Tuesday, January 6, 2009 at 2:30pm.
when i was a freshman in college i wrote a poem about what i was going to be like when i got old... it involved things like smoking cigars and getting married a handful of times, becomming a burlesque dancer and arguing about hemmingway. my writing professor got a kick out of it; said he admired my style... that i had "balls" (his actual words).
i graduated cum laude from de paul last june with a double minor, a study abroad, 200 service hours and a headache. i got so bored in the middle of the graduation ceremony that i left. just walked out in the middle of it, faux diploma in hand (they mail you the real one weeks later). i think i do that a lot. i mean, not the whole leaving the graduation ceremony early because, i mean, obviously i've only graduated like 3 times... but just kind of shuck something if i get bored. it's not necessarily a bad thing- i don't like to waste my time. i either give it all, or not all all. i don't know what that says about me.
i'm doing a lot of re-evaluating.
since june, i've gone on a handful of interviews, gotten maybe a dozen call backs, considered more school, rued the day i ever pursued secondary education... that's the big one- why did i go to college in the first place? i'm more than $30,000 in debt and (by all legal standards) unemployed (and apparently unemployable). what was the best part? the "college experience" i've gained? ummm, my study abroad was awesome? i've learned how to dissect a poem and gleam meaning out of meter and stylistic choices (but i've totally stopped writing them, btw). i've read more of the literary cannon than any of my friends? i can now identify obscure literary refrences to joyce, milton, chaucer (and believe me, pop culture is full of them! no, seriously... especially the simpsons). but what kind of employable skill did i gain? my grammar and spelling are horrific (see above and past notes), i forgot all the useful stuff i knew before i went (powerpoint, excel, outlook, frontpage- those things i knew inside and out in highschool). so here i am with all this pristine literary knowledge. i haven't written anything in months. years. did you know that i wrote a 200+ page novel in highschool? oh yeah. over the summer between sophomore and junior year. OVER THE SUMMER. i'm not kidding- ask my mom.
can you blame me for floundering these past few months? it's demeaning to constantly have to sell yourself and prove that you have marketable skills for months at a time. i think i had an existential crisis. no, i know i did. do. am having.
so i decided to go to law school.
i had a plan! i was doing something! when people asked me what was going on, i had an answer! and they were impressed! nevermind that i didn't really stop and think about what i wanted, or that orion kept hinting about more artistic pursuits (see: novel writing, file cabinet of poems, long rambling myspace blogs, and my rather creative resume cover letter- it was more like a short story). not to mention that when i expressed an interest in public defense work and actually talked to someone in the field, he seemed taken aback to learn that i was married and expecting to start a family in the next five years. "this type of work is not very conducive to family life" he said sternly.
i didn't care.
i wrote a personaly statement that i was very proud of: about my dad's obsession with the OJ Simpson trial, how my catholic upbringing had me constantly looking for loopholes, how coming from a big family gives you a strong sense of "the law" and how it doesn't always work for all people at all times, but you follow it because it works mostly for the most people. i talked about myself and my volunteer work. and Roald Dahl and judge Mathis. it was (unbiasedly) a work of art. i asked my mentor to read it and give me any tips (read: compliments) that she had. it took her three weeks to respond and by that time i'd already belly flopped on the LSAT. she said, something to the effect of, "don't get me wrong... this is a wonderful piece of writing, but it is just that: a piece of writing, not a personal statement to law school. i'm entertained by your anecdotes and curious about your parents, i'd like to read more about you and not try and follow some tenuous (at best) connections to why you'd make a good lawyer. this essay does nothing to address why you *want* to be a lawyer, all it does is talk about how you'd *make* a good lawyer." she had a point. a point that would have been useful to see even a day before my phone beeped in TJ MAXX calling my attention to the fact that i had one new email. i opened it, thinking it was a facebook alert or something equally useless and dropped my phone when i saw my LSAT score. 152.
i know, i know, 152 is, on the whole, not an awful score. after i had a total panic attack i googled it and discovered that it's a pretty good score actually. but when i took a few pre-tests at my inlaws house over thanksgiving break i averaged a 157. and i was drinking gin and tonics and semi-listening to all the banter in the living room. i don't know how i could have suffered such a dramatic drop at the actual test. i mean, i was nervous and already in st maarten (in my head anyway)... but a five point drop? that's crazy. i can probably still get into my fall back schools, and i have a lot of recommendations and a high GPA to fall back on. but i was surprised to feel a sense of... relief? actual relief in the days afterwards... like "whew, thank god that's over" and i think that says bad things about my future in 3 or 4 more years of highly concentrated, explosive schooling.
