The email arrived April 10 and started:

“Dear Student,

Congratulations! You’ve been selected as an Outstanding Student in the Bachelor of Arts in General Studies program. I’m delighted to invite you to SNHU’s College of Online and Continuing Education’s Academic Awards Ceremony. The Outstanding Student award is given to the student or students who hold the highest GPA in their program.”

Well, that’s inconvenient. I already said I wasn’t going to graduation. I even wrote an article outlining the reasons why I was skipping it. One last reason that I hadn’t mentioned in the article was an inconvenient and seemingly insurmountable reason. As a single mom who has spent the last five years working and going to school, I didn’t have the resources available to fly across the country to attend my graduation. One drawback to having skipped the impacted California University system for an online alternative. My graduation is being held on the other side of the country. This means airfare, hotel, rental car, and eating out.

Yet here I am, graduating with a 4.0 and invited to an Academic Awards Ceremony. I will be starting my MFA in July, but I have zero guarantees of ever pulling this off again. So, I can sit at home and watch the live-stream of my Academic Awards Ceremony and Commencement Ceremony, or I can buck up and make miracles happen one more time.

After freaking out, then analyzing the situation at hand, I made my decision. Having spent the last twenty plus years of my life making miracles happen, no sense stopping now.

I started and finished my federal and state tax returns April 11. I was up until midnight after working all day. I hit submit while fighting back a panic attack that I had forgotten something or made a mistake. Having spent eight years as a licensed tax preparer a decade ago, taxes are just a bit nerve-wracking for me.

I posted a status on Facebook the next day: “Plot twist: I stayed up until midnight doing my taxes, will get enough to cover a trip to graduation, won't get it in time to go.”

Fortune smiled on me, and two people who just got their refunds stepped up to help bridge the gap. The PayPal account from twenty years ago helped make a miracle happen. I just had to make it through the weekend. Oh, and tell the school I wanted to come to graduation. I created a service ticket over the weekend and held my breath.

April 16, I received an email from school, I had been marked as attending graduation. I reset my password for the Travelocity account I created for a job a few years ago. Travel has not been an option for years between work and school so I had forgotten the password. By 8:18 PM I had booked a travel package with airfare, hotel, and car rental. I will be spending Mother’s Day weekend in Boston and driving up to my college for the ceremonies on Friday night and Saturday afternoon. I will be flying home on my birthday.

Next hurdle, my driver’s license expires on my birthday. I had to go in to renew it. California DMV have not been easy since they started issuing Real ID’s. I had an appointment April 20, but would my license come in time for the trip?