Kathryn walked into her house Tuesday evening with a bag of groceries and an air of frustration. Her lack of sleep Monday night had affected her work, enough that her boss was angry with her for a short while. The chill reception from him had continued for part of Tuesday morning, warming up only after a lunchtime discussion between her and Richard Beckner. Even though fences had been mended, Kathryn was still upset that the problem had occurred in the first place, and her mood was down. After putting away her small bag of groceries (she had some years ago adjusted to cooking for herself or her and her daughter, instead of making enough dinner for her late husband as well), Kathryn looked through the small pile of mail inside the front door. She groaned over two bills, and threw away three sales circulars so quickly that she almost lost two other letters. Sitting at the kitchen table, she opened the one from her daughter first, hungry for news about Cindy's life and adventures in college.
"Dear mom,
Life goes on here at college. Classes are a combination of boredom and drudgery, with the occasional dash of tension and even rarer dollop of excitement. I'm about ready to choke my English 101 teacher. Turns out this school uses teaching assistants in the low-level English classes. The one I'm stuck with is going for her doctorate, and makes no secret that she'd much rather work on her graduate seminars than my class. My first paper for her was a 'C+'. I checked around, and a 'B' was the highest grade anyone in the class got. And when I asked her what I could have done better, she said that wasn't her concern. I took it to the English Department; they say they are looking into it. My other classes are going well; I even aced last week's Western Civilization exam. I couldn't have done it without you, mom, and all those times you had me watch 'Masterpiece Theatre' over the years. Helped me understand the reading a bit more.
I've been making a few more friends in classes, and learning which ones to be leery of. More than a few folks are trying to leach on to me for class notes at exam times. Been to a few parties, always with Beth. I'm lucky to have her for a roommate; we've looked out for each other pretty well at parties and kept the sleaze buckets from talking us into stupid stuff. I've already had three guys try to schmooze me into bed with them. Don't worry, I told them all to get lost. I'm not ready to be a mom, there's too damn many diseases out there, and I want it to be special, not just a roll in the hay.
Well, gotta close this so I can get it mailed off. Oh, yeah, the big reason I'm writing. Remember, Parent's Weekend is weekend after next. I know you've got a pretty busy schedule at times, but I'd truly love it if you could be here. If you can make it, try to be here by 10:30, that's when the big festivities start. There is a breakfast earlier, but I'm not about to ask you to drive here Friday night or early Saturday morning for so-so waffles. Bring Paul; he'll love the campus. But you two have to promise me -- no wild sex while you're here. Can't have you two corrupting the morals of the younger generation!!! But then again... maybe we'll corrupt you!!!
All my love,
Cindy