i keep thinking back to my senior year of high school and how the thought of college filled me with such a sense of dread. i had no good reason to go, but i had no good reason to not go either, no answer for all the "but you have to go to college!" sentiments offered by family memebers, guidence counselors, favorite teachers... of course i'd go to college. i went to a college prep high school with the express purpose of preparing me for college. so i applied to depaul because they had the shortest and least labor intensive application process and i didn't have to write an essay, just a personal statement. and i was accepted despite the fact that i took the phrase "personal statement" literally and wrote one line in the box provided... i believe it was "i want to be a better writer" or something like that.
so, i've got this very expensive degree and bunch of unemployed friends with similar degrees in things like "women's studies" and "philosophy" and to be honest, the only people i know who have good jobs are the ones who barely made it out of high school.
so, don't worry about me. i bought a desk. dug my behemouth 1998 laptop out of the closet. i have plans. i may not be able to articulate them, but believe me, i've got things going on.
in closing i'd like to quote Dolly Parton's 9-5 and remind myself that things could be worse, and that there's strength in solidarity: "in the same boat with a lot of your friends, waiting for the day your ship'll come in and the tide's gonna turn and it's all gonna roll you away."
very true. And Dolly never went to college.
COMMENTS:
Mike: Coming from a film school grad, I can relate to a lot of your words. Not all, certainly, but many. Only thing I have to say is that your notes add a little unexpected pleasure to my day that is already filled with some of life's tedious n...ecessities. Between finding a place and a job in L.A., paying off loans, watching reruns of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and justifying to myself everyday that becoming a filmmaker was the right choice I try to relax and tell myself I'm happy, healthy (relatively) and free.
In other words, Grace, I look forward to your next literary gem. :)
January 6, 2009 at 4:00pm
Mom: "...and if your train's on time you can get to work by nine and start your slavin' job and get your pay. If you ever get annoyed look at me I'm self-employed, I love to work at nothin' all day!"-BTO
Write a book.
Go on. I'm sure you can do better than "Attention Passengers", the book you wrote over the summer (in high school).
January 6, 2009 at 4:05pm
Grace: aww, mike... thanks! solidarity brother!!! I'll keep my fingers crossed for you too
January 6, 2009 at 6:53pm
Peggysue: I was such a bitch in that book, wasn't I? I start school Monday, thanks for the kind words of wisdom, asshole. I expect that I'll teach and spend the summer in lush paradises writing beautiful writings which will be published by a stern and ruggedly handsome publisher who will save me from high school students in autumn. yeah... sigh...
January 6, 2009 at 6:54pm
Grace: hahahaha!! Good Luck peggy!!
PS: you were slutty, but definately not a bitch...
January 6, 2009 at 6:58pm
Elizabeth: i adore any note that ends with a dolly parton quote.January 6, 2009 at 7:23pm
Sara: I think you should be a fake lawyer (like, practice law without all the hassle and pageantry of getting a degree first), just for a bit, you know, to finance your life as a writer. You're an excellent lia....I mean, actor, which combined wi...th your good looks should guarantee that you slide under the radar for long enough to make some money. That way, you can have the best of BOTH worlds! Case closed. (see, that was ME just pretending to be a lawyer! it's easy!)
But srsly, you've got a bright future.
January 6, 2009 at 8:02pm
David: I remember that poem. I liked that poem.
January 6, 2009 at 8:20pm · LikeUnlike · .
Dan: I think you're too good to be an attorney anyway! Check the number of lawyers in the big book..........I'm sure there are some who are not qualified to have a "phone number" listed that are hiding under rocks somewhere on Lower Wacker! ...
As for your degree....Remember you can't get to desert without getting past the lima beans. I washed cars, ran a vacum, and stood in a parking lot for 8 years before I did anything of account in my career! Go get started or go start something, but you gotta start somewhere!
or Plan B:
Tell Orion to work harder and start buying lotto tickets.......! Still a better option than lawyer'n! (no offense to lawyers..........I love mine!)
January 6, 2009 at 9:33pm
Jacqueline: Interesting note, Grace. I have been thinking about the same things a lot, lately...from the college instructor perspective...mostly I've been thinkiing how we've turned the 20's into one long extended adolescence...beginnng with the "shen...anigans" (you're a good irish-catholic girl, you know that that means) of college and for many (including my former students) extending into the late 20's, early 30's. I think the 20's are for having the crap jobs, really...I didn't start what I consider my "career" until I was 32. I couldn't do the crap jobs in my 20's because I was raising two children (a good option--rather than delaying it for your 30's and then having a career gap to deal with later)...but I definitely had my cubicle-misery crap job in my late 20's until I finished grad school at 32. Life is so much different now than it was even when I was finishing high school. The economy...job market...there certainly aren't any direct routes to fulfillment, security, work/life balance. January 7, 2009 at 6:12am ·
Erick: This is rediculous! Life should shuck this much chode!January 7, 2009 at 8:57am · LikeUnlike · .
Grace: you guys are so awesome. thanks so much for all the encouragement, personal stories, wise words and suggestions. i feel so lucky to have such a support network!! how neat :)
January 7, 2009 at 2:12pm
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