What I'm Not Doing
Back in May when I graduated from school, everyone kept asking me if I felt any different.
Not so much.
My library was bigger. I was a better writer. I was smarter. But it wasn't as though a switch flipped on graduation day that filled me with relief and warm fuzzies.
The root of the problem was that I had been in school for a long time. From age 3 (when I started preschool) to age 28, I had been in school every fall with the exception of 2002. That was the year I took off after Stacy and I got married. But even that year she was finishing school, and I was working at a college. I was still entrenched in the culture of academia, even though I wasn't a student.
May, June, July and August all fell off the calendar. An entire quarter of the year. And my senses finally started to come alive. Friends would talk about how they were heading off to class. The kids I work with started school. People were setting their gmail chat status to "studying".
And I was kicking it. Watching soccer with a big bag of pork rinds, a box of junior mints and a gallon of chocholate milk. Not pounding out an assignment.
Now we find ourselves nearing mid-October, and I finally feel like I'm not in school anymore. It's a nice feeling. There is space in my life. I am starting to enjoy reading and writing again, after a four-month detox.
I just need to remember this when the itch strikes me to apply for Doctoral programs. Not like I'll be doing that anytime soon. I promised myself I'd wait at least 5 years before even entertaining the idea. And whenever the subject is broached, Stacy gives me "the eye".
But still.
Renew and Restore
Not so much.
My library was bigger. I was a better writer. I was smarter. But it wasn't as though a switch flipped on graduation day that filled me with relief and warm fuzzies.
The root of the problem was that I had been in school for a long time. From age 3 (when I started preschool) to age 28, I had been in school every fall with the exception of 2002. That was the year I took off after Stacy and I got married. But even that year she was finishing school, and I was working at a college. I was still entrenched in the culture of academia, even though I wasn't a student.
May, June, July and August all fell off the calendar. An entire quarter of the year. And my senses finally started to come alive. Friends would talk about how they were heading off to class. The kids I work with started school. People were setting their gmail chat status to "studying".
And I was kicking it. Watching soccer with a big bag of pork rinds, a box of junior mints and a gallon of chocholate milk. Not pounding out an assignment.
Now we find ourselves nearing mid-October, and I finally feel like I'm not in school anymore. It's a nice feeling. There is space in my life. I am starting to enjoy reading and writing again, after a four-month detox.
I just need to remember this when the itch strikes me to apply for Doctoral programs. Not like I'll be doing that anytime soon. I promised myself I'd wait at least 5 years before even entertaining the idea. And whenever the subject is broached, Stacy gives me "the eye".
But still.
Renew and Restore