Happy Valentine's Day
So tomarrow/today I meet with someone to talk about my chances of graduate school. Its strange that so much can ride on a casual meeting. This isn't part of the interview phase or anything like that; just a meeting to see what my chances are and what I can do to increase them. It would be far too easy for me, a B average student to bitch about the exclusivist nature of higher education. All of my stresses and troubles concerning its availability are of my own making. I am perfectly reconciled to this. What scares me is that tomarrow I am going to be judged with nothing but a paper grade and a short introduction to represent me, my future and my options. This scares me because I do not look exceptionally good on paper (and in person I'm not sure exceptional is the word... not 'wolf ugly' or anything but not EXCEPTIONAL) That got me to thinking about how I will be remembered. In the end, once everyone you knew has passed away, all that is going to be left is essentially 'paper' (electronic counts too). What can you leave that is meaningful on paper? (There is no guarantee of decendants at this point and besides that's really very little of your own doing so we're going to call that a mute point) Granted, a GPA and decent credit score will bode well for you but what meaningful papers are there? Does one have to be privy to a constitution or a founding of some sort to make a mark?
Today, we are supposed to remember Saint Valentine but how many people know what he did? (If you're interested, he tried to convert the emporor Claudius to christianity, fell in love with the jailor's daughter and through his faith and love cured her of blindness. Before his execution he wrote her a letter signed 'your Valentine') This man is a saint. Even if one doesn't believe in these things, it is arguably a difficult status to achieve. Even if we are not remembered personally, is any part of our daily life going to be meaningful to future generations? Just as I don't like to think of my GPA as indicitive of my potential, are our daily activities going to reflect our capability? I keep telling myself that on the whole, whether or not I earn my doctorate will have very little effect on the future of mankind so it is really not that big of a deal, I don't want to generalize this to all of our existence. So at what point do things begin to matter? If it is now, then I am nervous. Happy Valentine's Day <3 Katie
posted by Pookie | 11:09 PM
1 Comments:
Well you're kind of a downer today aren't you? A bit nervous is understandable though, since even though this meeting doesn't really affect your chances of getting into UNC or anywhere else, you are meeting someone who could influence that slightly. I think that you will do just fine though and you really don't have much to worry about. I bet they are pretty short on people with as much passion for what you want to do as you; let alone someone who is not crazy themselves. (You should blog about that one.)
And as far as what you leave behind... on paper you've got records of everywhere you ever graduated from (and the "graduated" part is the only part that matters) at a minimum. You're going to have your name on at lease a few research projects while you're still at CSU.
But I really don't think that matters much. No matter what letters are after your name (mine might say LEED AP after it soon), what matters is what you do here and how you treat those around you. Even if they don't remember when they're 80 or your name isn't a household word or in 27 books. And in that department, I think you are doing very well and you will have a long time to keep doing it.
So chill.
And Happy Valentine's Day. :o)
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