They called her name, Anna Maria Ulricka Lundin Wilcox, appropriately the longest name of any of her fellow graduates.  She had to have worked harder for this honor than anyone else.  We watched her lug books to the beach, poolside, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Austin, etc.  Anyone who’s attempted to obtain a Master’s Degree in two years knows this is par for the course.  What makes Ika’s perserverance unusually admirable is that she did it in a foreign language.  I tried to read a chapter in one of her psychology books once (English is my first language); the terminology makes the ten-dollar word look like an understatement.  To try to comprehend this in a second language is incomprehensible.  Family and friends gathered to celebrate with her, supposedly poolside.  God had a different plan.  As it poured proverbial “cats and dogs” outside, we hovered together inside with Matt Dickson’s famous bar-b-q brisket and beans.  It was the coziest celebration I can remember in a long time.  The word “magical” comes to mind.