How I wound up here.

I graduated high school at the end of May 2008. Within a week, I was in Delaware, with my most necessary possessions packed into one checked bag, one carry-on and one purse. Classes would start in September. So why Delaware, and why so quickly? Well, the University of Delaware was said to have a very nice Pre-Veterinary program. My gifted ed teacher mentioned it to me once while we were discussing the colleges I should be applying to. My only real qualification was the school I went to had to be far, far away. There's hundreds of other colleges that fit. The honest answer is that I moved up here to be with my online boyfriend. Through high school I played a massive multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG or MMO for short) called Final Fantasy XI (FFXI). Most of the guys I dated before and during high school I had met online.

I met Justin in a leveling party (kill things for experience points together with random people) and he thought I was interesting. I told him all about why thief was a great job, and basically made myself known as an elitist. I didn't remember him afterwards, but he remembered me when he saw me leveling a different job, Beastmaster, by myself. So he stopped what he was doing and helped me. We had a really rocky friendship, mostly because at the time I was dating a jealous guy who hated Justin's guts. After Jealous Guy, there was /b/-tard, and after that I was ready to date a nice guy. Like Justin. We finally made it official (online official) on June 16th, 2007.

After Christmas that year my brother Matthew and I drove aaaallll the way up to Delaware from Oklahoma in a rental car to "check out the campus." I did a really bad job fooling Matthew. He didn't want me to tell Justin which hotel we were staying in, but I sort of directed him to one that Justin had suggested. The first morning, we were scheduled to take a tour of the UD campus, and Justin didn't know he wasn't supposed to know which hotel we were at, so when we walked outside he was standing at his car, parked a few down from ours. We recognized each other but I made a point of not looking at him so that Matthew wouldn't get suspicious. He got suspicious anyway. When Justin showed up shortly behind us to the building the tour was in, Matthew remembered seeing him before and got creeped out. That's why Matthew still doesn't like Justin. Anyway, we met Justin's parents for dinner at their place, and they liked me, so they agreed to let me stay with them if I ended up going to UD. And Justin and I hit it off.

When I got my acceptance letter, it was decided. The week of graduation I bought a one-way ticket to Delaware. I took my Wii, my PS2, a stack of cds and game discs, a scrapbook Katie and Sharlotte made for me, and all the clothes I could cram into my luggage. I had $250 to last until I could find a job, which took me about two weeks. I applied to two veterinary clinics, a daycare, Safeway, K-Mart, Dairy Queen and Pet Kare. I had an interview at one of the vets, which was dismal, and at DQ, which made me fear for my future. Just as I was resigned to working another hell job in the fast food industry, I got a call back from Pet Kare. I don't always like it there, but I know how good I have it comparatively.

Now I'm a Junior in the University of Delaware's Animal Science program, living on campus on school nights and at Justin's parents's house on weekends and breaks. I'm working towards surviving college, moving out with Justin, and somehow developing a social life.