Last Day of Class

I attended my last college class (barely awake) this morning at 8am.

This is a big deal because of the following break-down of my academic career:

Summer 2004: Attend BYU-Idaho with no other motivation than to eat as many Fruity Pebbles as I can. Live with my best friend Anna and bond with life-long friends Mandy and Nathan.

Fall 2004: Move home to Boise for my off semester. Work behind the counter of Clean Flicks, as a Target Portrait Studio photographer, a bank cleaning lady and a concessions girl at a corn maze AT THE SAME TIME. Somehow found time for my first boyfriend ever and ignored the senior in high school with braces who worked at the corn maze. His name was Scott Chapman.

Winter 2005: Attend BYU-Idaho and live with Anna and Mandy. Focus more on getting involved in the theatre program. Get cast as Dolly in Steel Magnolia's. Become life-long friends with Meredith who played Shelby. Have my first love/heartbreak- act like crazy ex-girlfriend (yeah. I was one of those).

Summer 2005: Still at BYU-I, move Anna and Mandy in with Meredith- have a whirlwind summer of rivers, bon-fires, camping, Rigby and bathing suits. Oh yeah, and class. Still a bit of a crazy.

Fall 2005: Move to Alaska and sell T-shirts that change color in the sun. Basically have a relationship with Skagway Alaska (a tour guide, and a helicopter pilot). Feel the best I ever had before in my life. Make tons of money. Not wanting to move home, move to Provo, Utah where I leave with $100 in my pocket, a weird relationship, a broken car, an "injured" biker and a speeding ticket. Swore never to give Utah another chance.

Winter 2006: Move in with Anna, Sarah, Ashlee and Nicole. Ignore school, ignore my major, get ready to go on a mission but feel very unprepared. Dark time.

Summer 2006: Get my mission call to Toronto, Canada. Leave August 16th which means dropping out of my summer classes. Go white-water rafting before I leave and have a life-changing experience.

End of Summer 2006-Beginning of 2007: Serve as a full-time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

Winter 2008: Come home to Boise where I make the decision to change my major. Work as a substitute teacher- still my favorite job ever. Date some weirdo's but find a great friend in a guy named Ammon. Ammon and I talk about our missions a lot.

Figure I would like to major in social work.

Summer 2008: Re-take classes to get my GPA back up, take some intro social work classes, decide to change my major from theatre education to social work. Start work at Artco- still my least favorite job ever (that's a lie... it's a toss up between Artco and cleaning banks). Date some more weirdo's, pray to find a normal boy to date. Scott Chapman runs into me on campus. We start hanging out everyday. Then we start dating because- why not? Then we fall in love because I had never met someone so ok with themselves than Scott.

Fall 2008: Take more intro to social work classes. Realize that it will be a long time comin' till I graduate. Scott and I talk about marriage. Scott proposes in November under golden trees. I serve as the Relief Society President in my ward. That was hard.

Winter 2009: STILL taking intro to social work classes. Marry Scott in April. Play on the campus improv troupe, Comic Frenzy.

Summer 2009: Finish up taking intro to social work classes. Live in the smallest and hottest apartment known to man. Play with Comic Frenzy. Quit Artco.

Fall 2009: Move into a real apartment. Have my first off-semester in a while. Work nights as a waitress at JB's. Start playing on the community improv troupe, The Humors. Scott works for his parents as a salesman.

Winter 2010: Start the social work program! Love my classes more than I thought. Get cast as Lady Macduff in Macbeth. Discuss finishing the class portion of the program by the end of the year and am told it is impossible.

Summer 2010: Become very involved with my major- putting my heart and soul into it. Get on the fast-grad program. Scott graduates from BYU-Idaho with his associates degree. Try to decide what Scott's major is going to be and where he is going to go to school. Live below life-long friends Liz and Jacob. We decide Scott will attend University of Utah in the winter. I am not happy about this.

Fall 2010: Despite everyone saying it was impossible, I figure out how to get done with all of my classes but one and my internship. Become vegan for a month. We find out we are pregnant.

Winter 2011: Move to Salt Lake City. I start my internship at Salt Lake County Youth Services. I also start my final social work class at U of U. My professor is racist and I drop the class. We find out we are having a girl. I am not happy about living in Utah, but after a while figure out I need to just accept it. Scott excels in school and at work.

Summer 2011: Finish my internship in half the time. Give birth to the most beautiful creature you've ever seen. And, coming July 22, 2011: Graduate.

I don't expect any of you to have read that, but it was cathartic for me to write it all out none the less. It's been a long road for me to get through college, and I feel very proud of myself for never once thinking about giving up. I always knew I wanted a degree, and even though it took me a bit to get there, I'm happy to check it off my list of things to do before I die.