Ben

I met Ben, like Sarah N., on my first day of college. He was a CJ major too. I remember seeing him walk up to the group getting ready to take a tour. He was walking kind of bouncy like and had an empty cup of tea in his hand. I remember because he kept on slipping out of the cup and was making that awful slurping noise. "Enough already!"

He lived in Terrell Hall too and we immediately clicked. I would run up to his room the second that the co-ed restrictions were off in the morning. We had most of the same classes and would walk to them together. If I didn't get up in time, he would usually walk down to the lobby and wait. I remember our first test. He came to my room about 30 minutes before. He started quizzing me and I wasn't doing so well. My roommate later told me that she swore up and down that I was screwed. Nope, got a "B." Ha ah! But Ben did make a better grade.

We would always be out cooking in the grill on the front steps of Terrell or playing frisbee on the front lawn. For some reason, he would love to sneak up on people, girls mostly, and smack them in the leg or butt with his flipflop. It was a hard echoing smack too. The kind that leaves bruises. I screamed at him once for doing that.

Once, Ben was doing laundry on the first floor and I was in his room hanging out. While he went down to change the loads out, I fell asleep. Apparently he came in and saw me, then went downstairs to tell everyone. I woke up with about three faces staring at me. Ahhhh. To wake me up, he gave me a donut. I had to heat it up, cause I'm weird (I know, nothing new). Evidently, ten seconds is more than enough time because shortly after taking it out of the microwave I blistered my lip.

Sophomore year, we climbed Stone Mountain together after Joey's bday party. This was right after my wreck and my feet were still in pretty bad shape. Every few minutes I would say to him, "Ben, you see that rock up there, I'm going to sit on it." The top steep part was the worst. When I reached the top, I had my shoes in my hand, because going up barefoot seemed to feel better at the time, and when I walked in the restroom, my face was bright scary red.

We stayed up there for a minute, looked around. No, Dad, you were wrong. You can't see the smoke stack in Milly from Stone Mountain, sorry. Then it was time to head back down for the lazer show. That was also the same weekend that Ben got his new mustang convertible, and while we were backing out to head over to the mountain part to go on our climb, someone backed into him. Bitter moment for him. He handled it well though.

While I was living in my apartment, so far away from everyone else, Ben was the one who really pulled through for me. He always came and visited. I would get a knock at the door and would see him through the peep hole. Always a pleasant surprise. He would also come over and cook with me. One night we were making chicken and noodles with a cream sauce. Right as I was pulling it out of the oven, my hand slipped and it turned upside down into the oven and started smoking everywhere. Sorry, my bad. We were able to salvage some of it though.

When Ben got his dog Apache, we took my car since it was bigger and went road tripping to Valdosta to get him. That was a great trip, except for the fact that Mike was sick and sneezing everywhere and he was sitting in the front with me. Yuck! "Keep your tissues on that side of the car."

When my friend Eli was playing on the intramural softball team, the "Dysfunctions," Ben, Apache and I would make the trip out there to watch them. I even made a sign. Wooo, go team!

Ben was the first person to drag me to Athens for a night out on the town. Originally it was just going to be him and Sarah, but he called her and told her to come and get me and pick out something appropriate to wear to Country Rock. Yeah, baby. Not really, that place is disgusting, but I had a great time though.

Then Ben took me back to his parents' place with him to stay the night and on to Milly the next day. Also, while I was living with the crazy Russian, I would stay on Ben's couch a lot. We would cook together so much other there too. (Did I mention that Ben and I like to cook?)

Ben was also the one who got us all to go see Bill Engvall live. What a great night. We all had never laughed that so hard in our lives. All of our faces were bright red and our stomachs were aching.

Our senior year, Ben and I would stay up until the crack of dawn working on our Research Methods projects. We literally stayed up until 4 and the class was a 8. Those were some rough nights. Ben and I would also have our fights. I got mad at him one time for getting to noisy and digging through things on my desk. I asked him to stop, and he didn't. I asked him again and he freaked out. Sarah S. had to play "Dr. Phil" and smooth things over.

I hate to say it, but that year is when we lost Ben. The second that he got engaged, V-day `07, we saw less and less of him. Even when he graduated, there was a big party at the house, and he just drove by with his family and furniture in tow. That was it. By Ben. Since then, I have only gotten him to attend two Holiday dinners in four years. Each time was its own disaster. It has never felt the same with him.

Its sad when you see your friends drift apart from you. Especially when they were so close.