So in my uncertainty, I went to graduate school and there it all happened.

Nelson frames graduate school as a turning point reached not through a clear plan but through uncertainty—an in-between state that nevertheless becomes productive. The line suggests that institutional spaces for study can function as incubators: time, resources, and intellectual community allow latent ideas to cohere into a life’s work. The casual phrasing (“and there it all happened”) compresses a complex process of discovery into a single moment, emphasizing retrospect and narrative shaping: only afterward can one see how a period of exploration became decisive. It also hints at Nelson’s broader ethos—innovation emerging from questioning established paths rather than following a predetermined career trajectory.