Okay. One more post about college and then I swear I'll (maybe) never write about it again. But I ain't gonna make no promises, yo (This is the title of my upcoming rap album). Prepare for a lot of rambling thoughts and reflections and feelings and subtle undercurrents of denial (because WHAT THE HECK HOW AM I A COLLEGE GRADUATE WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN I FEEL WEIRD).
During my last semester I was in a Graphic Design class. An actual, real design class where we used Adobe programs and made logos and said really long winded, conceptual things that never needed to be said about circles and squares. I find it very interesting that I wound up taking this class in my final semester of college as it's a very narratively perfect bookend to my undergraduate career. I started here, and I ended here.
When I first got to college, all wide-eyed and excited and full of confidence, I decided fairly quickly that I was going to major in Graphic Design. People always told me I would be so good at it, I loved doing creative things, and anything art-related was a big chunk of my list of creative endeavors. When I was little my favorite thing to do was draw. My mom says I would end a marathon session of drawing with hands completely black from the ink of my favorite Crayola markers. Creating things had always made me so happy, so it made sense that I would pursue this path. So I enrolled in the pre-requisite design and drawing classes, and I did really well. My professors told me I was definitely going to get into the program. They gave me grades that reflected that. But, a year after I started and had applied, my application was rejected, and I had to decide between waiting a few months and applying one more time, or choosing a new major and leaving my artistic aspirations behind.
The funny thing about this transition period was that I wasn't really that upset about not getting into the program. All along I think I knew that something was off--I didn't really belong there. Looking back, I think I subconsciously knew I would be an English major all along--I started with an English minor, for goodness sakes--and was just fighting it because I thought the art program would be easier. And it's true—the art classes I took were a lot easier. And I would also have to take two years of a language if I pursued an English degree, and I was a gigantic chicken and thought that it would be too difficult. But, after a lot of thought and experiences happened at once, it was one of the easiest decisions I ever made. I remembered how much I loved writing research papers in high school, even though they took a lot of effort. I remembered how much I loved creative writing activities in elementary school, and a certain story I wrote about a magic carrot. I remembered the day I walked into my English class near the end of my senior year and a school counselor I rarely talked to was walking out and he stopped, looked at me, and said with all seriousness, "You should be an English major," before walking away without another word. I remembered how invigorated and inspired I felt in every English class I'd ever taken. And it was obvious—the English program was where I belonged.
But I kept graphic design as a minor, and had to squeeze the introductory course I would have taken had I originally gotten into the program in my last semester in order to complete it. And honestly, I really loved it. But standing where I am four years after I began my college experience, I can see that even though I enjoy it and am good at it, I wouldn't have fit in there and I wouldn't have been truly happy there. I could still see that something felt off. So I am extremely grateful that I ended up where I needed to be, and had this realization once again at the end of this very fitting, very cohesive plot of this chapter in my life. And what an interesting narrative this college chapter has been.
I find it fascinating that we all create narrative arcs in our own lives. As if our lives are already books, as if WE are books. (And Milton would argue that books contain the essence and life of the person who wrote them--and to destroy a book is as bad as killing a man. But I digress.) We use stories and narrative to shape our disparate experiences into meaning, which is one of the reasons I am so interested in stories and their power to affect people. We are drawn to them because they are how we understand ourselves. And in these past four years of my life, all of the mundane, routine days going to classes and working and reading and completing homework, now, at the end, have formed quite the story. It really has all of the elements of a heroic sort of fairy tale:
A girl, who became a legal adult the day she traveled to a place hundreds of miles away from where she had lived her whole life, found herself in a place where she knew no one. She was a stranger in this foreign place. She struggled and cried. But she realized she was not alone in her feelings, and with the support of newfound friends and family she came into her own. Everything was going well, and she thought she knew which path she should walk down, but then halfway through her time in this place she came to a dead end and wondered where she would go instead. And then one opened up to her view, and she realized a longing to go down this path was within her from the start. Along the way, there were like-minded people on that path who she grew to love. There were great, master teachers who inspired her mind and directed her skills. There were villains who didn't want her to succeed, many frogs, a charming prince, a few dragons blowing fire her way, and a final test in the end that required her to do something far outside of her comfort zone to accomplish what she previously thought was beyond her. And then, before she knew it, she emerged from the maze victorious, ready to search for her next path in life. And with the flip of a page, she began the next chapter.
At least, that's one way to construct the narrative.
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