anniversary of The Battle of Farrel Hall. And this gentle beast beast fell asleep to prepare the next day of insanity.
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