All Done
Last night was my final undergrad class. It was a lovely finish to the year. We all brought wine to class—we sipped and chatted, and the brave folks read some of their own poems (no, I wasn’t one of them). I’m feeling a little bittersweet today though. I’m happy because after seven long years I’m finally (FINALLY!) finished. The champagne is chilling in the fridge and we’re going to celebrate. I was going to get a head start on the MA this summer, but the course I wanted is full, so I think I’ll take a little time to relax and try and do some writing. Feels good.
But I’m also a little rueful that I didn’t do all this sooner. I was too busy getting stoned in high school to care about school, and my family didn’t push it much—they were just happy I made it through college (I’m the first in my immediate family to go to university). Then I wasted years building a career in IT that I walked away from.
I can’t help but wonder where I would be today if I’d focused on one goal (I’ve whined about this before). Have any of you had a strong sense of vocation from day one?
Since I last posted about this, I am a lot more clear on what I want to do next. I love writing, and it will always be my hobby. I may even get paid for something now and then. But I really don’t think I’ll ever earn a living from writing. Plus, even if I had the talent, I don’t think I could handle the solitude. I’m really starting to believe my vocation is to teach adults. I know I’d be good at it. I really want to make a difference in people’s lives and I think I can do so as a teacher (the professors who have encouraged me have been so important in my life). Another plus—I would get paid to read books!
If this doesn’t work out, I’m going to hairdressing school.
Labels: moi
posted by metro mama @ 1:34 PM
35 Comments:
Congratulations!
Good for you, I hope you are very proud of yourself and that you celebrate like it's Tuesday night baby...or is it Wednesday at your house...can't remember.
By the way, you CAN write and very well.
Congratulations! That's fantastic!!! I think you are an excellent writer, but I also think teaching adults would be a wonderful profession.
Celebrate big time! Congratulations. I'm so proud of you.
I have no idea what I want to be when I grow up.
Congratulations!! I can't wait to be finished. (as I'm very jealously stuffing chocolates into my mouth to dull the pain.)
I, too, wonder where I would be if I'd taken another path. And I'm also thinking about teaching (although in primary grades).
Drink something for me, will you? I'm off to write papers this weekend.
Lots of congrats to you!!! Drink a glass for me as well.
I didn't know really what I "wanted to be" until well after I graduated, and well let's just say the moment has passed.
I think you'd make a wonderful writer and teaching too is a great profession.
Congratulations!
That is a huge accomplishment. Especially with a toddler on the scene. I think the break over the summer will be great for you.
I have no idea what I want to be when I grow up. I just tell people I am a teacher bc it seems respectable.
a huge congrats!
for what it's worth I would have been right there beside you doing bottle tokes in high-school.
But unlike you, never had the discipline to go back and give it a second go (for seven years)- AND with a new baby!
My hat goes off to you.
you deserve lots of bubbly tonight..
Good for you. It must have been difficult to "go back". I'm impressed that you did it.
Congratulations!! I'm so excited for you. Happy endings are always bittersweet, aren't they?
That is terrific! Congratulations!
My backup has always been beauty school, too.
Felicidades! Congratulations!
It is a wonderful feeling when you discover what it is you truly want to do. I wish you all the best in graduate school.
I say relax and enjoy your time off before classes, tests and assignments begin again.
Hooray! and who cares how long it took to find what you want to do. the point is, you found it, which is a lot more than some people can say.
you'll make a great teacher.
Congratulations! A major accomplishment, for sure.
I have not had a strong sense of vocation all my life -- in fact, I frequently say I don't know what I'm going to do when I grow up. (A fact that is supported by my undergrad and my 2 Masters degrees...)
Congratulations! What a woman you are! So happy for you!
Wow!! That's great
congrats, you. and i know what you mean, i passed something over in my youth and now it's too elusive to capture...good for you for going after what you know to be true about what feeds you.
and if it doesn't work out, at least i'll know a place to get a good haircut.
it's win-win, basically.
CONGRATULATIONS!!
A strong sense of vocation?
Me?
Nope. ;)
Congrats! What a huge accomplishment - keep going. I think society needs more commited, bright, caring teachers.
Yay, congrats!!
As you know, I have never had a strong calling for a particular vocation. I did get through college right out of high school, but even then didn't really know what I wanted to do. Which is why I'm now entering nursing school for yet another career change.
I don't think it matters when we finally realize what we want to do, as long as we go for it. And you're now going for it, which is awesome.
such a good feeling!
Me? My mom found books from when I was a wee tiny thing with due dates written in the back from playing library... There were several years in between where I was really into a medical career, but realized that what I wanted wouldn't work, and i just kept coming back to libraries. (Where, um, I get paid to read books...sometimes.)
Hey CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!
All that work! You did it!
