“I stood looking at the entrance to my dorm, trying to find the energy and courage to go back and face that old woman with all of the keys. I began to notice the other students moving into the dorm. I saw girls hugging their parents goodbye. I saw girls moving in with their possessions neatly packed in U-Haul boxes. One girl even had a whole set of matching luggage. And there I was, standing alone with my paper bag in hand and a whopping $2. I started to think that maybe I should have left in the truck with Donald. But, instead, I made myself go inside the dorm and give the woman the $2.

Key in hand, I climbed the steps to the second floor and began looking for my dorm room. I had to pass by daughters hugging and saying goodbye to their mothers. One mom had her hands on each side of her daughter's face and they were both crying. I quickly passed by them, thinking how silly they were.

I found my room number and was relieved to get out of the hallway before someone noticed me. The first thing I noticed about the room was the cool air. Air conditioning, I thought. I stood there in the middle of the room, letting the cool air surround me. It brought me back to my childhood, when I would be so excited when dad would go into the city and we would park behind Sears and Roebuck then climb the back steps and open the heavy door. Cold air capturing the aroma of roasting nuts would wash over me and rescue me from the extreme Mississippi heat. And now here I was, living in a place where I had all the air conditioning I could ever want. I truly was far from home now.

But by that time, I was so exhausted that I threw myself down on my bed, still holding the paper bag with all my possessions in it. Tears began to roll down my cheeks and I watched them make spots on the brown paper bag — until I realized that the bed was covered in plastic. “Sheets,” I remember thinking. “Nobody told me about sheets.” Like so many other things a mother might have prepared me for.

Of course, I had no sheets with me. I could never have brought my old sheets from home. But then I spotted a blue cotton bedspread folded at the top of the closet and saw that the closet curtain perfectly matched the bedspread. I climbed up on a chair, got the bedspread, wrapped myself in it, and cried myself to sleep. I wasn’t sure how many more obstacles were still before me. ”