I'm sitting at this desk, in this pink house, for the last time to write in this on-line journal. The emotions are wonderfully overwhelming. Pardon the Hallmark-like nature of this last entry of mine as an undergraduate at the University of California, but what I want to write tonight is sincere.

Today, I graduated and four amazing years at Cal officially came to an end. All day today I've been surrounded by the people I love, my friends and family. I'm so happy to have each of you in my life. Truly, I would not have made it without you. Each of you has shaped a part of me, each of you has played a role in my success, and each of you, in your own way, has been an inspiration to me. Thank you!

To my family: I love you. You are my pride. You are the people that have lifted me up to where I am today. You've been my strength and you've fueled my passion to pursue City Planning, to go out there and try to make a difference. I can't begin to even explain how much each of you mean to me. What I can say, is you don't know how many times I hear my friends tell me, "Wow Nick, you have a really cool family". I sure do. Our diversity, our drive to make change, our shared heritage, and our love for each other (even if it's tough love sometimes! haha) means the world to me.

To my friends at Cal, especially those of you that have been on this journey with me for all four years, we made it!!! I'm going to take with me so many memories from this time in my life, gifts from each of you, who have come to be like a family to me. I could not have asked to be surrounded by a better group of friends.

For most of us, fate threw us together freshman year, and we transformed what could have just been "people we lived with in the dorms" or "people we met at CalSO" into lasting friendships. I feel so lucky that we were able to stick together and experience Cal together.

As I write this, there's a lump in my throat and I have to fight back the tears. But I'm truly happy inside. Only something this good could be this emotionally tough to say goodbye to.

There will probably be quite a few tears tonight and over the next few days. There already have been quite a few, actually. We can't stop change, we can't freeze our lives in this place and time. And I think we all know, deep down, that we would never want to do that.

Something is indeed coming to an end. But as that old Semisonic song says, "every new beginning, comes from some other new beginning's end."

Let's be those Old Blues who grow old together and never lose touch. This might be the end of our time living all within blocks of each other, but its only the beginning of a lifetime of friendship that lies ahead of us.

We've got a lot to look forward to! I love you all, and once again thank you.

Go Bears!

No more finals. Just a symbolic piece of paper away from my BA in Urban Studies.

Onward to summer adventure and grad school!

I present to you, the late stages of chronic senioritis:

Avengelyne01: what happens if we just don't study?
Nap98: i dont know?
Nap98: im thinking...
Nap98: A+'s all around
Avengelyne01: shouldn't i, like, really be trying to apply myself or something, for this last time?
Nap98: maybe
Nap98: maybe you already have
Avengelyne01: hmm
Nap98: maybe youve become such a genius over four years..
Nap98: that you dont need to study anymore
Avengelyne01: you know, i think you're right!
Nap98: haha
Avengelyne01: i just spent two hours watching tv
Nap98: i just spent a half hour on facebook
Nap98: and reading Time

This is my last week in this house. Seven days and I'm gone.

Please excuse any moodyness on my part this week.

Wow. It's over.

The World You Love

I got a story it's almost finished
all i need is someone to tell it to
maybe, that's you.

Our time is borrowed and spent too freely
every minute I have needs to be made up
but how?
i'm looking for a nice way to say "i'm out."
i want out.

I fall asleep with my friends around me
only place i know, i feel safe
I'm gonna call this home

The open road is still miles away
Hey nothing serious
we still have our fun
oh we had it once

Windows open and close
that's just how it goes

Don't it feel like sunshine after all?
The world we love forever, gone.
We're only just as happy
as everyone else seems to think we are.

I just got back from my first graduation ceremony. This one was the first ever Alumni Scholar Association Convocation Ceremony, for all us over-achieving campus leaders.

No family was there. No friends, except acquaintances I know who happen to also be Alumni Leadership Scholars.

This one was just for me....well for me to get my framed lithograph of the campanile from the 1920s with my name engraved on a small plaque underneath it (sweet!). Initially I went to just get that goody...but I got a lot more out of it.

The ceremony really touched me. A great series of speakers who made me feel really good about what I have done and accomplished, and made me look forward to being an alumni. Even if I were leaving Cal after this year for good, they made me realize that you can't really leave this place, its a part of who you are and its a community that exists throughout the world. It feels really nice, to feel like I belong (fully and without any reservations) to such a community. I've never really truly had that before coming here.

Ceremony closed with a singing of Cal's Alma Mater, Hail to California. I've never sung it before, don't know the tune except the final "Hail! Hail! Hail!" part, even though I've heard it plenty of times at the end of football games. But I tried my best to follow along.

And it was really nice to be in the shadow of the Campanile singing that bittersweet song, celebrating my past four years here, doing it only for myself (even though it was kind of strange to not have to take a million pictures after). It made me feel..well really good, and maybe even excited, about graduation.

Learn these words fellow future Cal alums, it really is a beautiful bittersweet song when you put these words to the music:

Hail to California

Hail to California,
Alma Mater dear;
Sing the joyful chorus,
Sound it far and near.
Rallying round her banner,
We will never fail;
California, Alma Mater
Hail! Hail! Hail!

Hail to California,
Queen in whom we're blest;
Spreading light and goodness
Over all the West.
Fighting 'nearth her standard,
We shall sure prevail;
California, Alma Mater,
Hail! Hail! Hail!