She decided last year that one year living in residence was enough. She was in one of the supposedly best residences at University of Toronto, a former hotel converted to a student residence, and the chefs had been retained from the hotel service and the food was reputed to be good. She had a food voucher as well, that she could use to supplement what was served at the residence. But she hated all of it, other than for the friends she met there. The room mate assigned to her shared accommodation and she got along quite well. There were quite a few international students; her room mate one of them who had transitioned from living in Moscow to life in Toronto with equanimity.

She has always been intense about studying, very disciplined about assignments, intent on extracting from the system and her own academic abilities, the most she possibly could. She was a child who never needed reminding about doing her homework; she took it on of her own volition. And that habit has continued on into university. Her nose, it seems, forever to the grindstone. I know, because she either telephones daily or leaves a lapse of several days between calls.

She likes her history classes, not so much philosophy, finds both criminal law and law and society absorbing. She complains bitterly if she gets a mark under 80. Which commits her to more intense application of her mental resources to extract marks she considers more acceptable to enable her to advance toward her professional goal.

Last year, at least, she would often go along to the university gym, and work out a bit, use the track lift some weights and do some swimming. She loves to swim; when she was four I had taken her for swimming lessons to the wave pool in our community, since we were responsible for her weekday care while her parents were at work for the first nine years of her life. But this year, not once has she ventured back to the gym. And when her friends go off somewhere and she's supposed to accompany them, she is conflicted, agonizing that she can't spare the time. There is always studying to do for some test or exam, or a paper due to be delivered that she simply must work on.

Instead of the shared room at the residence, she now lives in a three-bedroom apartment, a short walk from her campus. Her former room mate and another university friend live there with her sharing the apartment and splitting costs. Conveniently they're not far from the university, areas of cultural interest, the Eaton Centre, and there's a good supermarket in the basement of the apartment building across the street from theirs, where other friends happen to live. Her arrangement and that of her friends definitely is not the conventional vision of the impoverished university student.

Finally, she's had a break from studies and researching assignments and editing her friends' work, something she's good at and they take advantage of. She went out shopping for new underwear, winter boots and a handbag, very pleased with the results. She usually sends me photos of things like that when she emails me. And there have been some get-togethers with friends in the evening, finally. Everyone is celebrating time off for the Christmas and New Year's festivities. One small party in particular struck her; she's a foodie, and a dinner she and a group of friends enjoyed at another friend's apartment was particularly delicious, she said. And she told him he's a far better cook than she is.