Bumping Into History

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I have class. Those are good days. If you would have talked to me 2 years ago, I wouldn't be the least bit excited about class. You see, I started my undergraduate degree at Northern Illinois University in 2001. I graduated with my B.A. in Philosophy in 2005, and entered directly into the graduate program. Then, I kind of hit a wall. In 2007, I had a series of personal hang-ups. There was an unhealthy relationship, substance abuse, alienation, the whole nine. By Fall of 2007, when I should have been done with my M.A. in Philosophy, I had lapsed into oblivion. I had not completed my graduate work in Philosophy, but decided to try my hand at Political Science, as it was also an interest of mine. In an odd "settlement" with the woman I had been dating at that time, we no longer lived together, but were still in a relationship. I found 3 other grad students with which to live, all of whom, like myself, had spent 2 years in the Philosophy department, but started pursuing another Master's Degree in another field. Within the year that I lived with them, I experienced some of the most turbulent times in my life. I had legal troubles, scuffles, arguments, binges, you name it. It all ended with me leaving school and leaving the apartment.

Fast forward 18 months, and I bump into one of the roommates with whom I was suitably close before I moved in with him. After the year ordeal, not so much. As I approached him, I could see that he was a bit hesitant of how I would act. I merely made a few jokes about us being old eternal academics and asked him how he was doing. I asked about his boyfriend (he is gay, now follow along, people) and his future plans. I told him a bit about what I had been through. But somewhere in the middle, I apologized. I let slip a sincere and unequivocal apology for the way I had acted and imposed upon him and the others in our year of cohabitation. He seemed surprised at first, but thanked me, and assured me that if anything, it made for good storytelling. Was it a big thing? No. Did it matter? Absolutely. It's a been a few months since I've really had to be humble. But this encounter reminded me of just how necesarry it is, when you have been where I have, to practice humility. I am still just trying to make it, and I can't pretend not to be. The ex-roommate and I parted ways, and I scuttled off to Metaphysics class, where I learned a bit about identity, kind of. If you wish to be bored by details, send me an email, I can provide you with thrilling class notes. [note: the italics were meant to convey sarcasm for the sake of those reading, I actually do find the metalinguistic analysis of the identity relation enthralling]

The Rundown:
Today, I ran the longest I have run to date. My hamstrings were sore from yesterday, both from running a short 2 mile and from helping my girlfriend (Erin)'s mom rip up the floors in the house she just bought. But I decided to stretch those suckers out and just hit the road. I actually didn't have a plan, as I felt that the scheduled 1/2 mile run (5min) - 1/4 mile walk (3min) - 3/4 mile run (8min) - 1/4mile walk (3min) - 1/2 mile run (5min) was too light.
The following is what I did:

10 min run - 2 min walk - 5 min run - 2 min walk - 5 min run 

The total was just over 2.64 miles. Woooo.