YEAH!!!!

[melcty]

Ok, so most of you know the story. I did pretty good during my undergrad, but as is not unusual for a lazy bum like myself, when given the opportunity to, I procrastinated. It's worse than you might suspect though.  We all know about pulling all-nighters, waiting until the last minute to even think up a paper topic, cramming caffeine and/or stimulants down our esophagi in order to complete and assignment on time.  I took it to the Nth level.  I waited two god forsaken years to write some papers.  The incompletes turned into F's, marring my otherwise nearly flawless transcript.  Well, this fall, I got some professorial intervention, (thank you Julie Graham) and finally bucked up and did the work.  Four short papers on 4 German Philosophers from the 19th C. and one 23 page paper on women and welfare reform for a Political Economy of Women class.  I handed in what was to be my last undergraduate paper the second week of December after being the most slothful, complacent, yet oddly content human who occasionally wrote papers.  I did this for three months, living in others' homes, taking what was basically charity from those who either pitied me or envied my extensive personal vacation.  I watched Animal planet all day while mastering spider solitaire.  I smoked copious amounts of cigarettes and enjoyed seeing how long I could go without paying my bills.  In the end, I have to tell you, it was well worth it.  This week, I have learned that my occasional or even rare efforts to produce some decent written work paid off.  I received A's for classes I had taken two years ago.  I also got very nice commendations from the professors that gave me the chance to do the work, very very belatedly.  I would frame the emails they sent me, but I don't know if I can put nails in the wall and I don't have money for frames, nor a printer to print them out.  So, I am posting their comments here, for posterity and to memorialize what I never in a million years thought I would do.  Complete the work.  Let me say this, I tried many a time to write those papers, and I had finally given up and accepted that although I would have a cum GPA of 3.57 even with two F's on my record and would graduate anyway, it just wasn't going to happen.  This is a symbolic event for me, cause I finally finished something completely, to the bitter end, and I will not have to look back with any regret.  I did it, and maybe this signifies that I can do it again someday.  Life is good.  Here are the comments:

Melanie
                    That paper was excellent--really grad level quality. I put an A for the class for you before Christmas.  I was very pleased to read your paper and I have no serious criticisms of it at all.
                                                                                   regards,
                                                                                           Tony G.

Hey Mel--Your papers were REALLY GOOD! And I gave you an A for the course. . .

I realize that I am tooting my own horn, but I don't do it often, and for fucks sake, I think I deserve to.  I'm a high school dropout who's made her own way through a legitimately shitty early life  to become a college graduate with a 3.8 GPA and several honors and awards from the sociology department at Umass.  I owe it to myself to feel proud of this accomplishment.