Last week I started a new job as full-time staff of the university I attended as an undergraduate. Here are the really surreal experiences I’ve found on going back ten years – almost to the day! – since my eventual graduation from that institution:

  • My old email address still exists and is still assigned to me. It was ready for me on Day One.
  • My old personal ID number, from my old student ID? Still assigned to me. It’s now my staff ID number.
  • My office is half a block from my freshman dorm. If you want full-circle, I’ve got full-circle.
  • When I went to get my staff ID made, in the same office where students go for their student IDs, they still had my old student ID photo on file. The kid behind the counter asked me if I wanted to use it for my staff ID. My response was, “Well, I’d love to, but won’t everyone wonder why I wore a wig to have my staff ID photo taken?”

It’s so strange. It’s also very, very comfortable. I love the job and I really like my co-workers and my manager. I love the work I’ve done so far, and I have tried to dive in with both feet. I am in love with the variety of work and the cooperative atmosphere on my team. This is how the technology-related organizations were not when I was a student. I am really, really glad I made this move. Still, it’s weird. It’s weird to feel a sense of ownership over a place where hardly anyone has heard of you before. It’s weird to return to a place after a decade has passed and find out that all the identifying details that you thought had been put to rest were just waiting for your return.

In my fraternity we have a saying that no one really leaves town so much as they enter a highly eccentric orbit. So true. So very true.