I should be doing homework...

Which means it's about time for me to blog!  Now that all this blog traffic has died down, thank you Tawny (and really... who are you people?  Bucharest?  Buenos Aires?  What are you googling to get here?!), I feel like it's time to recap some recent developments.  I haven't got any lovely anecdotes, or tantalizing quips, but what I have got is looming dread.  On Saturday, I shall attend my 10-year high school reunion.  This, dear reader, means that I have been released from the cocoon of adolescence for a full decade, expected to unfold my tender wings and soar upon the winds of life.  Like the butterfly I have metamorphosed from unsightly chrysalid into new creature, vastly altered from its pupa state.  Unlike the butterfly, I have become something of a cautionary tale - a ghastly warning to those who ponder treading upon my worn path.  WALKER BEWARE!  DESTRUCTION AND UNAFFORDABLE THERAPY AHEAD!  

Okay, so I'm being dramatic... it's not so bad really.  I've had more fun than I deserve in my ten years since graduating.  As a matter of fact it's mainly due to the fun I've had that I'm quasi-terrified of the upcoming celebration.  I've accomplished less than I intended to, but the curious thing is that I've lived more than I expected to.  When trying to figure out exactly what I wasn't looking forward to this weekend, I realized that all I really dislike is the parade of achievements.  I don't know that I have so much to brag about except this: I have learned the power of discovery.  

Some people call it life-long learning, but I think that phrase may have become trite through overuse.  It misses the crux of the issue - seeking and finding, investigating and solving, questioning and answering - this is what it means to learn.  Whether or not I have achieved what my peers have achieved I now understand that this process of discovery is available to me at every phase and stage of life.  Whether emerging from a cocoon to a brave new world, or finding that I can still fly when my wings have been damaged, or beginning to grasp what it is to have unique beauty... there's something to be appropriated and gleaned.  And although I am indebted again, encumbered in school again, cloistered in life - again... I believe that I am richer and deeper for it.  Ten years on, I might not be winning the rat race - but life is sweeter, and I am better.