I am watching Friends– in denial that I need to start packing, taking inventory of my things, perusing my Manual de Gramatica and student handbook– and it’s “The One Where No One’s Ready.” I have always loved this episode because it was shot in real time; the chronicle of Ross’ desperate attempt to get all five of his friends to his speech on time in under thirty minutes, conveniently the air time a typical sitcom gets when sprinkled with commercials.

I set out to write this first blog, being New Year’s Eve day and one week till I depart, a rather apropos crossroads if I do say so myself (which I do because, well, this is my blog), and Joey takes Chandler’s seat while he was in the bathroom discovering that he does put career before men according to a Cosmopolitan quiz. Joey maintains that Chandler left, this was before “shot fives” I suppose, but Chandler exclaims, “It’s not like I went to Spain!”

Was this fate, or was this fate? For someone who spends a large chunk of time quoting Chandler or Phoebe rather than coming up with something clever to say on her own, I never took note of this seemingly inconsequential line before.

Well soon enough Bingaling, I will be coming back from Spain, and I’ll want my seat back too.

What will happen when I come back to College Park next fall, having pressed the fast forward button to I find myself as a senior in college? Will everything be just as I left it? Will I come back the same girl?

As these questions encroach on my daydreaming of tasting tapas and learning the flamenco, Joey reels me back in to my primary distraction revealing a solution to my packing quandary. To get back at Chandler for hiding his underwear, Joey puts on every item of clothing Chandler owns. “Hey look, I’m Chandler. Can I be wearing any more clothes?” This has to be one of my favorite lines from the series. Well, at least for today, it’s pretty hard to stick to just one with this show.

Having my entire closet on me would be ideal and would obviously take the pressure out of under-packing; I’ll want for nothing. Then I remember this is a post-9/11 world complete with TSA security and x-ray scans, not to mention the colossal back up that I would produce, as I would have to remove layer after layer after layer. My fleeting schemes are quashed, but still I get a laugh. Joey does his lunges while commando, and Ross agrees to drink the fat. I always insist that Friends has a way of relating to my life, even if I need more than six of those degrees of separation to get there.

I am a bit like Monica in this episode, clinging on to past love Richard who seems to have moved on, and going to desperate lengths to have a grip on her past. A lot of my friends will be graduating this semester, and life in College Park will most certainly go on with out me. It’s scary but liberating to be moving on to the next. So tonight the Billboard’s Hot 100 will provide the perfect soundtrack to the ring in the New Year, from Pink’s “Raise Your Glass”, to Katy Perry’s “Firework”, and some may even “wish you the best” with Cee-Lo. One thing is for certain, 2011 will be miles away from my 2010, and baby I like it.

Post Script: Two separate Alcalá alums have signed off e-mails to me with “un abrazo” or a hug. So to do as the Alcalinos do:

Un Abrazo,

Hilary