A couple days ago, I was expecting to be able to write a melancholy account of what was going to be the crappiest birthday I’ve had to date. It didn’t happen. What I ended up with was a story of people taking time out of their busy schedule of fucking other people over to realize that we’re all important in this hell-bent world. I’ll relate this to you now, and you may take from it what you will.

• Thursday, December 14th.

     I was mid-way through a busy day of class/work/class/work etc. . . at dinner time. Coming up the stairs, I passed by one of the RA’s (I’m pretty sure it stands for Resident Asshole) and he asked me to wait because he had a letter for me. Well, I’d had a pretty decent time of it up until then, so I obliged him instead of giving him a hard time. Got back to my room, opened the thing up, and HALLELUJAH:

December 14, 2000

Dave Dembinski
Henry 216

Dear David,

As you have not paid your fall semester bill in full, you are being administratively withdrawn from Hiram College. This withdrawal is effective as of Wednesday, December 20, 2000 at 5:00 pm.

Furthermore, I am an asshole and have no qualms about kicking you out of school on your birthday, not to mention it being five days before christmas. I hear the donkey balls are great this time of year in Tijuana, and I look forward to licking them, the privilege of which I’ll pay for with the money we swindled out of you and your family.

On Behalf of Hiram college,

Hugh McManamon
Dean of Students
Darkness, Prince of



PO Box 666, Ninth Level, Hell

     I might have taken some creative liberties with reproducing that letter, but you get the gist of it, I’m sure. After I choked down a stale roll or two at dinner I promptly trudged the mile and a half back to my dorm and thawed myself out so as not to shatter anything vital when I collapsed in bed. While attempting to light a fire with only used tissues and a philosophy textbook, I called my parents for “advice.” (read: bitching at them) They were surprised but not, I noticed, nearly as disturbed as I. I shook this feeling off for the time being and got down to some serious fretting and complaining. By the time it was over I had the vague sense that something might get done about it, but that I should probably prepare myself for the eventuality that I might indeed be leaving school for good. So I took a nap.
     Strangely, this failed to solve the problem and when I woke up things were pretty much exactly as I left them, except Sam was playing Spiderman on the Playstation and Amber was reading something disturbing about bacteria. I decided against telling them of my problem for the time being and put on my best “What? Nothing’s wrong at all! I FUCKING LOVE MY LIFE!!!” face. I guess they really weren’t paying attention, because they didn’t say anything.

• Friday, December 15, 2000

     I told Sam about my problem today and he was quite irritated. I’m not sure if it was because he cared or if he was annoyed at the prospect of a new roommate, but it made me feel a little better. I asked him not tell Amber about this yet and he agreed.
     Meanwhile, my father had called and reported that he was, indeed, working on getting the situation resolved. Again, I had my doubts. Not that I didn’t believe he was doing his damndest, but I have seen the speed with which most departments here take care of business and, frankly, I wasn’t expecting to be done with this before I died. He said that there wasn’t anything more he could do over the weekend, so I sighed pathetically and we agreed that he’d call again on Monday.

• Saturday and Sunday

     I had resolved by this point to enjoy what little time I had left with Amber and Sam, and did so. I still had not told Amber by this point, but that was only because I knew her too well. She would have spent the entire time worrying and being mopey and not enjoying herself at all and then would have blamed herself for being this way and gotten even more depressed and, well. . .you get the picture.
     Had pretty much accepted the idea of no longer being in college. Also, a strange thing occurred to me: why were my parents so calm about this whole thing? This is my entire future we’re talking about here! Then realization dawned, like spring sun after an all-night pot-binge. It’s nothing. They have probably gone through things ten times as bad as this and are still alive and happy and together and in love. What the hell am I getting so spastic for? Suddenly, nothing looked so bad anymore and, while I’d still rather stay in school, I knew that if I did go home I’d be fine and more than likely get on with my life in a productive manner.

• Monday, December 18th

     penny-arcade.com - This strip at Penny Arcade spoke to me that day. There was still no resolution in sight as far as I could tell, but my father assured me that he was the king of last minute comebacks.
     I had rediscovered my infatuation with the internet by this point, which didn’t surprise me. It seems like there are a few things I default to when under stress that I don’t want to deal with. Either 1) becoming a net junkie again, 2) renewing my affection for Buddhism, or 3) both of the above. This was a 3, ladies and gentlemen.
     Today was also the day I decided that I had to tell Amber. After buttering her up with love songs, I gave her the letter I received and let it sink in. She reacted pretty much as I expected her to, except that it was a sort of time-release flip-out. She didn’t turn on the water fountain all at once, but spaced it out over that night and the next day so as to get the maximum amount of misery out of it. I wish she wouldn’t do that to herself, but then it’s not up to me.

• Tuesday, December 19, 2000

     Well, needless to say, I didn’t get a whole lot of sleep. By the time I got to work at 8:30 I was off in a weird half-fantasy world, but managed to retain the presence of mind to let my boss know about the pickle I was in. And I’ll be damned if I wasn’t completely taken aback by her reaction! She said that maybe she could pull some strings so that I’d be able to stay in the dorms and work 40 hours/week at the computer center, and they’d pay my room and board. Alas, this couldn’t be arranged, but I was still extremely impressed.
     Finally, after 5 full days of hair-pulling uncertainty, I received an answer. Yes, I would most likely be able to stay at Hiram. My father called and said that the wonderful ladies here at the Financial Aid office had been “well, not busting their balls, because they don’t have them, but you know.” Indeed I did. I told Amber as soon as I got off the phone and I swear you could have ripened an entire harvest with her smile.

• Wednesday, December 20, 2000 9:24 am

     It’s strange, but I was almost looking forward to going home and pretending to be an adult for a while. Ah, well. Instead of the bitter, sardonic tone I would have left you with had things turned out the way I thought they would, I say this with all sincerity: Happy Birthday to me.