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Contradictions and college students are about as hard a combo to find as ramen in a cheap Mexican grocery store. I’m sure you all run into a lot of the same dilemmas I do while struggling through the last few semesters for that diploma:
“Do I graduate on time…or actually care about my major?”
“Do I work extra hours to pay tuition…or show up for class?”
“Do I work on my skills…or do homework?”
It almost seems like school keeps me from learning the things I want to do for the rest of my life. Weird, right? I mean, between grocery-shopping, cruising the Blue Line and panicking whenever SafeAssign decides not to recognize my Word docs; not to mention juggling a part-time job and trying to make it to the gym once in a while, I just don’t have the time to work on the things I’m passionate about. Who knew that learning could get in the way of…well, learning!
But maybe it’s just me. All I know is, I’m not planning to always live on those four chicken-and-cardboard noodles for a dollar, or get stuck in a 9-5 and still miss out on the life I’d put on hold until after graduation. What about my trip to India or learning to ride a motorcycle? What about random free-form poetry in a hole-in-the-wall hipster coffee shop or people-watching at the ‘face fountain’?
My point is, maybe it isn’t the end of the world if you don’t graduate summa cum laude. Believe me, the hours I spend sweating about raising my GPA by a couple of micro-points is probably about equal to my part-time job. It’s disgusting. Haven’t we been told time and time again that no one in this economy cares about grades? Ok, that may not be strictly true, but we all know that it’s experience and the determination to keep going that gets you anywhere in the real world. Why not put that effort into something you can actually keep awake for?
So by all means, stock up on the ramen, it’ll get you where you need to go. Just don’t forget to switch it up once in a while.
Sushi, anyone?
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