I have never finished college. I attended a community college with the purpose of becoming an occupational therapist because it looked promising when I was going through the course catalog. Yes, I think I will be one of those even though I don’t know what one of those actually is.
In a role playing exercise in front of the class, I was the therapist dealing with an uncooperative patient and had to use my newly learned skills to get the patient to agree to a therapy session. The patient was another student who either secretly hated me or was pursuing an acting degree. She was good. Me? Not so much. After the exercise the professor pulled me aside and told me that I should think about this course of study as “it might not be suited to you.”
What??????
She did me a huge favor.
I left for a semester and went back to get an associate’s degree in business. I paid for every cent of tuition, every book and every supply until I reached the one year mark in my job for a utility company and could take advantage of their tuition assistance program. Do companies still have those perks? Oh please be so.
My college experience was very different than what my kids have had which is what made me so determined that they would get the chance to go away to school and finish with a bachelor’s degree.
If you were to ask me my one regret in life it would be that I don’t have one of those. I pine for it. Dream of it. Hope that when we finish paying tuition for the kids that it will be my turn.
I read a decorating blog whose author announced last month that she was going back to school for an interior design degree. A few weeks into it she decided it wasn’t for her. As someone who quit a job after a week when I knew it wasn’t a good fit, I get it. What I didn’t get was the number of comments knocking the pursuit of a degree…..almost to the point of mocking.
A few years ago when one of Mark’s students got their PhD. we went to the ceremony. As one of the graduates walked across the stage, a kid in the balcony stood up and shouted, “GO GRANDMA!!!”
That will be me one day and I will weep right there on the stage.