Two weeks ago at Parents’ Weekend my mom hit me with this gem: she told me, “I feel sad for you, Megan. You only have two and a half more years before you’re thrown into the cold, hard world.” Gee, thanks mom. As depressing as that statement is, it’s true. She followed it up by saying, “Unless you go to grad school, you’re gonna have to start working a nine to five job, and all the fun of college will be over.” Her words hit me like a punch in the gut. They were hard to hear, mostly because she was right. Time flies. I’m about to turn twenty and yet I still feel like I’m seventeen. There’s no way that I’ve been in college for almost a year and a half now. In my mind I still have all the time in the world to figure out my life, but in reality the real world is hurtling toward me with rapid speed.
It’s now Fall Break. We’re halfway through the semester. That’s some pretty crazy stuff. Soon it’ll be time to register for classes for next semester. I’ll have to declare a major, maybe apply for a study abroad trip, research internships and jobs and start acquiring skills that might actually be helpful in a work setting other than the ability to quote any movie at the drop of a hat.
The harsh reality is this: we only have four years in college. When you’re in high school that seems like an eternity but in college it’s a few mere moments. Blink, and it’s gone. In my near year and a half in college I’ve come to notice that students spend far too much time wrapped up in what major to choose and what job would be the most practical. It’s kind of sad, really. As a kid we have so many dreams, there are such high hopes for the future. Passion is infused in everything we do. As we get older that fire ebbs away, so by the time we’re in college our aspirations have shrunk. We choose the major that will lead to a sensible job, something that will pay well so that we can save up and retire comfortably. In essence, we’re already planning for our retirement at the age of 21, and that’s incredibly depressing.
Why do we choose practicality over passion? Why do we settle for mind-numbing jobs, always looking ahead to old age and seeing the middle portion of our lives as simply a means to get to a better future? If I’m going to be stuck working a nine to five job for the next forty or fifty years of my life, then by gum I better like it. I refuse to look upon graduation as the Day the Fun Dies, to put a twist on the American Pie song. Find your passion. Seek out something that truly matters to you, something that will make you want to put effort into it. Something that you won’t constitute as “work.” Do that and then maybe graduation won’t seem like an ending; it’ll be a beginning.