Brooding, also (copycat)
Rana talks about feeling incompetent.
Yes, I know quite how that feels. Not that I felt competent or anything in grad school, or ever, except, possibly, in my early teenage years and before, but that sometimes felt better, like I was — I don’t know — doing something that affirmed my abilities, in some vague and not actually real way.
Now . . . well. I get an email from someone who was a reasonably good friend in high school. We drifted apart after graduation. She’s organising the 10 year reunion.
Part of me is just plain happy about this. We were a small class (43 graduated, or so), and I am curious about what quite a number of people are doing. I was on the side of most of the cliques, so I don’t feel I need to be proving myself. A friend does, in a way I don’t entirely understand. I know she will be there only if she is happy with her life, her job, her love life, her everything. Me? I’ll be there almost no matter. (The friend with whom I had discussed going is moving. To Prague. For med school. Which she apparently decided upon, applied for, and visited in the 2 months we didn’t email. I’m shocked. On the other hand, guess where I’m going to go for vacation next year? Of course I’m also happy for her; she was so unhappy in her job.)
But another part . . . the person organising this has been married for I don’t know how many years; she met her husband the summer after we graduated, they married 5 or 6 years later, and now she’s pregnant. (And, oddly, in school to get her MLIS, or whatever they call it now, at the same program my mother just finished.) I’m — unfinished? I don’t actually want to be married and pregnant, and I don’t know her life. But I feel like I’m faking this all. I’m not really an adult. I don’t know what I’m doing, where I’m going. I’m (sigh) single, with no real prospects in sight. (And my grandmother’s illness has me slightly worried; I mean, I’d like to marry eventually . . . but while my grandparents are all still around. This is, I know, somewhat backwards.)
Graduate school . . . at least it was something. I mean, I could say “I’m a PhD student blah blah” and people would know what I meant. It would be something to say. What am I going to say? I dropped out of grad school; I moved back home; I’m single; I’m studying something *else*; I didn’t live up to half the promise I had.
Or something. Funny — just recently I was perfectly content with my plans. Now it just sounds sort of sad. And I never wanted a life I could brag about, I wanted a life I was happy with. Maybe I misunderstood myself. Maybe I was taken into a cult.
No, I don’t mean that seriously. But I don’t know where this vague dissatisfaction comes, except certainly that it has something to do with this whole high school reunion thing. I think it’s worth considering more, though. Because I am not ashamed of my plans to friends. Still, what do I say. I say I’m working as a linguist: fine. I don’t detail what it involves; it’s too boring. I’m what — a parttime not-really-artist? Why am I back to deciding who I am based on what I do? But how else do we do it? I can’t break out of this mold.
In any case, I suppose I will work this all out; or, I will ignore it until up comes whatever reunion happens and it will be over. But I want a life I’m not ashamed of . . . and leaving the PhD? Not over that, yet.
I need to find that contentment I had just recently; I want to have good and happy summers, not the depressive ones I’ve had every year but one (2002) for many years. I want to have a good and happy life, too: this summer would be a nice start.
June 29th, 2004 at 2:40 pm
Ah yes. I sometimes think of this situation as having a lack of convenient labels. Work identity? Pretty generic, and not how I think of myself. Social identity? I’m D’s girlfriend, which is significant only to people who don’t know me but do know him. Hobbies? I suppose I could say “I knit” but that’s not really _me_.
Of course, I can see if one did have a standard label — wife, mother, professor, artist — it could be confining — but at least it’d do well in small-talk situations!
I hope you have fun at the reunion — I’ll probably never go to any of mine, but that’s because there are no people from high school I want to see again, and only a handful from college (who probably wouldn’t go either).
