[Summary: Thomas Joseph talks about why he went into the field he went into, and gives thanks to his parents.]

I really like this post by Zuska. As a matter of fact, my parents did the very same thing for me. The only exception being that I had to pay my last year of college because my dad was laid off from work* and so my folks couldn't help me with some of my tuition and fees that year. They didn't have to shoulder the entire burden -- I was on a X-C and T&F partial scholarship when we went to Division I my sophomore year, and I did work/study as well -- but they shouldered the majority of it. They wanted to give me a leg up on life, a life without being crushed by student loans the minute I flipped that tassle from right to left on my academic cap. And I couldn't be more grateful to them. Life wasn't always easy in the Joseph household, we were middle class, but that didn't mean times were always peachy. I remember my dad being on strike a few times and having to work odd jobs to keep food on the table, I remember him working 4PM to 12AM shifts for months at a time and him waking up at 6 or 7AM to see us off to school and t . . . More