About the hairdressing school, my mom worked for Revenue Canada her whole life, though my dad always told me she worked for the mofia- anyway, she always said that her true wish in life was to be a hairdresser...
Funny.
Also, once I saw this shirt that said, "I transform people's self esteem, self impressions, and image- what do you do for a living?"
It was hairdressers shirt.
But that's kind of irrelevant, my point to the comment was congratulations. Awesome that you did it!
How awesome for you!!
(strolled on over from Forg and Toad's)
Mary, mom to many
umm.... FROG, that is....don't ya hate it when you notice a typo JUST when you release the send button....?
I've had that rueful regret for time passed, too - but it's a pointless sort of thing, isn't it. You'll make a wonderful teacher - are you interested in grade school, primary or high school? My mom is a grade school teacher - 4/5 - and my brother is trained as a primary teacher.
I used to want to be a nun, unhampered by my Protestantism.
I feel the same way at times. I've yet to finish school. I didn't have the drive earlier and I lack the time now! When KayTar goes to preschool, then I think I'm going to do it. As for vocation? Nope. But being that KayTar has had so many medical issues, I think something in the medical field is looking mighty interesting, I suppose we'll see when I get there.
Congrats!!!!
YEAY YOU. Congrats on finishing up. And I think you'd be great at teaching!
Hey, last night I came across something that made me realize you did a post on what your ideal porn film would be like. And now I'm going through your archives and can't find it. Gah. Am DYING to know. Where is it?
But the upside is that I got a chance to catch up with what's been going on with you! Yeay.
And I'm a little envious of those pretty flowers and the fact that your hubby doesn't turn into an asshole when he finds out you're hurt about something. (My hubby doesn't do gifts. In fact, I mentioned years ago I was hurt because he didn't get me a gift for Christmas and he told me I'm greedy and materialistic to want gifts. So now I don't buy him anything either.)
Sounds like you got a great guy! And you've got a wonderful little girl too.
Lisa: I took it down 'cause of the weird google hits it was generating.
Hey, congrats on the last class!
I had a really strong sense of vocation coming out of high school-- I was going to be a Corporate Lawyer (not that I actually knew what a corporate lawyer did). After undergrad (English also), I went to art school (a far cry from law school), and I definitely get how you feel about school taking forever-- I did 9 consecutive years of post secondary. Since then, I've had a strong sense of vocation that morphs about every five years, and I don't know how I feel about that: at 35 I still waver between knowing and not knowing what I'm doing with my life. I think our culture and media model the Career as one straight ahead road pointing toward the Ultimate Goal of Big Success, however that is defined; but for me, professional life is turning out to be a process with a lot of loops and side trips, with both hot spots and low periods of creativity and learning. And I think that even people who seem to have taken off and continually excelled in a forward motion right out of high school (I have a friend like this, who incidentally did do law, was at the top of her class and has since dabbled in litigation, corporate, criminal and gov't law) would not feel that they are, indeed careening forward at the rate to which they aspire.
Anyway, you probably got way more out of your undergrad, and definitely have better marks, than I did as a good girl dutifully going straight to a top university out of high school.
Funny, I've often thought an alternate career in hair would be a nice idea too...
Congratulations dahhhhlllinnn!!!
Well done. As someone who put herself through university with two toddlers, I know what you went through to get this far.
As for the strong sense of vocation...um, no. Hence a degree collecting dust and me sitting at home wondering what I should do when I grow up...
Congratulations! It takes a lot more drive and determination to do it after marriage and having a child than when you are 18 with no commitments and living in a basement suite.
You inspire me.
Like you, I didn't figure out what I wanted to "be" until I was in my 30s. I screwed around and wasted time all through university because I was taking courses that didn't interest me. Then I went back to college at the age of 28 and took all of the courses that DID interest me. Unfortunately, they didn't directly result in steady employment. Then I did some more boring, soul-destroying jobs for a few more years until stumbling onto a career that I both enjoyed and that paid the bills. But, the way I see it, it's better late than never. Some people spend their whole lives doing jobs that they don't enjoy and never figure out what will make them happy. So relax - I think you're actually ahead of the game.
Congratulations Metro. You deserve this. So celebrate.
And anything you choose to do you are going to be good at......
Hi, I sometimes stop by your blog because I enjoy your writing and here and there I find things that I am able to relate too.. but this is a post I can really relate too... smoking my highschool days away, building a career in IT that I really do not enjoy.. doing my BA part time (2 more courses to go) and thinkin about doing an MA.. Congrats and all the best to you.
Congratulations on getting your degree!
And don't look at the previous years as 'wasted years' ... you were living and learning, and it's made you appreciate all the more what you went back to school for and what you're going to do with it. I think you're going to be a wonderful teacher.
congratulations, again ;-)
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