Big day!

Graduation! It felt pretty good, although it felt this time more for show than for real emotion - I just wanted that degree, forget the pomp and circumstance.

Not to take myself too seriously here, but I feel like some remarks are necessary since this is pretty much the closing of the Vanderbilt/Nashville chapter of Volume One of my life. I think Volume One's title is simply: School. So that volume is closed, too, pretty much, or will be once I have a job.

I think coming to Vandy was the right decision overall. It was not the smartest financial decision, that is for sure - I've got a Wachovia Education Loan statement to prove it. But I do think it was the best choice in terms of my education and my own personal development. With the exception of perhaps two courses, I got the book-learnin' I wanted out of a Master's program. I've really expanded my knowledge of the system in which I will be working, have broadened my worldview overall because of the material I have studied, and have felt the pull of an even greater sense of social responsibility than I felt even before coming here - and it was pretty big to start with. And, after all, isn't that truly what education is about?

I also think coming to Nashville was the right choice. I was just restless enough that if I hadn't ventured out of the Mid-Atlantic, I would have always wondered. Now I know - the South is not right for me... mainly because of the weather, to be honest. And every time I go back to Central PA, it hits me how much I love it. Maybe just because it's home, I don't know. I need snow in the winters and a cool breeze in the summer, with pretty, mild seasons in between. I also know that cosmopolitan areas are not right for me. I don't know that I want to live in the middle of nowhere exactly, but I'm cool with a nice small suburb.

I'll miss a lot of people. I'll also miss some places, like Maggiano's and Jersey Mike's and the Pancake Pantry - but not as much as I'll miss the VIPs in my Nashy life.

Almost as soon as I came home I put my diploma in my new Vanderbilt diploma frame - thank you Dad and Mom! And then we packed the van... my stuff is rolling out on Sunday (I am a super-awesome daughter and am making my parents drive my stuff back to PA - and unload it - on Mother's Day), and I'll make that one last 12-hour drive back to York over Memorial Day weekend until I know where I'm starting my real-world life.

And that, my friends, is that. Hollllller!