Stylized line drawing of mark playing the flute

Scotty's extra-lean Thanksgiving

Empty Plate - https://flic.kr/p/8hcht8

It's fall of 1994, our first Thanksgiving Break at Lewis & Clark.

My roommate Scott (Scotty!) has decided to stay on campus during the break. I fly home to visit family and friends in California.

After gorging myself on pie, turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy for the entire week, I head back to campus late Sunday night. Campus is still quiet when I walk back into our room to find an exceedingly ragged-looking and attention-starved Scotty.

See, none of us knew that campus was officially closed that week. No cafeteria meals. No sandwiches or milk-shakes at The Rusty Nail or The Platform. Pretty much no one around.

And Scotty had no money and no car.

We had a small amount of food in our room, mostly granola bars and tomato soup. That got him through the first few days but he got hungry fast after running out.

He was so hungry by Friday that he called his mom (collect!) in Colorado. She turned around and called a pizza place in Portland and had it delivered to our room and that got him through the rest of the week.

It's funny to think how easily I can get food now, in 2016, with just my phone and a credit card.