June 29th, 2004 at 5:06 pm
Thanks for this post. The “vague dissatisfaction” you describe is so familiar, yet whenever I try to write about it I end up with something mature like “grr!” Rana makes a good point — a lack of useful labels makes it hard to explain choices to others. Leaving grad school made sense for me, but whenever I have to explain it to someone it seems like I’m defending myself. I hear myself saying left school, moved home, looking for a job, might try school again soon and it does sound pretty sad overall. (It’s certainly worse when people say things like “oh your family must be so disappointed!”) Most of my friends from hs and college are doing something (working, studying, marrying, etc.) now, but nothing spectacular. I like to think that I’m *doing something* even if I’m back home and basically figuring out what to do next. Most of the people I knew in grad school spent several years after college deciding what to do (trying out different jobs, joining the peace corps, etc.). Why is that more acceptable than taking some time now?
At any rate, enjoy the reunion :)
June 29th, 2004 at 11:38 pm
My Trackbacking Test and Ping
A wolf angel is not a good angel : Brooding, also (copycat) is a test for me. You know, I have been told that I am really good at writing directions for how to do something (although I’m not good
June 30th, 2004 at 11:14 am
Rana:
I like Susan’s term post-academic, still, but no one *else* knows what it means. Yes: no convenient label is a problem. But also I don’t feel my life is settled into a shape I like. I’m sure it never will be settled entirely, but I’ve barely started forming it . . .
Small-talk is about jobs, or starts there. And so what do you say when you only have a job and not a career?
Brina:
Yes, that’s it. When I say my plans more specifically, they sound better. And even to people who know me, they don’t sound too terrible . . . but then I say them in a more general manner and it sounds pitiful; it sounds like a failure.
It’s not, I realise. But it’s just not where I saw myself, once. Maybe it’s the death of dreams still.
June 30th, 2004 at 2:20 pm
I understand why you’re both feeling down, but for what it’s worth, my experience with some of the same issues–and with many others like you whom I’ve known–has shown me that “post-academics” are far more interesting people than just plain academics.
Is that blatant prejudice on my part? Of course it is. But when I’m at a party, I’d rather talk to a post-academic who’s now doing something new and unexpected than some twitchy bore with tunnel vision who can’t talk about anything but her damn dissertation–and in falsely self-deprecating tones at that.
You’ll both find something neat to do with your lives, and you may be surprised to find that your grad-school experiences actually enhance your subsequent careers and offer much-needed perspective. Plus you’ll belong to a community of post-academics who are increasingly comfortable coming out of the shadows.
Some brooding is understandable, but don’t be consumed by it. Enjoy, and exploit, your newfound freedom–because it *is* freedom, even if it may not feel like it right now.
June 30th, 2004 at 5:58 pm
i totally know what you mean..
i took over three years “off” between college and grad school (where i’m trying to get my mlis, coincendently) and it was really tough to try and tell people *what* i was doing those years. a friend of mine, in the same boat, came up with the phrase “cover story”, i.e. “i wish i had a good cover story so my parents/friends/etc would stop bothering me/looking bewildered/etc about my life right now.”
sigh. now i’m in grad school it *is* easier but now i don’t like it when i say “grad student” and people nod their head like they *understand* me now and move on. argh! no pleasing me, i guess..
July 2nd, 2004 at 11:49 am
I’m all for blatant prejudice that makes me feel better about myself & about having left.
Academics who only talk about their research are incredibly boring. I’ve met, though, very few of those. A lot of people I knew in linguistics were incredibly interesting, just in general.
I’m sure I’ll figure things out, eventually. I don’t regret going to grad school; I certainly don’t regret getting the MA.
I hope it leads to some new & interesting life, too.
July 2nd, 2004 at 12:12 pm
Andrea:
It somehow seems more acceptable to do it earlier — or later, especially. But why should you waste 20 years until you decide it’s time to figure things out?
I guess it depends what they understand. I didn’t mind misunderstanding when I was doing *something*, but now . . . I don’t know. Grass is always greener, I guess. Maybe when I feel I’m doing something real & authentic.
July 2nd, 2004 at 1:21 pm
On “twitchy bores”: Maybe I’m just lucky but most of the professors in my department are vastly interesting people who are passionate about their work and who lead ordinary lives including extracurricular interests. Although there is one definite twitchy bore.
WA, I’m with you. I don’t regret getting the MA one bit even though I have no idea how it will possibly serve me later in life. (However, I don’t actually have it yet so I better stop being so proud of it already.)