Once upon a time...

There was a young girl. She was finishing her bachelor degree, she was 22, and had planned a very ambitious journey: she would fly to Belgium, and from there, cycle her way through France. She wasn't exactly well prepared, but she was young, and fearless. The year was 1996, and the date of the big departure was May 23.
But the girl got sick. Really sick. So instead of leaving for her big adventure, she stayed home, and was slowly nursed back to health by her mom. That was an even bigger journey than the cycling expedition.

Forward to 2006. After finishing her masters degree, and then starting a PhD, the girl, after a ridiculous number of catastrophes - changing university and supervisor, hurting herself badly while running after a cat, in an injury that had consequences for years, losing new supervisor when he died in a scooter accident (at 47), changing supervisor again (duh), having the next 2 supervisors, however nice and interesting and challenging they were, disappear to some degree (one, 45, adopted two little girls, the other, 48, had mono (seriously, at 48??? what is wrong with these professors, who die on scooters and have monos?), various financial and health troubles, etc.-, to every one surprise, even her own, said girl finally defended her doctoral dissertation on May 23rd, 2006, exactly 10 years after the planned voyage.

Forward today: 2012: mostly healthy, even if struggling sometimes with a chronic disease, unemployed but confident in getting the graal (the professor job) or in finding some way to keep writing. 16 years later, I'm not as careless and fearless as I was, but hey, I'm still there, and happy most of the time!

Ain't history a great thing?