the beginning of the end

what a long strange trip its been. officially done with college. after about 17 years of being a student, i am on to a real life career. its absolutely crazy. graduation was very anticlimatic.

went down to charlottesville on friday evening to have dinner with my parents, brother and sister, and grandparents. delicious restaurant called hamilton's on main street. highly recommend it if you have the means. after that neal and i came back to harrisonburg, hung out with pootie for most of the evening with a little splash of erin thrown in for good measure. then saturday was the big day. the big ceremony started at the bridgeforth stadium, the football field. i was a little disappointed with senator allen's commencement speech, but i think just about everybody was. that's cool that your daughter is going here, due to the fact that she is too attractive to go to uva, but try not to be such a political-technology dweeb next time, senator. then the business ceremony came next up at the convocation center, the basketball "arena". with about 730 graduates (including the 2 valedictorians in quantitative finance. why would you subject yourself to that much stress??), they flew through the different majors like a hot knife through butter. we got out of the ceremony around the same time that some other colleges did with a meager 300 or so graduates.

after the ceremonies and sitting in silly traffic for way too long, my family made it back to my apartment for a little food and drink before hitting the road back to norfolk that afternoon. i then split to stonegate to meet erin's family. aside from the initial nerves, it was a lot of fun. after dinner, we went out to catch up with jakob and some oldschool alumni. saw a great band play, had some fun, said some goodbyes. kicking the night off with some champagne and ending the night with 40s was both a classy and fitting way to celebrate graduating from jmu.

woke up early sunday morning to drive home for a graduation party consisting primarily of my parents friends and neighbors. it was an alright time. nothing too exciting. i was just so exhausted after the past month with my broken collarbone and staying up late the past couple weeks straight, i konked out around 9:30 last night.

today was spent catching up on some much needed beauty sleep, investigating changing my own oil in the volvo (then later deciding it was actually cheaper to take it to get done), cleaning the inside of said volvo, and going to target. saw lots of sweet things for my apartment at target, i am getting really stoked. although a sense of longing is beginning to develop along with the excitement. longing for framiliarity, friends, yada yada yada. im sure ill be fine, just the mix of emotions that are flowing in and out i suppose.

looking like another night of monster sleep. score for me. loss for you if you were hoping to talk to me past 11pm. but before bed i plan on sitting here, listening to music, playing around online, and catching chocolate covered rasins in my mouth by tossing them as close to the ceiling as possible.

best of luck to all of my friends and freinds-of-friends who are traveling to europe or across the country before starting their jobs. adam and bk, i hope you get pictures of the kodiak you are going to wrestle. jakob, i dont want to hear about some crazy techno-rave with a crazy american flashing the locals left and right. basic, drink lots. everyone else, be safe, have fun, and relax. in a way i envy you all. but in another i don't, because i will be having my own adventure up in pittsburgh with a whole new world opening up.

And all of these moments

Just might find their way into my dreams tonight
But I know that they'll be gone
When the morning light sings
And brings new things
For tomorrow night you see
That they'll be gone too
Too many things I have to do
But if all of these dreams might find their way
Into my day to day scene
I'd be under the impression

I was somewhere in between

Jack Johnson