July 13, 2014 by Caroline Leland

where the lines overlap

Every weekend I’m surprised by how much fun I have. Is that weird? I think I had a lot of boring weekends in Pamplona, so the contrast is striking.

This past Friday, I met up with a huge crowd of UNC friends at the Empire Hotel free rooftop bar happy hour. Then Emily, Sagar, Elijah and I went to a delicious Thai restaurant for dinner. (Ellie was supposed to join us, but got held up at work.) After dinner Sagar, Elijah and I went to a different free open bar, and Emily went to meet up with Ellie at another friend’s apartment party.

I love being 21.

UNC crew at Empire Hotel

Andrew (UNC), me, Emily (Duke), Jack (Duke)

UNC friends

On Saturday after brunch I had just enough time to respond to the most pressing of my neglected emails, and then I met up with my old friend Hunter (who lives in Austin and was visiting NYC for the weekend) in Central Park. While I was waiting for him at the southeast corner of the park, I randomly saw an old friend from Governor’s School! It was a semi-awkward encounter, but one of those typical wow-it’s-a-small-world moments.

Hunter and I hadn’t seen each other since October, so we just walked through the park for a couple of hours talking and catching up. At 5:45 I met up again with Sagar and our friend Claire, and the three of us took a train over to a dinner party in the suburbs of New Jersey. Sagar’s previous and Claire’s current boss was throwing a party for his partner’s birthday and had told them they could bring a plus-one. It was great conversation, wonderful food and absolutely perfect weather.

I’ve finally caught up to myself — it’s Sunday. I’ve spent most of today catching up on emails, working on my online class, and blogging. I watched the World Cup final with Hunter and Ellie and was disappointed that Argentina lost, since my summer there made me somewhat fond for the country. I drank Brazilian caipirinhas while watching the game; I guess it should have been Argentinian maté…