Posted May 1, 2008

Here marks the beginning of life after school. For me, a student dedicated to "life long learning" I feel like I would never escape tuition, fees and life as a student. I got use to long hours at the library, homework on the weekends, road trips, moving every 4 months with over 200 lbs of text books, and accruing debt in a flawless fashion. Tomorrow will be my last class-ever (as a student that is, I am teaching classes for others...and that is a real trip). I am prone to nostalgia and introspection during times of change. I guess 7 years at BYU doesn't involve much change, but from semester to semester-life has a way of marching onward. Friends come and times are rich and full. Friends go and explore paths of their own. I still keep in contact with many of them, see their lives happening (via blogs, facebook, letters, phone calls) almost like turning pages in a picture book. I see their adventures and their families. The faces of their children, their families, their professions, their faith. I sit in my room, pondering the last decade for me. This time ten years ago I was preparing for prom with my best friend Cori Matos. I had two jobs and high school. I was sweating bullets about acceptance to BYU seeing as how I had only applied to one college. I was making plans to go, packing my necessities (a Tigger jacket from 9th grade, a blanket made by my YW advisors, various renditions of artwork, a special set of crayons, my favorite scrubs, and a pot with no handle bequeathed by mom who acquired it during her own college years).
I worked long, tiring hours at a payroll company that summer, waiting for Just Dave to be born. He came along and a month or so later I planted my feet on that rich Provo soil. All that learning. All those struggles. All the laughter, love and loss. I learned so much, I became so much-life was full and overflowing.
So many people crossed my path, so many opportunities and soulful connections. I sat in our Baylor College of Medicine LEAH (Leadership, Education, Adolsecent Health) fellowship graduation on Friday thinking of those moments. Pulling hair from dorm showers, sledding by Jamilyn's house, dancing at sports camps, hiking in the canyon, Halo and couches at the Amarillia, millions of chats with girls in the dorms, Simpsons with the Bush clan, temple trips, mission calls, farewells, chess and watching golf, talks about Naked and anorexia with Lia, Superfans meetings with Adam/Yas/Jess, trips with Yathsmina, Shmem and Martha Goodrich at the GlenHOOD, the Oakland marriage of Rachelle and attacks of EBE's, Cannon Center, Hours and hours of library time with studious friends, last minute frantic paper writing, Mr. McKee, kinships with bishops, Foxwood dinners and extreme spoons, the year of the rash, Skyview my home sweet home, weddings of friends, projects, awards, C papers in Motivation psychology and Stats (again, and again and again), the night techs at Center for Change, Friday snacks and outings, testimony meetings, moonlight walks, communion, mystery canyon, snowboarding, painting, being crazy, getting arrested, reading, reading reading, writing, writing, writing, scraping by, eating grass, luv sac luv, Bishop Hill's tunnel singing, the Flame, the Flame-deaux, camping, letters, phone calls, family, aging, growing, becoming, dreaming big.

And then.....Texas. Montessori, teenagers, LEAH, Child Protective Services, University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, Gonzales, concerts/shows, pictures, flying into the mystery, renewal, Allen House, Versailles Park, Houston traffic, Farmers Fight, Chaco the wonder dog, Friends of P, Baboo, mine floofy easter fiend, headaches, the ocean, Mexico, Amy Beth's art, good times, good food, good friends and WAY TOO MUCH HOMEWORK. The Dean's office, the plague that is Jan Leger's "guidance", University of Houston's "educational policy", internships, fellowships, Minerva's "What is Oklahoma?! Family Violence for 1,000", truth, family, East Shannon, kolache's, BBQ, del sol, Mark's return and Sean's graduation to a place bigger and better.

There is a lot you don't see in a transcript. There is a lot you expect "when you grow up". But growing up is now, was then, and is yet to be. History. I often feel like Max as he sails away in and out of weeks and through a day to the land of the wild things. The Rumpus began a decade ago and what a WILD time it has been. Everyone has a story, and this is mine.