Illiterations: Laughing At My Own Expense

Original work by Nicola Holmes, copyright 2002 (completion date), (2018) first publication. I’ll See You In the Fall By the time I arrived at UC Davis, I’d been a student again for about three years.   Returning to college at the age of 28 held both perqs and drawbacks.   At Davis, I worried about being viewed as ‘old’–I was 31 when I started my first full-time quarter there–and I wondered if I could keep up with the competitive population of each of my classes. I loved the feel of the campus, and this bolstered my resolution to keep fighting.   The UC Davis campus felt like an old friend to me.   I’d attended summer classes there during my Junior College years, hoping to get ahead on my coursework, and to prepare myself for the pace of university classes.   Summer was hot and quiet at UCD, but the Fall–the Fall season at UCD was amazing.   While the many trees were busy turning their cloaks to gold and red, the bustling pace of student life belied the onset of

Lake Kesar This is part 2 of my short story, "I'll see you in the Fall."  If you read the first installment, you learned about my struggles in my first year at UC Davis, and about how I came to meet my friends, Bailey and Phyllis.  Here is the next installment; Part 2. ======  Continued from Part 1 ====== I'll see you in the Fall -- -  by Nikki Holmes, ©️ 2002, 2018 The next time we had class, I waited for Bailey, and it was apparent that she knew I would.   She said, “I asked my friend Liz to meet us at the corner of the quad so she can take the pack from there.   We have that class together.” “Cool,” I answered.   As we walked and talked, I heard about her life before Davis.   She was not a Freshman, but was actually a sophomore who’d come to Davis directly from high school; no stops at junior college in between.   So, I figured her age at about 19 or 20, and in my head, I dreaded the day that she might ask me my age.   I assumed that would be whe

This story unfolded for me at UC Davis, over the years I was there; basically late 1992 through early 1995.  My experiences at the university were absolutely the most life-changing and shaping ones of my life. I hope you'll bear with me for this story.  It means a lot to me, but it is too long for one blog post.  In it, you'll find there are characters; people I know and love.  Most of all, as I re-read this story for the fist time in a long while this evening, I am taken all the way back to 26 years ago, when I began as a full-time student a UC Davis.  I hope that it an transport you, too. I’ll See You In the Fall   - by Nikki Holmes, ©️ 2002, 2018 By the time I arrived at UC Davis, I’d been a student again for about three years.  Returning to college at the age of 28 held both perks and drawbacks.  At Davis, I worried about being viewed as ‘old’–I was 31 when I started my first full-time quarter there–and I wondered if I could keep up with the competitive pop