In 2000, I graduated high school and started college. In 2001, I found myself back in Chicago managing a video store. College, it seemed, wasn't for me.

Three years later, I was making enough money to live on, but at the expense of all of my free time and much of my happiness. I didn't want to work retail for the rest of my life. College was starting to sound more appealing every day. I needed a change. Quitting my job, packing up all my things, and moving to Montana after living in northeastern Illinois for my entire life seemed like the logical thing to do.

Things were different here. Mountains dominated the landscape instead of buildings. No one seemed to be in such a hurry for no reason. Strangers smiled and said "hi" as they passed me on the street. People knew their microbrews. But most important, when I began classes for the second time in the autumn of 2004, my teachers cared.

Beyond being a proficient user, I didn't know much about computers before my first college attempt. Not much had changed in the interim. This time, though, instructors were spending time with me instead of saying, "Here's the assignment; figure it out or fail." Things were finally starting to make sense. Those introductory computer science mantras ("inheritance, encapsulation, polymorphism!") meant something to me. The field also turned out to be more complex, more interesting, and deeper than I'd ever expected.

I started to get interested in scientific applications of computing. My teachers picked up on this, and new opportunities started to present themselves. Instead of being apprehensive, I jumped at everything I could. I got a job in the math department. I became a CS researcher. They sent me to Bozeman. They sent me to Reno. They sent me to Alaska. I kept finding myself in unusual, surreal, amazing situations while being encouraged to work on fascinating problems. I was finally able to say something that had never been true before: this was what I wanted to do.

It's now late 2008 and I'm set to graduate with a bachelor's degree in December. Perhaps not surprisingly, I've decided to continue my education at UM and get my master's. I've learned more in the past four and a half years than I ever have, and I still don't know much. I hope, though, that I'm much closer to being wise.