It was raining, when I awoke that fateful morning. I ducked my head into my raincoat and made my way down Stuart Hill. Unbeknownst to me, I was approaching a major milestone of my freshman year. I slipped inside Marycrest and dried my feet on a damp rug. Everything was business as usual, I came here everyday for breakfast before my morning classes. I'd do a lap around the food and make a show of perusing my options, but I always ordered the same meal.

I'd request an egg, cheese and hash-brown croissant from Lloyd--who introduced himself to me as "Shrek" (he also once asked me if I was "doing the transgender thing" because I had long hair and was wearing leggings...but that's a story for a different day). Lloyd and I exchanged pleasantries and then I tucked my to-go box under my arm and headed to Laura's cash register. "That will be $10,000," joked Laura. I chuckled, even though this was likely the hundredth time I had heard her tell this joke. I'd always laugh because she delivered it fresh every time!

Then out of the corner of my eye...something new. I turned to see a freshman of the female variety scanning the yogurt bar. I remember thinking to myself, "hmmm, she is pretty."

It all happened so fast...

She was standing there looking at the yogurt with her phone out, when suddenly:

SPLASH!!!

Her iPhone plunged into the community-sized container of semisolid fermented milk.

Reenactment of the Incident (Dramatization) {colorized 2018}

I reacted with decorum.

Just kidding, I loudly laughed my ass off!

As I gathered my ID and breakfast I caught a final glimpse of her timidly putting her fingers deep into the yogurt and excavating her phone. As she plucked her brand-new iPhone 6S from the gooey mess, some yogurt flung off her case and onto the front of her trendy Patagonia jacket.

And so, a legend was born.

Naturally, I recounted the event to all my friends and when they asked me who she was I didn't know what to say. From that moment on, I knew her only as Yogurt Girl. Throughout the rest of my freshman year, I would see her in the dining halls, on my way to classes, or in the neighborhood on the weekends. I never even considered introducing myself, because I was too afraid that at some point in the conversation I would let slip that I had a very vivid memory of her dropping her phone in yogurt and that was how I defined her as a person.

Days passed into weeks and weeks fell into years; until, last semester when I walked into my first entomology class. I wanted to make a good impression on my professor since it was the first day of the semester. So obviously I showed up to class three minutes late. I nonchalantly barged into the large lecture hall at a half-sprint and quickly scanned the room for people I knew.

There she was a full two years later in my entomology class. I was amazed that in a crowd of about sixty people I could still pick out Yogurt Girl easily. The obvious next step would be to sit by her and introduce myself, right? Negative (one does not simply strike up casual conversations with legends). Fall went by swiftly and attendance for entomology was heavily optional, so I didn't see a whole lot of her last semester. However, this semester Yogurt Girl is in two of my classes and the risk of me learning her real name or anything about her that doesn't involve her phone in yogurt has never been higher.

Pictured above is Serenity Pines, which I have found is a good place to contemplate life's hardest questions, such as: "Do I tell her she is Yogurt Girl?" The building in the background is Marycrest, the dining hall where it all happened.

The truth of it is that there are many "legends" on campus. I would define a legend as someone who we know by sight but not by name. For instance, my freshman year alone there was also "barefoot RA," the "daredevil who would freeline skate down Stuart Hill," and simply the "Legend of Keane" (dude has a great beard now and he was technically a friend before he became a legend).

We give strangers little descriptors to compartmentalize them. Some of my titles have included "Sling Guy" (I had my right arm in a sling because I dislocated my shoulder falling out of my lofted bed the first day of classes freshman year), then I was "that guy with long hair who looks like a pretty lady from far away", and now I'm "dude with the creeper mustache" (I prefer the pronouns Tom Selleck or Magnum P.I. stache, but I guess you don't get to write your own legend).

Which brings me back to Yogurt Girl. I'm sure this woman that I see everyday in my classes is full of complexities and nuances like any other human and would probably not enjoy being thought of as just Yogurt Girl. But alas, as time passes legends only grow and I feel as though she will forever be Yogurt Girl. I reflect on this legend's humble beginnings, her phone laying there lathered in yogurt...and how after all this time she is still anonymous. Then suddenly, rain starts to drizzle on my window.

(All images courtesy of moi,...oui oui)