Doctor Depresso; that's how I've been feeling lately.
What with the being in the 3rd year of law school, and the "oh no job yet!", and the "oh this person got that internship that you applied for!", coupled with the "finals around the corner, batten yourself down in that study cave (sunlightless apartment), no time for friends/fun/normal experiences!", and the back of your mind is "Bar! Bar! Bar! Debt! Debt! Debt! Get a job!!!!" you could see how this side might make an appearance from time to time.
However, during my pre-study internet procrastination I came across this tidbit of advice from Polly Ester over at The Awl. And while it is directed at someone whose grandmother is paying for their education, it made me feel a lot better. So I'm posting it here:
"But look, the three people I know who are the happiest with their careers are the three people with the most years of education. My sister (a surgeon), my friend Steve (another doctor) and my husband (a professor). I love being a writer and I can't imagine doing anything else, but after 15 years of writing professionally, I still feel like I'm just starting out in my field every morning. My husband, on the other hand, has tenure, a pension, administrators who do shit for him, and speaking gigs across the seven seas. He's basically treated like royalty (when he's not at home, that is). My sister is somewhere above royalty. She belongs in Bespin City with Lando Calrissian, among the clouds. Compared to them, I'm like some dirty peasant woman, mucking about in the mud in a Monty Python sketch.
Remember how I told the girl with the trust fund that she should save her money and enjoy it when she's middle-aged? Graduate degrees are like that. Status seems like a ridiculous thing when you're young—and it is, of course. But being treated like a child when you're 42 years old isn't all that fun either. That's what happens to people who have no discernible career status—they're demeaned, like small children. Fine if you're young and hot and still look good sneering in your biker boots, not quite as good when you're pissed off and exhausted and your knees ache.
When you're young, you always hear potential grad students and med students lamenting how long they'll be making next to nothing, or working their asses off in med school. But then when you're just a tiny bit older (32?), it's the people with the flat-lining careers who are saying, "Fuck, I could've had an MD or a PhD or an MFA by now, like my fucking royal friends over there, eating their roasted pheasants and holding forth to fawning servile youth and such."
That said, my husband (sound the trumpets!) says that people who apply to and enter PhD programs without knowing why they're doing it are not only severely annoying to him personally (sound the trumpets!), but they tend to reach a point in their studies (while writing their dissertations, perchance?) where they have to know why the fuck they're working so hard. If they don't have an answer to that, they end up quitting."
In other news, I just did my nails, and they are an amazing neon green with pentagram decals on the ring fingers. So that's one benefit of finals time, I can freely wear both obnoxiously bright and occult nails without giving a shit about work.
