"I'm proud of you"

For the last year I've been feeling rather ho-hum (read: really depressed) about my lot in life. Back in February/March of 2009, my cohort in housing were all offered jobs, either while earning their masters, or bachelors-level, but in the field we all wanted to go into. Except me.

It was a very dramatic time in my life, as I waited to hear back from any school while my friends went on final interviews and school visits. As they were deciding on where, of the multiple places that had offered them jobs, to accept and spend the next 2+ years of their lives, I started getting the rejections. I stopped counting them, but there were enough.

I applied to graduate school on a whim in 2010, deciding that once and for all that I needed to do something about wasting my education on food service. I was rejected. I knew I would be, but it still hurt. Later in the year I decided that if my current bachelors degree was inadequate, then perhaps I should just get another one. This is what I started on Monday.

Its going to take me until 12/11 to get this second degree, if all goes well, grade-wise. I am hoping by the end of BA #2 that I will have a high enough GPA that I can go into graduate school. I will be two full years behind my former cohort. They will have advanced degrees and I will not. Though I am trying to do good by my own future, I'm still feeling low, dumb, and a bit like nothing I do means anything. Or, I did.

Tonight I was talking to a friend I met through student affairs, but who did not attend my undergrad. I feel no need to be better than him, feel no validation in a difference between us. I am ashamed to say that I do with those who went to undergrad with me. I am less than them for not having started a masters yet. I thought everyone felt this way about me, in that way that you think that everything that you do is the norm when you are small, because its all you know.

Tonight, E proved me wrong. I was chatting with him about my homework and he said 4 small words that actually made me cry. "I'm proud of you"

It was like he was validating my very existence. I matter. Someone thinks of me in a positive manner.

I can go on now.

Back in the Saddle Again

I start back to school for my second bachelors degree on Monday. I am nervous and excited. I wonder if being back on campus will give me a sense of calm, of belonging that I have been missing since May 9, 2009. I wonder if I will feel out of place, older than a traditional undergraduate, not old enough to be 'non-traditional". I wonder if I can do it.

The Two Paths Before Me

So I work at a pizza place. It's not the worst job ever, its not the best job ever, its a job. I have risen through the ranks in the 11 months that I have been back (this was my high school job as well as my oh-crap-I-have-student-loans-to-pay job now) as high as one can go without becoming management. My best friends there are the managers. What can I say, I appreciate people who aren't idiots... My best friend is stepping down as a manager. She is changing a lot in her life and is doing things to make her happy and I am stoked for her. I am apparently also slotted to replace her.

I was told today "I really can't think of anyone else who I would trust to step up, but you're going back to school... aren't you?"

Yes, I am going back to school. My first degree got me as far as $7.95/hr and living with my mom. I'm hoping I can do better with the second. And better for me is not managing a pizza restaurant.


Though I am flattered to have been thought of, truthfully. I sometimes wonder if I'm valued for the work that I do and this demonstrates to me that I am.

I have decided on my path for now. Will there be future forks and more decisions down this path? Of course. But for now, I'm set.