Jake Longshore

I went right into UND after graduating, double-majoring in English and philosophy. Three years and I had no clue what I was doing or wanted to do, so I dropped out.

After kicking around in Grand Forks a couple years, I moved to Arizona - and kicked around in Flagstaff for a year.

Then off on a Greyhound to New Hampshire, where I studied three years at Thomas More College. A semester in Italy whetted my appetite for travel abroad. Still, I didn't expect to come back to Europe until my philosophy instructor recommended I apply to Leuven. Which I did, and they accepted me.

The MA program was good to me, and I did well enough to stay for the doc program. That was when I had to start working to make ends meet. So I taught English in Brussels for about six years, which was a good experience, but it made the research tedious.

Now I'm in the home stretch: I should be defending my dissertation in December, just before Christmas break. But it's taking some serious work to catch up for the lost time. After the dust settles, who knows what's next? Not me.

Stories - more like a collage of events and impressions,

like thinking of silly sentences to write for German class (Frau Berg thought I was nuts, but she couldn't argue with the German),

or dissecting the green, rubbery earthworm for biology class (how disappointing),

or running with my buddies through the hard-hat areas to avoid a pep rally,

or Bryant Hansen making smoke come out of his eyes (yes, *I* remember that).