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By Macy Waddle
On April 22nd, 2022, I sat in my high school anatomy class dissecting a pig when I receive the following message from none other than Dr. Gary L. Gregg. It read as follows:
“Macy, it’s Dr. Gregg from the McConnell Center. Just checking in to see if you were still interested in our program? I hope you’re having a great end of high school.”
I sat there with blue dye all over my hands, in shock. College decision day was in nine days, and I had planned on attending an entirely different school in an entirely different academic program, one that UofL didn’t offer, and I also still wasn’t entirely sure what Dr. Gregg’s message meant. I reply, asking if my admission status has changed. Three grueling, anxiety inducing hours later, he replies “Yes! We will send you your offer on Monday. *Insert fist bump emoji*
I left school that Friday filled with disbelief and disappointment. My perfectly planned and calculated six months of the college admissions process had been altered by a message that ended with a fist bump emoji. All the stress and excitement came to an abrupt halt. In hindsight, I can confidently say that I made the right decision, but at the time it felt like the biggest dream I’d had was no longer possible.
As I choose to continue my education through law school, I find myself having the same conversations and decisions to make; I spend my afternoons shuffling through pro and cons list and asking everyone under the sun what they think I should do. This decision, arguably more important than the last one, may result in me moving across the country for the first time ever. Deep down, however, I still feel a sense of restlessness. That another “fist bump emoji” moment is going to happen.
No matter how carefully I plan, life seems to have a way of interrupting the outline I’ve written for myself. At eighteen, I thought I had learned that lesson already, sitting in anatomy class with blue dye on my hands, realizing that six months of careful decisions could change in the span of a three-hour wait for a text message. At twenty-two, I find myself in a strangely familiar position. I have charts, lists, color-coded notes, and well-thought-out arguments for every possible law school choice, yet the feeling is exactly the same. The more I try to control the outcome, the more I realize how little control I actually have.
What I did not understand then, but am beginning to understand now, is that the moment everything stops going according to plan is not the moment things fall apart, it is usually the moment something new begins. When Dr. Gregg sent that message, I thought my dream had ended. It had just changed shape. The opportunities, friendships, and experiences I found afterward were ones I never could have planned for, no matter how detailed my lists were.
As I prepare to make another decision that feels just as permanent, I remind myself that uncertainty does not mean I am making the wrong choice. It simply means I am making a real one. No matter how hard you plan, life does not always follow the version you imagined, and that is not a failure. Sometimes the unexpected message, the delayed answer, or the path you never meant to take becomes the one that leads you exactly where you were meant to be.
And maybe that restless feeling I have now is not a warning that something will go wrong, but a reminder that it might, and that I will be okay even if it does.
Macy is a McConnell Scholar at the University of Louisville in the class of 2026. She is studying political on global studies and international affairs track and minoring in Spanish.