It’s starting. It’s starting and it’s not pulling any punches.
I went to my parents’ house for the holiday this past weekend and saw everyone who has known me since I was little. The meetings with my relatives, old teachers, and family friends went a little something like this :
Question 1 : When are you getting married? (Funny).
Questions 2-18 : When are you graduating? What will you do after you graduate? Do you have a job? When will you start earning your keep? (Not funny. At all).
It was the same story at this year’s Virology retreat (minus Question 1, thankfully), the questions delivered by professors and students alike, with marked vehemence from the former.
Oy.
That’s my answer. That’s the best I can do right now.
Question 1 can just sit in the corner all by itself.
Questions 2 – infinity I am going to have to deal with at some point, whether I like it or not.
The expectations are high, in large part due to the name of my school. I am expected to achieve great things, to knock down the doors of opportunity with the word “HARVARD” as my battering ram.
Well, guess what? It doesn’t work that way. That battering ram is bestowed upon hundreds of people every year. It is not a magic wand that can ensure my financial and emotional security for the rest of my life. I still have to fight for what I want, and I may or may not get it.
The pressure I am now feeling from within and from without to define my future, to draw a schematic of the next 10 years of my life is driving me further and further away from working out the answer. Driving me straight into planning my move to Rome the moment I graduate. I may not come back. Not even for Question 1.
A week or so back I told my mum I was about to submit my thesis. Her first response was a somewhat tersely delivered “what are you going to do next?”. This was somewhat different from the ‘fantastic, well done’ that I must confess I was hoping for. Ah me. She’s been more positive since then, to be sure, but it was a moment that shall live with me for some time.
So….to avoid the unpleasant questions…When are you getting married?
Jamie – Let me do the honors: Congratulations! That is wonderful, really. Am jealous. I hope you had the chance to celebrate properly and thoroughly. It is funny how we always have to be one step ahead of ourselves, not taking the time to enjoy the accomplishments along the way.
Bora – Ha! [rolling my eyes] I am in no rush. No rush at all (opposite of rush, in fact). Wish I could say the same for my grandmother :)
I am in the same boat as you are (minus having permission to write my thesis). I am really not enjoying the fact that I have to make decisions about my future soon. It is a terrifying thought that at the age of 21 I was allowed to decide to complete a PhD. I am not the same person now as I was then (Thankfully, I would make the same decision again). I’m sure in a few years I will think it was utterly ridiculous that they let someone in their mid-late 20s decide what to do with the rest of their lives. Anyways, the only encouragement I can offer you is you should accept that you can always change your mind later if you end up hating your decision. As for the other people that try to plan your life, do your best to ignore them :) Haven’t people been asking when you would graduate since you were a 3rd or 4th year? haha.
It’s true! They start asking when you’ll be done around 3rd year. My answer was 2 years for about 4 years straight :)
I am trying my best to ignore them. Think I am getting better at it.
It is scary to stand at the edge of the real world and realize that there are no more rules or guidelines – you have to make your own way, your own decisions. I wish us both luck. Can I wish myself luck?