Tea for two, commencement for one
Copyright 2004 Ben S. Pollock
April 10,25, 2004. To a graduating high school senior, whose identity I’m not otherwise revealing.
This is advice about your coming college experience. These comments are not "nice." If anyone disagrees, fine; I could be wrong.
That sentence was written by the nice me. But why tell you this at all if I wasn’t sure that I am 100 percent spot-on correct and just about everyone else is full of it? That’s right, I know I’m right, even when what follows is not entirely consistent. You’ll know what I mean.
All that matters now is getting that bachelor’s degree. It’s not the grades. Really. Nothing is dumber than dropping a class because you want an A and it looks like you’ll get a B, or need a B and you’re getting a C or even a D. Sure, make it up in just one extra semester; maybe maybe not. Sure, make it up with a heavy semester or two of 18-21 credit-hours; maybe maybe not.
Better to finish with the disappointing grade so you can get that degree as soon as possible.
If you want to be a doctor or lawyer then the best grades matter but only a little more. You will find a grad school to take you and your so-so grades if you need that advanced degree to be an engineer, social worker or even a professor. But not even your first job after college will care about grades (that’s a myth), especially if you can sell yourself on other attributes. You’ll get those attributes volunteering and interning, which you’ll have time for with a moderate course load and summers off.
The country today is full of adults who lack 3 or 12 credit-hours from graduating, after 6 or 10 or 20 years. They never have the jobs they could’ve had, and they remind themselves about it every time they pull into the parking lot at work. I know them, and so do you if you think about it. Employers do not care about grades, but they care very much about that degree. Unless you want to pour sodas and grill burgers until Social Security.
College is not vocational, though certain adults pretend that it is. That is, college is only secondarily about job-training. Any job-training you get in class will get you work for only the first few years after graduation until the techniques or fancy software become obsolete.
College really is about finishing what school started: Completing 12th grade just means you have learned how to learn. College then teaches you how to think. Learning how to think (from English, history, science etc.) will give you the flexibility to take you through life with pleasure and satisfaction.
Almost every mistake is reversible. Putting your life back on course may mean anything, from now knowing never to drink beer with Southern Comfort — just a few hours lost — to dating the wrong person. Then it’s some weeks or months gone, but, hey, now you know more about what to avoid the next time, and also what you need to have in a person.
Here is the exception on mistakes: It is not impossible to reclaim the years lost due to a too-early pregnancy; there’s thousands of moms who’ve made wonderful lives, going back to finish their degrees. But the millions of moms who don’t get talked or written about had to refocus their goals to earning enough for rent and child care, dumping the other dreams; that’s sad. More sad because it is preventable through contraception. No matter how saintly the guy is, he always has the ability to walk away, and the girl always is stuck.
Reject no opportunity for growth and for adventure. That means take some courses outside, far outside, what you should be taking. What you don’t know yet might fit you like a glove! As for adventure, college is 49 percent about classes and professors. Fifty-one percent or more of the college experience comprises new friends and their friends and their families and their backgrounds and their wisdom and their habits and their likes and dislikes.
Don’t waste time talking out your problems in great detail. You never feel much better afterward or for long. Writing it out, though, often helps. Don’t let others waste your time by listening to their woes hour after hour; that’s a job for a therapist, or give your pal a notebook.
Go ahead and take risks.
The most unexpected people will be the nicest or most helpful. Slightly mean people sometimes end up being wonderful.
Friendly people very often just want something of yours. You saw that in high school; it goes all the way to the end.
The reasons why people sometimes are hurtful are interesting but meaningless. Who cares if the sniper had a rotten childhood when if you’re shot you’re shot.
Be open. Be aware.
Write out your experiences so you can refer to them later (for your 15th class reunion or just next month). In ink, on a keyboard, doesn’t matter. What matters is logging some paragraphs or just a few phrases at least weekly. It’s for your eyes only; spelling and grammar don’t matter.
You can learn as much from reading (or viewing) fiction as non-fiction. Hell, you learn more.
Don’t be surprised at the loneliness you will feel at college. You will fail sometimes. You will be rejected sometimes. And those occasions, damn it, occur at the worst moments sometimes. You won’t meet — or keep — the right mate until you are comfortable as an independent entity. In other words, don’t depend on anyone to make you happy; it never works that way. Only you can make you happy, and the mate is dessert, to share the joys with and to hold you when you cry. But you’ll still have to cry every once in a while.
Just keep moving.
College, and life afterward, is about more than work and family. Not much more, but don’t forget about hobbies, games and sports. You run and ski? You might like tennis. You like gin rummy; you might love bridge. You like to listen to music? Keep up your piano playing or switch to guitar. The main other sadness I see in people years after they’ve not taken full advantage of the college years (and that’s what this is about), besides not graduating and not graduating promptly, is having no life outside of work besides nightly TV and weekly religion. -30-
