Ever wonder what kind of email “Geese Aplenty” gets?  Me neither.  But sometimes I check my inbox anyway, and recently I found this:

“I’m not trying to sell you anything, I promise. I do want something from you, though. I’m an English major at UCLA currently taking a History of Rock and Roll class, which is why my life is really going places.  Our last assignment for my Rock and Roll class is to contact someone older than us and ‘ask about the music that he or she grew up with. Try to find out what kinds of music were more important to this person and why,’ and then write an essay comparing that to our own experience and examples from our book. As I was thinking about my essay, I kept thinking about what you had written in that post about the way music affects you at different ages and suddenly had the brilliant and not-creepy-at-all idea to see if you wanted to help me out. Don’t worry about it if you can’t, because I can absolutely find someone else. But I picked you first, so if this were middle school and we were playing dodgeball, it would mean something pretty serious.”

I helped her out--I mean, she invoked the sacred honor of being picked first in dodgeball, which gives me as rosy a glow in my thirties as it did when I was eight--but I had to stop and think about something.  As a teenager, I applied to UCLA, didn’t get in, and ended up attending UC Davis.  At the time, I figured my scores weren’t high enough or my application essay wasn’t persuasive (my thesis statement: “I never had sex with a cheerleader in high school but I’m hopeful that college will change all that").  But it never occurred to me UCLA just might be too difficult in terms of its academics.  But surely it must!  I can’t even wrap my mind around the enormity of the idea of writing about my experiences with music and interviewing people about music.  Thank God I was an English major at Davis where I could do activities more geared toward my more limited abilities--such as reading novels, writing papers, and studying theory.  Dodged a bullet there!

On a completely unrelated note, I’m aghast because the rules of our “Secret Santa” exchange at work said: “Please do not give the gift of shoes or socks, as they are unlucky.” No wonder things haven’t been going my way lately; I’ve foolishly been indulging in footwear.  From now on?  Bare feet--all day, all the time.  My ship is finally coming in!