On any given day...
On any given day, a person gets the chance to do something extraordinary. Whether it is pulling a man out of a car wreck, convincing a friend to go into therapy, or even just listening when someone needed to talk. I have been blessed enough to know when to act, and when to listen, though many say I still talk too much
A couple weeks ago I graduated from Whitewater, earning two degrees, and achieving summa cum laude as I ended my five years in college. It’s been a whirlwind of a few weeks, to tell the truth I haven’t really had a chance to reflect on it yet until today. I’ve been working during the week, dodging my family when I’m not at work, and spending a lot of time with Nicole either down by me or up at her house. Yet now the time is here to grow up, and to take my first steps into a new world. It is one that I’ve glimpsed at from the safe windows of Fischer Hall 413, it’s one I’ve flirted with the last few summers, and it’s something I never thought I’d get to hold; now it’s here. Life after college.
I started applying for jobs several months ago, knowing that there would be a long period of rejection, tests, and interviews. I know that there is still a lot of that ahead of me, but it’s the here and now that demands my attention.
My parents threw me a wonderful graduation party, it was going to be family and some friends from school, but it wound up mostly family. The weather was gorgeous all day as the thunderstorms danced their way out of our area, we had the grill going, and I had the first beer boiled brat of the year off of our old charcoal grill. Then I noticed how much had changed.
My oldest cousin is turning 18 this year, when the last I looked he was still in grade school. My other cousin is no longer the “pretty in dresses” girl that used to come to holidays but rather the metalhead about to get her driver’s license. My neighbor’s son whom I used to baby sit is about to start high school, and half my friends are about to get married. It’s a shock to say the least when you wake up from a year at school to discover just what you missed while your nose was in the books. I don’t know if it’s the day winding down or the brat/Mountain dew inspired insomnia gripping me but for some reason I felt the urge to write, and so writing I am.
To tell the truth I’m not quite sure where to go from here. I’m in a very strong limbo until I find gainful employment. It doesn’t pay to find an apartment and drastically change my life over until I find where I’m going to be working, but at the same time I know I can’t stay with my parents any longer. This place just isn’t home, and it hasn’t been since I left for Whitewater those three years ago. This is a stopover, a storage unit, and a place to crash for the night, but it is not “home.” I know many people feel this way after returning from college, but for many of them it goes away as they readjust to their lives with their family. Others find fortune enough to get an apartment and skip the readjustment to going back home, but they have the advantage of knowing that come fall, they’ll still be living in that apartment when school resumes. The result is again, they have a “home.” Fischer Hall 413, my home for three glorious years has been passed on to two new tenants for fall.
Don’t get me wrong, my family is wonderful, and caring and giving, but my time here is at an end. My biggest fear is not the unknown, but rather it’s whom I know. I have made a great deal of friends in my time at good old U dub dub, and when on campus it’s pretty easy to stay in touch with many or all of them. Now that I am gone, and presumably going a lot further away from Whitewater than Elkhorn, I wonder how many I will get to stay in touch with. Invariably I will lose some of the people in my net of friends. There are some people I just won’t allow myself to let go of, but how many people will say the same?
I go now into this, this, “Undiscovered Country” with the knowledge I’ve accrued and all the wit of my soul. I know those who walk beside me, in the shadows, in the light, the day and the night. My only regrets are the things I’ve done over my time in school that hurt those closest to me, when I couldn’t see past the next day to further down the road. But as I made all those mistakes I learned a great deal, and paradoxically I learned not to regret them. I am the man I’ve made myself, with many great friends, and hopefully a long and bright future. The only regret I truly lament is all the opportunities I let pass by.
“And in time all things shall pass away,
In time, you may come back someday.
To live once more, or die once more,
But in time, your time will be no more.”
Thank you everyone I’ve met along my path, May our journey’s always parallel, and when they diverge may we reunite.
Forth my friends into the breach, damn the sails and give them hell.
A couple weeks ago I graduated from Whitewater, earning two degrees, and achieving summa cum laude as I ended my five years in college. It’s been a whirlwind of a few weeks, to tell the truth I haven’t really had a chance to reflect on it yet until today. I’ve been working during the week, dodging my family when I’m not at work, and spending a lot of time with Nicole either down by me or up at her house. Yet now the time is here to grow up, and to take my first steps into a new world. It is one that I’ve glimpsed at from the safe windows of Fischer Hall 413, it’s one I’ve flirted with the last few summers, and it’s something I never thought I’d get to hold; now it’s here. Life after college.
I started applying for jobs several months ago, knowing that there would be a long period of rejection, tests, and interviews. I know that there is still a lot of that ahead of me, but it’s the here and now that demands my attention.
My parents threw me a wonderful graduation party, it was going to be family and some friends from school, but it wound up mostly family. The weather was gorgeous all day as the thunderstorms danced their way out of our area, we had the grill going, and I had the first beer boiled brat of the year off of our old charcoal grill. Then I noticed how much had changed.
My oldest cousin is turning 18 this year, when the last I looked he was still in grade school. My other cousin is no longer the “pretty in dresses” girl that used to come to holidays but rather the metalhead about to get her driver’s license. My neighbor’s son whom I used to baby sit is about to start high school, and half my friends are about to get married. It’s a shock to say the least when you wake up from a year at school to discover just what you missed while your nose was in the books. I don’t know if it’s the day winding down or the brat/Mountain dew inspired insomnia gripping me but for some reason I felt the urge to write, and so writing I am.
To tell the truth I’m not quite sure where to go from here. I’m in a very strong limbo until I find gainful employment. It doesn’t pay to find an apartment and drastically change my life over until I find where I’m going to be working, but at the same time I know I can’t stay with my parents any longer. This place just isn’t home, and it hasn’t been since I left for Whitewater those three years ago. This is a stopover, a storage unit, and a place to crash for the night, but it is not “home.” I know many people feel this way after returning from college, but for many of them it goes away as they readjust to their lives with their family. Others find fortune enough to get an apartment and skip the readjustment to going back home, but they have the advantage of knowing that come fall, they’ll still be living in that apartment when school resumes. The result is again, they have a “home.” Fischer Hall 413, my home for three glorious years has been passed on to two new tenants for fall.
Don’t get me wrong, my family is wonderful, and caring and giving, but my time here is at an end. My biggest fear is not the unknown, but rather it’s whom I know. I have made a great deal of friends in my time at good old U dub dub, and when on campus it’s pretty easy to stay in touch with many or all of them. Now that I am gone, and presumably going a lot further away from Whitewater than Elkhorn, I wonder how many I will get to stay in touch with. Invariably I will lose some of the people in my net of friends. There are some people I just won’t allow myself to let go of, but how many people will say the same?
I go now into this, this, “Undiscovered Country” with the knowledge I’ve accrued and all the wit of my soul. I know those who walk beside me, in the shadows, in the light, the day and the night. My only regrets are the things I’ve done over my time in school that hurt those closest to me, when I couldn’t see past the next day to further down the road. But as I made all those mistakes I learned a great deal, and paradoxically I learned not to regret them. I am the man I’ve made myself, with many great friends, and hopefully a long and bright future. The only regret I truly lament is all the opportunities I let pass by.
“And in time all things shall pass away,
In time, you may come back someday.
To live once more, or die once more,
But in time, your time will be no more.”
Thank you everyone I’ve met along my path, May our journey’s always parallel, and when they diverge may we reunite.
Forth my friends into the breach, damn the sails and give them hell.