It is finished.

I took the last final of my life today. Here's how it went down.

I woke up bright and early - 6:00 a.m. The Jl MC 460 exam doesn't start 'til 7:30, but I still needed to buy my blue books and get some last minute cramming in before the test started. It's a big one - 3 essays and 10 short answers. But I put on the face of steely confidence as I walk out my front door. I'm James Pusey. I'm wearing my "Da Bears" shirt. And I'm ready.

I've been cruising in my dad's truck lately because my car was having some issues for awhile. The car is fixed now, but I still like the feeling I get when I'm ridin' high in the Nissan Frontier. On my last day, I need the confidence. Plus, my dad makes these awesome mix CD's and coincidentally the song playing as I turn on the ignition is "Takin' Care of Business." I crank the tunes, throw on my dad's "sunglasses" he got from the optometrist, and I'm off to the WestSide Market to pick up some blue books.


I arrive at the C-Store a minute early.


So I wait.
I buy my blue books. They cost 30 cents. In the next two hours, I proceed to fill every page of those two blue books with arguments about intrusion, copyright, federal regulation of commercial speech and fair use doctrine. I purge all of the information I'd binged on an hour before, knowing I won't remember much of it two days from now. I'm okay with that.

I turn in the test and walk out the door into a flood of fluorescent light, the whole world ahead of me. No more grades, tests or group projects. I think of everything I'm thankful for - God's purpose in me being here the last four years, my parent's love and tuition payments, all of the people I've met since I've been here. What a ride.

Tomorrow I will receive my degree.

But today... I will pay my parking tickets.