After high school, I went straight to the University of Texas. After five years there, I graduated from a program in which I earned both a bachelor's and master's degree. After that I returned to the area of Texas where I was from and taught school for a couple of years. Then I got married. Then I went back to school to study law, which was silly, really, because I never had any desire to be an attorney, so that was basically an unused degree I earned. I had my son during the law school years. Right after law school, I worked as a reporter and feature writer for the local Dallas newspaper.

For the last 17 years I've been working in corporate America, and next month I'm about to stop working and give up a well-paying job to go back to medical school at the age of 44. Medicine's what I've really always wanted to do, and I'm finally in a good place where I can do that. I figure I'll be 50-something before I'm earning money again, but that's OK. I like school.