We are family

Tonight my husband and I are basically exhausted after driving 250 miles each in separate cars to transport my visiting family members to and from the large city (where the humongous university from where I'll graduate tomorrow is located) to the small college on the hill and back again and back again.

My mom, my younger sister and my two nieces/goddaughters went with me in my trusty, salsa-red Scion XA, while my nephew/godson traveled with my husband in the ugly but useful black pickup truck.

Once here, and after having a great lunch at the college's first-rate cafe, we gathered in our small living room, and talked all at the same time, telling jokes and funny stories, and laughing raucously at Darwin's antics. Dr. S and my wonderful former student (who will soon be departing to spend a semester in Chicago) visited for a little while, too, and partook of the fourth fresh peach cobbler I've made so far this summer.

After Dr. S and my wonderful former student left, we stepped outside to spend a little time in the courtyard, where my mom and three of her six grandchildren had a grand old time on the swing.


My sister, who yesterday had her glorious, curly hair cut by my magician-stylist, found a way to keep her hair up in the heat by borrowing our meat thermometer when we failed to produce a chop stick. She's a very resourceful woman, that's for sure.

Before evening came, we drove all five of them back to the large city, dropping them off at the curb of their hotel, and taking off quickly thereafter to make the long trek back before night fell. Tomorrow, my husband and I will do the same round trip so we can all attend Commencement at the humongous university's basketball stadium, which is thankfully air-conditioned.

While my father and my brother (and his family) won't be with us, they will be very present in my heart, along with my failing grandmother, who, until her mind wandered recently away, never to return again, always remembered tomorrow's date as my graduation.

Tomorrow, the episode of the doctorate will be officially behind me once my wonderful advisor hoods me and the university president hands me my diploma with the title Doctor of Philosophy. I think I'm definitely going to have to cry a little then.

I'll never scale Everest or any mountain, for that matter. But tomorrow I'll be as close as I'll ever get to the feeling of heady accomplishment that doing so (and surviving) surely entails.