Party on Wayne.

So, if you don't already know (or are just living under a rock, and we don't talk much lol) I am officially BACK IN SCHOOL. I know I know, most people's initial response when they learn this information goes a little something like this...

Person: "Don't you already have a degree?"

Me (rather sheepishly): "why yes, I do have a degree. I have two in fact."

Person (confused): "Why on earth would you go BACK to school then?"

And then crickets chirp, and silence follows, because man, they got me good on that one.

Why would someone with two perfectly good degrees, and a career VOLUNTARILY CHOOSE to go back to school?? To essentially spend more time, more money, and have significantly more stress in their lives?

I have a million good reasons. Some are legit, some are just me probably trying to hold on to that last bit of youth I have left. To grasp at those days when life was crazy, but in a totally non-one-flew-over-the-cuckoos-nest kinda way. When I spent my days cramming 30 hours of studying/partying/working into a 24 hr only time slot. And I did. And I still looked fantastic.

Nowadays, if I don't get my full 8 hrs, and my three square meals plus snacks, and my run, and my HGTV fix in...beware, because I'm waking up looking like Laura Ingalls from Little House on the Prairie on a bad day. Like I literally slept on a straw mattress, spent all day hoeing the damn fields, and then didn't bathe because Tuesdays are bath day, and its only Monday, and we have to go pump the water from the well three miles away and drag it home. Yes, its THAT bad.

So yes, part of me is sub-consciously reaching for those days when parties on the weekend were a given. Speed quarters with your best friends. Mildly revolting but at the same time very entertaining cupcake eating contests. Shots taken out of penis shaped shot glasses (with no hands mind you). And certain unidentified people barfing all over the front lawn and then using leaves to wipe their mouth. (Mom I promise you, it wasn't me with the penis shots, and barfing, I was a perfect angel :)

What part of that doesn't sound like an all out blasty blast?

On a more serious note though, the full reality of my decision centers around the fact that I haven't found what I'm truly passionate about. Scratch that, I have found my passion, and that is helping other people, but I haven't found a profession that will allow me to experience that calling to the fullest, while at the same time maintaining some semblance of a personal life. There is a very delicate balance between work, family, and personal fulfillment, and for me pursuing a new career is my last-ditch effort to achieve that balance in my life.

So that is why these days my free time is spent pouring over Math for Dummies, trying not to look like I have no idea what's going on, and fighting the urge to call my 13 year old sister for help on my Fractions homework. It's a rough transition, but throughout the process I'm truly learning a lot about myself. What I know, what I don't know, and who I am as a health care provider. I'm also definitely satisfying my thirst to continually grow, develop, and learn as a lifelong student.

AND I AM in college right? I feel like that totally justifies a few nights spent re-living my glory days with penis shaped shot glasses and thermoses filled with Boones Farm Blue Hawaiian Punch. Party on Garth.