The First Day of School

Ahhhh, the newly sharpened pencils, brand new binders, a knapsack with Dora the Explorer cleverly going on an adventure on the front.... just kidding.
What it really looks like for me is lugging my laptop, water bottle and lunch bag downtown for my first day of school (again, for the umpteenth time)! It really was like the first day of high school, or something like that - it has been so long since I've had to have a 'first day of school', I'd forgotten what it was like. Certainly, in my program, 90% of us are women, so it's made early bonding way easier.
There is something inevitably exciting about starting a new school year, however. The possibilities seem endless, the opportunities abound, the thinking and knowledge and intellectual challenges required of me almost make me swoon with delight. Obviously, this time around, it's not going to be all beds of roses - there's slightly more at stake, I now have way more responsibilities and commitments than I ever did previously, and much is expected of me. Whoa. Well, one or two credits at a time, I keep saying to myself, plod along, keep cracking at it, and it'll be done wayyyy down the road.