Last uncontacted tribes

Sarah shared this with me and I am obsessed with the story now.

New commitment

Tara and I have a new commitment! Aside from the other things we are using to fill our free(-ish) time now that I'm done with school (mainly house-hunting, excessive demands at work, and vacations!), we are committing to training to walk a half marathon! During June we will just be doing some general physical get-in-shape kind of stuff, but in July we start training. We're doing it on our own (with the help of a self-printed guide from prevention.com) so hopefully we won't lose our motivation. We need cheerleaders! That's YOU!

The training includes a mixture of workouts, including rest days, something-other-than-walking days, short walks, long walks, in-between walks, and culminates (hopefully) in a 13.1 mile round trip walk. I measured, and it's 13.1 miles exactly to Amherst from Northampton on the bike path.

Here's to our adventure!

Image: What a way to go out!

My last semester grades are UP! Two As! And an overall grad school GPA of 3.918. I am damning those three A-minuses I got! (Click the image for a better view.)

Image: Return to the land!

I'll post about graduation weekend soon. Until then, thanks for the calls and cards and visits!

Going dark

The family arrives today/tomorrow to participate in/witness my graduation, so I'm disappearing until all the festivities are over.

I'll be back with pictures to post soon!

Jenna is almost here! (Hi, Jenna!)

The first White valedictorian at Morehouse, an HBCU

As a student of higher education, I'm fascinated with this. I'm not sure how I feel about it, actually. What are your thoughts?

Graduate School Retirement: What it's like

I've always heard that people who go into retirement are actually busier than they were when they were working. Not being retired myself, I can only relate through my experience since finishing graduate school a week ago. In part, things are better because I'm sleeping better - less wear and tear on my mouth guard, and I'm sleeping shorter amounts of time. At first I thought that meant I was sleeping worse, like my body and mind didn't know what to do in the absence of stress, but I think it actually means that I'm sleeping better. I think the sleep I'm getting is less restless and fretful, and I'm waking up early because I am rested. That feels good, because I haven't really had that for a week straight in three years.

Among the things that are keeping me busy are pre-graduation events, pre-baptism events, and all of the deferred maintenance on me, especially my hair. Yesterday I went for a long walk outside, and despite the five mosquito bites I came home with, it was lovely. So, I have a haircut today, dinner with the cohort Sunday, we had a picnic last night, we're assembling programs tomorrow, we're meeting with the pastor tomorrow, too, and a realtor on Saturday and blah blah blah. All of the things that have been put off for anywhere between four months and three years are happening now!

I have not cracked my huge stack of growing magazines, and my knitting and quilting are dusty. I hope to pick those things back up over the summer.

My next project is to mimic this. You can check out the full list, Mighty Life: Things to Do Before I Go, here. I want to reflect on the things in my life, what I want to do and see. I am also taking a lesson from Mighty Girl and will begin to list the moments I hope pass before me before I die, those moments I hold sweetly in my head and mind.

Until then, I'm looking forward to the busy-ness of the next few weeks. Both the celebrations and the quiet moments. I've been waiting a long time just for time. And I think I've earned it.

Today is the day

Need I say more?

UPDATE: HOLY SHIT. My hands are still shaking.

Now that I can use my brain for other things...

this is blowing my mind!

Anagrams are fun! I know - I'm a loser. Ask Jenna about the conversation about Justin Timberlake's new album that we just had. Oh, wait. I think I promised her I wouldn't tell anyone about that.

Sorry, Jenna! Like I said, I hope you still love me after this month is over and done with.

:)