Good Evening, Nito and/or Good Morning, Granito.

I'd like to dedicate this post to my one and only partner in secondary English education crime, Ms. Kelly Granito; a poetic warrior, a fierce educator, and a voice of daily reason. As is the case with most people from home, when I talk to Kelly, if it is her morning it is my evening, and vice versa. Hence the title.

Kelly and I met during our sophomore year at Western. I found myself at her apartment one night, and per the usual small talk (What year are you? Where are you from? What's your major/minor?), we realized we were both studying exactly the same thing. There is something to be said for people you meet while in college; there is an automatic connection because you will inevitably have something in common with them. We, they, are a dime a dozen. But to meet someone who is spending their time writing the same papers, having the same discussions and thought processes as you are, it takes your friendship to an entirely different level. As is the case with Kelly and I.

Over the course of the last three years, we have spent hours upon hours chatting about everything from relationships to Janet's essays, to Obama and Dr. Dre, and of course, anything correlating with education-- which most things do. We took four baccalaureate classes together our senior year: Topics in Literature; Popular Culture, Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools, Studies in Verse, and Teaching Students with Special Needs in the Secondary Classroom, aka the worst class either of us have ever taken. Seriously, the WORST CLASS ever. Which is saying a lot, being that it was a 4 credit class and you need at least 122 credits to graduate. That means that out of about 36 classes, this one was the worst. That takes some serious [lack of] effort. Nito and I would just sit there, for three hours a week, wondering how the hell a high school educator was getting paid to teach an upper-level education course to college students. F that. Seriously. It still pisses me off that it was such a waste of our time.

So on top of having taken these classes together, Nito and I were also given the Adolescent Literature Award, recommended to us by two of our favorite professors, Dr. Webb and Dr. Nash. One of the reasons we had initially bonded was because we had both had Dr. Nash for Adolescent Literature. She was one of those professors who, to put it quite simply, shook shit up. Some of the best discussions I ever had were in her classes, and she was such an inspiration as a professor that I took three of them in total. Nito and I had both taken the Adolescent Lit class at different times, but had both read the same book she had assigned, The Diary of a Teenage Girl. When we then took Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools with Dr. Webb, for our final project, we grouped together with three other girls to create a teaching unit based around the theme of literature and sexuality (if you click this link, you will be taken to the website we made for the project; still really, really proud of it). Because Kelly and I had interwoven a novel we were taught in Dr. Nash's Adolescent Lit class, and then used it as our base text for our final project in Dr. Webb's class, the two professors decided we should be given the Adolescent Literature Award. And there you have it. Super sweet. Kelly is someone who, whether she knows this or not, had always challenged me in the classes we took together. She almost always got higher grades than me on papers (for every 92% I got, she got a 96%). She made me want to work harder. Being given an award with her from two established professors was, to me, a highlight of my college career.

Then there was last summer. Kelly and I went to Rothbury, Michigan's first festival, with six other friends. I could wax poetic about my time there... the 36 hours of non-stop dancing, watching The Wailers, 311, and Dave Matthews all in one day, the conversations, the people... but, I won't. Suffice it to say it was one of the best times of my life.

Us on Saturday at Rothbury. Dirty and slightly intoxicated, in the middle of swaying to Michael Franti, and about 3 hours until Dave Matthews.

So, Nito, here's to you; to the time we've spent together, to academia, and to the many, many hours I am sure we will spend chatting daily/nightly about the men and women in our lives. You are the shit. I love you!