Please eject the tape, and switch to side B

I open my eyes.

This is it, the last time.

I roll over and turn the alarm off, lay in bed for a few moments and collect myself, letting the day wash over me sense by sense. The person in the bed beside me stirs, murmurs something encouraging, reminding me of what I need to do. Feels like I've always had someone there to do that.

I get up, unplug my phone, and walk to the bathroom. I'm not really there yet, my body is just doing it on autopilot, shuffling me through the seamless steps of a path well remembered. In the bathroom I turn the lights on, see myself in the mirror. I'm so different than before, different than yesterday, different than nine years ago when I started this journey. My face has swollen, eyes sunk deeper into my skull, and the sides of my hair have kept pace with my eyes from above, pushing my brow back into what some would call an educated look.

I don't feel very smart.

Nine years. What some made into a molehill I turned into Everest. In the time it took me to do what they've done they've changed careers, started families, made large purchases, and probably destroyed one or all three. They're probably just starting over right now with their lives, too.

I think about the face in that mirror, everything it's seen and done, everything it's dreamed of doing. Is it happy with all that? Does it feel like it's made a difference?

I smile. Bad idea, keep moving.

I go to my laptop, open it, and then go to the sink. Have to give it time to remember who it is, too. Pour myself a glass of water to get my metabolism going, wake up. I've been doing that for three years, ever since I read about it in Outside Magazine. Feed the cats, they're pining at me with tiny mews and rubs against my legs. I've learned to love them like my own children, obsessively and in everyone else's face. Everyone loves to hear about my cats. Everyone.

I sit down at the computer to the sound of tiny food pieces being pushed around glass bowls. I remember this, too.

This is the part where I sit and think about all the things I'm supposed to be doing, then go to gmail. Gmail is the gateway drug of social networking. It's okay to open Gmail, right? Because it's my email, that's where I do all my important correspondences. Have to keep up with everything, stay organized, you know.

I scan the list of my contacts who are online. Anyone I want to talk to? Nah, not yet, but I bet there's someone to annoy on facebook. And off we go.

Two hours later I come to the realization that I haven't started working on what I was supposed to be working on, yet, nor have I eaten breakfast, put on clothes, and the class I was supposed to be writing a paper for is about to start.

Then I do the one thing I'm good at, natively and with flourish, and create some incredible piece of writing in the matter of moments. It's the one sail that always stayed up throughout this journey, the one that kept me moving forward when nothing else would. When god was giving out gifts, he gave Hermes' pen to the wrong soul. Better it had gone to someone who was going to use it with some effort, than someone who'd use it to supply his own aversions to work or duty.

But that's the way it is, and the way it's been done.

I print it off, my fool's masterpiece, and take my time getting ready. I'm already late, there's no point in not showing up late looking good. Procrastination is something best done with style, because style is too cool for clocks.

After I eat, dress, wash my face and find my favorite track on my ipod, I walk outside and get on my bike. I look around at the house that I've spent the last career of my attempt over college mountain, with it's widely ignored yard and tiny square footage. I look around at where I am, and wonder what the fuck I'm going to do next.

I put my foot on the pedal, scream at the sky for want that the neighbors will hear me, that anyone will hear me and know that somewhere today, someone finally found release from their long-path to adult enlightenment, and I go to my last day of school.

-Sean