…and not really with a whimper, either. The ending just kind of came and went. Like most major things these days, it seems. Graduation from Western was a lot like graduation from high school; you did a lot of sitting, you did a fair amount of getting up to applaud, and some guy in a really really big robe was up there pontificating. In other words, you basically got a college-flavored Catholic mass that ran 2 hours.
But it’s over*.
(* by over, I mean that it’s over pending the final submission of my final grades and a last check to make sure that I passed all the classes I needed to. But the odds of that not happening are slim enough to not merit much concern)
So what’s next? Quite possibly the most seamless transition ever. I go back to work on Monday, and the only thing exceptional about that is that I haven’t worked a Monday in 4 months. I’ll keep doing precisely what I’ve been doing, albeit with a bit more accountability. I am an intern no longer, but I’ll still have the same company phone, company computer, and desk in the repair lab. I suspect that some time towards the end of January it will hit me that I’m really out of college and that the next major thing to look forward to is either getting a house or getting married (or for added stress, both at the same time), but to haul out the cliche, tomorrow is the first day of the rest of my life.
I have to admit, I have no idea how I’m going to fill the time.
I also know that in 4 months I will look back at the above line and laugh at myself for thinking such ridiculous thoughts.
Still…for the past sixteen and a half years life has been defined by how close to the end of my formal schooling I am. Now I’m there, and the end of my career seems inconceivably long. 45 years, maybe 50. I can’t even imagine 10 years. My mom mentioned to me today that there are teachers at the high school who are teaching students who can’t remember what they were doing when 9/11 happened; was it really that long ago?
In the short term, though, my to-do list is pretty basic. I need to undo the last year and a half of beer drinking. I’m going to paint my apartment in January, and within a year I’ll be a Microsoft Certified Enterprise Administrator (their acronym for it is something like MCITP: Enterprise or something ridiculous like that, but for those who know your letters, it’s the Server 2008 version of an MCSE). Beyond that?
I have no idea. And while I normally am one for having a well-defined plan, for now, I’m okay with that. I feel like I’ve got enough under control that I can allow a little ambiguity in my life.
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