That wasn't funny, dad. I understand you were just making a joke, but it wasn't funny. Don't you realize that any college education for your daughter is going to be a waste of your money?
What would I do with a liberal arts education? What use is an English degree? What niche will I fill in this blasted economy? What job can I possibly get with my paltry, nonexistant work skills?
You and mom both call me a writer. Writers fail high school. Writers have no money. Writers live in hovels. Writers starve. Writers become alcoholics. Writers die in lonely misery, cursing the world. I wouldn't have minded a life like that, really. I could have been okay sinking into the background, becoming another useless member of society and then fading away. Woulda sucked, but it would have been okay.
It's not anymore. Someone depends on me. I've got a future, now I have to live up to it. And I know I can't.
Good students make bad citizens once they leave the happy academic bubble of utopia where parents foot the bill and world issues seem so important and the greatest crisis imaginable is failing a class. There's no air outside that bubble. Past graduation, life ends.
Wow, life sucks when you're looking at colleges.
5 comments:
Well that's certainly a pessimistic way of looking at things.
The plan is to go to college where my parents foot some of the bills (namely tuition, room and board, etc.) and I foot others, then go to graduate school where I pay for myself. By that time I should have built up a good enough resume' and or connections to find some sort of job in whatever field I may choose to go after.
I agree these "liberal arts degrees" are generally seen as lower than others (and I guess I'd have to agree), but a degree of any sort speaks of intelligence and effort. It's nice to have on a resume.
Don't worry, you'll find out which cog you can behind to fit into the machine that is this world.
You truly are a writer.
and a poor writer at that... How you've come to all these conclusions without any life experience is amazing. My uncle has an English degree and it got him a job at NASA. In fact, I know many employed happy folks with a degree in English. There is nothing wrong with a liberal arts degree but if you don't want it drop out and sane your parents the $$. Then you can see what the world is really like, regret it and whine some more.
My friends' dad is the VP of purchasing for Golden Corral. He does math, spreadsheets, PR, conventions/speaking, et cetera.
He has an English degree.
I agree, your major in college has nothing to do with your career.
I'm sorry, that angst was meant to be self-directed. I didn't mean to implicate other people; the things about which I worried were for me specifically. Other people will do fine in the world, I'm not trying to dis the college-bound as illusioned, immature idiots. Only myself.
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