Because, well, if you think about it

Maybe it's not cool to admit (because grad students are notorious for griping about stress and the solitary nature of their intellectual pursuits waaaaaah), but...

"I am kind of loving grad school right now,"

she says as she doffs her blazer and settles into hours of reading over Pope.

...Okay, I wore flannel today. And I watched Scott Pilgrim instead of reading 18th-century-ites.

You see that? Grad school isn't what you think it will be with the reading and the leather patches and other such n such. But it's better.

This is what I love about it:

I love my mentorship and mentors, the department that pays for me to visit campuses and present creative essays at conferences, the practically free education I get to read and think about things I am passionate about, the teaching experience the university gives me, the friends in my program that are smarties and funnies, and the opportunity for creative pursuits.

I also love the word "cohort." And being a part of one too, but really that is just a side note to my love for the word.

Year one of Operation: Pretend-Like-I-Know-What-I-Am-Doing is almost at a close. And it's going by too quickly.
I feel like this is one of those elementary school line-ups on picture day. Except I am not the second shortest anymore (the shortest was the sole asian in my class every year who was too-fittingly named Amanda Short. Boy, the kids had fun with that one).