It is something very profound to me and I suspect that will sink in at some point but probably later and not today or tonight. As I opened a door and entered into the sunlight I asked myself what I wanted and I first thought I wanted to walk a little and than thought I wanted a beer and perhaps a pizza to go with it and so I walked to Orsinis by the river and sat down and had all three. I might want some ice cream later but I won't know that for awhile.
Five years is a long time. Some people never lived five years and others will not live five years more. To sign up for a five year program is assuming a lot. It was also expensive. The amount of money that went in to five years of school is more than many will make in their entire lives once you start venturing out in the world. It also took time. I invested time that many cannot have or simply choose not to. The last five years are as much a gift as they are an accomplishment and it is apart of more characters than I.
I remember driving down to Austin for the first time and asking someone carrying books where the tower was. I remember changing schools because I discovered I hated chemistry but maybe liked business. I remember the night I lived in a common room on campus because I had to and I would fall asleep at home. I remember very well studying for a finance exam and thinking how much more beneficial to my career the New York Times would be over the time value of money and deciding to read the Times for a little and that ended up affecting my grade but that would not matter much in the end. I remember Austin too. I almost forgot about Austin.
I also remember long nights at work before an early class and going for swims between other classes and getting on a plane for Australia that summer and a plane for Spain that winter where it would all end in style. And today I was surrounded by Spanish students and not Americans. That was strange. And after ten Spanish questions it all ended very suddenly like it began.
My diploma will arrive in the mail in a few months but I do not know when. I missed my graduation by over a month and will miss the next one too. It is possible I will miss my third chance to walk if I am where I expect to be. I do not know if that bothers my parents but I think it does not if it does not bother me. We all know what happened and my mother and I will cheers with a glass of Spanish wine very soon and my dad and I will do something similar come the fall and these things I much prefer to sitting and watching myself and others get recognized for something that was supposed to happen.
No one entered this agreement expecting not to graduate and if they did that was very silly. What I feel now is not surprise and it should not be because there is an expectation that to accept and to finish are synonyms. Therefore to recognize someone as special is like patting a teenager on the back for arriving on time to his first day on the job. When I am eating with my mother in a week I will feel a level of mutual acknowledgment. Acknowledgment that I worked hard and did well and was lucky enough to be given that chance and came out very different than the person that went in. I am very different now than I was before.
So what now. What happens now. In my youth I often brought up extravagant ideas to my parents about cruises and roadtrips and they responded saying that was the kind of thing people did when they graduated and I hated that phrase than but love it very much now. I have almost three months of my life free. That is another wonderful sentence to write. I might see the Tour de France in July. I might see the Olympics in August. I might do neither and go to an isolated island with a hammock in Greece. I might not even leave Spain. It is a good country and a big country and I speak well now and feel very fine here. I am writing something big and that could be nothing or everything and we will see on that too.
After that. What about after that. I sure get asked that a lot. I could be on three continents and the opportunities are there and I can feel them very well and I am not too worried because things have always flown like they should and they flow very well now and there is no reason to think they will not continue to.
Who am I. How is this possible. When will I wake up and see a light at the end of a tunnel which is hopefully just me being born again.
Orsinis is very quiet at this hour and myself, the bartender and the cook are the only people present. Earlier there was a girl working and when I walked in her eyes were red and she had been crying. She tried to pretend and smiled when she brought me a beer and I asked if she was okay but she said she was fine. She left and I will never know why she was crying. It is funny how the world does not change much though we might feel very differently.
I watched the new bartender pour a beer just now and I see myself, but myself in a different time. We are now in a much different time.
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