After seven years traveling around the world, Peter finally decided it was time to settle down and finish his degree.
Ah, this chair! Peter bought it while he was studying at LaTrobe - Albury Wodonga. It cost him $20. All of his house mates thought it was ugly and they all teased him for it. But it really is the most comfortable chair in existence. When he left for the University of Oregon, everyone offered to take it off his hands. He said no and stored it at his parents' place. It now resides in our house. It's still not the most attractive chair, but it's very comfortable. It's not going anywhere.
Peter started out studying a science degree at LaTrobe Bendigo straight out of high school. He always told me that he studied science, not because he was interested in it, but because he didn't really know what he wanted to do, and he was good at it. But his heart really wasn't in it. That year, he rented a large building with twenty or more rooms - Ruth thinks it was an old nursing home - and hired rooms out to other students. According to his mother, he made so much money off renting it, he didn't have to pay any rent on it himself. It had a large commercial kitchen, and he would often cook meals for everyone. That year, one of his house mates had a guidebook to Europe, which he read zealously (according to him, more than he read his textbooks!) He decided over the course of that year that what he really wanted was to go overseas.
So he did. He took a gap year that lasted 7 years and took in over 60 countries.
It was just as well he was already planning the trip when he lost his license! On Peter's 18th birthday, his sister Jenni took him, Deb, and their cousin Sue to get their driver's licenses. Peter got his, but didn't keep it for long. Back in those days, P-Platers had to go no faster than 80 k/hour, even on highways. One day Peter noticed all the cars were passing him, so he sped up to keep up with them. He wasn't speeding - or at least, he wouldn't have been if he had a full license. But because he was still on his P-Plates, he was. His license was taken away from him; but it didn't matter much anyway - he already had his international license, and he was leaving in a matter of weeks to go overseas. (When he came back from his first trip, he had to sit his license exam again. This time he took a corner without stopping. Back in those days, the local cops gave driving exams. The Kerang cop who was testing him for his license told him, "Well, I probably shouldn't give you your license because of that, but you'll get better.")
At one point during his years overseas, he was offered a job managing a pub in the UK. Because his father's parents were both born in the UK, he thought he should be able to claim UK citizenship, which was a necessary requirement for him to stay in the country. For some reason he was knocked back. It's just as well for me that he was; there's no way a good Mormon girl from Oregon would ever have ended up with a pub manager in London!
Instead, after 7 years of traveling, he decided to go back to university - this time LaTrobe - Albury Wodonga. He took a business class, decided his real passion was in economics, and changed his major.
He had a great time at LaTrobe. He made many close friends, including his best friend Itai, who was like a brother to him. He was vice president of the student union - a job he took more as a joke, he always said, because nobody else wanted it. He, along with Itai and Bradley Barrett, won the car rally. I never really did understand why this was such a big deal but he was always very proud of it!
The car rally gang - Brad, Peter and Itai
While he was in the student union, he discovered there was unspent money that was supposed to go to student groups. So he and some friends started the Gutter Appreciation Society. Apparently they sold it to the faculty as a group dedicated to appreciating the architecture of gutters. It was, in fact, an opportunity to use student funds to drink.
Peter enjoying a few drinks with Zarah and a friend
That's just the way Peter's mind worked. He was always very good at spotting opportunities, and exploiting them! (Calan has the same mindset. He is always looking for loopholes.)
While he was at LaTrobe Peter played a lot of sports. He was especially fond of indoor cricket. I think he devoted about as much time to sports as he did to study. He was a pretty gifted student naturally, though. I remember once he told me he got a High Distinction on an exam he took while he was hungover. Another time he took an exam, not realising he'd dislocated his shoulder. (Alcohol might have been involved in that one too.) He worked through the pain and got either a Distinction or a High Distinction.
Peter decided to take his final year of uni on exchange at the University of Oregon. He told me he selected Oregon more by the process of elimination. He knew he didn't want to go to any schools in the University of California system, and another student really wanted to go to the University of Washington, so that left the University of Oregon. And that decision changed my life forever.
There were some complications with his student visa. It almost didn't come in time; but he managed to get it at the last minute. At the University of Oregon he chose to stay at the Hamilton Dorms at a dorm that was supposed to be for sporty, athletic kids (although all of the kids who were at the UO on athletic scholarships were actually housed in a separate dorm.) I chose to stay at the dorm that was set aside for international students, which was also at Hamilton, hoping to meet people from all over the world. I did; but in the end only one of them mattered.
Peter made friends easily. It helped, of course, that he was old enough to buy beer, and thought the US drinking laws were stupid. But he would have made friends regardless. His friendly, open nature and natural curiosity about other people made it easy for him to connect with everyone he met.
Peter worked for the University of Oregon Telecom installing microfibre (then, state of the art stuff!) in all of the dorms. At the time the University of Oregon was consistently named one of the most wired campuses in the US, and prided itself on being up to date with technology. Peter also attended a lot of football games as part of his Telecom duties, because Telecom was responsible for making sure the phones in the coaching suite worked, and had to be there to trouble-shoot. He quite enjoyed that perk. American football was never a favourite sport; but he loved watching pretty much any sport.
We met within a few months of him starting at the University of Oregon - within a few weeks of me starting there. And so most of his story there is really the story of us, of our relationship, of how we met and fell in love and grew together. Later, after he'd left, I wrote to ask if he minded that so much of his time had been spent with me, instead of with other friends. He responded that he didn't - that he got to spend his time with the person who was most important to him there, and that was all he really wanted to do.
Peter was certainly the most important person I met in uni. It was love at first sight. I will never love anyone the way I love him.
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