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There were a lot of moments I could have picked for this first entry, but when I looked through my pictures, this seemed appropriate. The date is May 16th, 2003. Graduation day. A day that should have happened in 1992. I got there - I was just eleven years late. If anyone had told me in 1990 that it would be thirteen long years before I heard someone call my name from the stage at a college graduation, I would have laughed at them. I was going right to college, and I was going to graduate in four years. After that, I planned to do great things. I didn't have a clear idea of what those great things would be - politics, novels, journalism - but I knew they would be. I couldn't have been more wrong. There was no way I could have predicted the things that would lead to my degree taking three times as long to earn as it should have. I don't even know if there's anything I could have done (or would have done) to stop it. My life turned out pretty well. I would have been okay if I had never earned that degree. But I wanted it. Oh, how I wanted it. I was not a college dropout. I was supposed to be a college graduate. And on May 16th, 2003, I became one. I didn't do it alone. I couldn't have done it if Greg hadn't told me to quit my job and just do it, if he hadn't supported me while I finished. I couldn't have done it if professors like Dr. V and Dr. Carb hadn't inspired me so much. And I don't think I could have done it so well thirteen years ago. I didn't do it alone. On the afternoon of the 16th, as the rain raged outside (rain, on graduation day, for the first time in nearly three decades), I was alone in the bathroom of the gym where graduation had been moved. I had to put on my gown, my hat, my tassel. Fix my hair. Attach my Sigma Tau Delta membership pin to my robe. I was in a hurry; the rain had held us up and the plan for the ceremony was uncertain and I wanted to get out of the bathroom and into the hallway. On my way out the door, coat over my arm, I caught sight of myself in the mirror. I was frazzled, I was tired, I was looking ahead to our Ireland vacation - but something in the mirror made me stop. Look at that, I remember thinking. That's a college graduate. It took me so long. It was so hard. I did it so well. I was so proud of myself. I started wrong and finished the very best I could. It didn't change my life, but it changed the way I think about myself. It took me so long, but look - right there in that mirror - that's a college graduate. back | next
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