The Remodeled Blog

I don’t miss school

Since I have started school a lot of people have expressed their longing to be back in school. I have decided that this is a misappropriated emotion. You don’t miss school. What you miss is the time of your life that included school. You miss the intellectual stimulation of class, and living in a dorm, and being surrounded by other students, and not having to worry about money or a job. I know this is simplistic and I am sure that some of you are saying, I had to work, I had to worry about money.  But it isn’t the same as now is it?  You didn’t work like you do now. You didn’t have bills or responsibilities like you do now. You got to devote all of your time, energy and resources (varied and/or limited as they might have been) to you and your intellectual and social pursuits.  The people who surrounded you were interested in having a good time and entertaining odd and often esoteric intellectual discussions that did not include mundane things like car insurance. Yes car insurance existed..but not like now. Now it is different. Now is the real world.  Now is being an adult, even if you still don’t feel like one. Now is political discussion that really do apply to how you live your life rather than how you idealize your world.

Going back to school now is not the same. Unfortunately you cannot get rid of “now.” It’s already out there. Once you stick your toe in those waters, you cannot pull it back out. Now school is work, and money, and financial aid and student loans, and a full time job, and a house, a mortgage, car payments, insurance, electric, gas, water, mow the lawn, take out the trash, sweep the floor, do the laundry, balance the budget, talk on the phone to all the people you don’t have time or energy to talk to, make dinner, pay your taxes, fill out your taxes, write your resume, work on your career….oh yeah, did I mention study.  The enjoyment of hedonistic intellectualism is lost in the myriad of stuff. Stuff that exists now, but didn’t exist then. At least not in the same way.

So no, you don’t miss school. You miss the entire experience.

…and yes, classes have started back up. To say that I am dragging my feet would be a metaphoracle decription or general reluctance and a lot of whining. But I am actually working ahead so that way I feel like is getting done sooner.  Don’t ask me to explain my logic, it is all how I perceive the world.  This is my last year. I wish it could be done without having to do the work. But no such luck.  So I am remembering exactly how I don’t miss school and kind of wishing that I could still be naive enough to think that I did.

Final Stretch

It has been hard to write lately. Ok, that is not entirely accurate. I have not really had any interest in writing because I don’t really have anything interesting to say.

I am in the final stretch of school. No I don’t mean finals. I take one class every 6 weeks, though we do have semesters and summer breaks. This semester I have taken 2 classes and am finishing my third. I have one more week before finals, though I have already had 2 finals early this semester. I am in the final stretch before summer break.

Even though I am not cramming for finals like traditional students, I am feeling that itch of dissatisfaction and a desire to have a life beyond a book. I appreciate this class as the last class of the semester because it is not as horrendously brutal as my other 2 classes. I guess out of 3 classes, they need one that didn’t make me want to kill myself or someone else. I say that metaphorically of course. Though I have built up a supply of poppits in rough effigy of my professors.

I am working hard at school, though it feels as though I am more of a sprinter rather than a cross country runner. I push hard for a while and then collapse while waiting for the next yard to sprint. This is getting worse as the class comes to a close. I am complacent in my responsibility. I don’t accept it begrudgingly. I accept is flatly. I have to do this so I will. But the enthusiasm was lost in the fall.

To say it has been a hard first year at school is to put it mildly. There were many things that happened that I could not have accounted for. There were some choices that I made, that had I known now blah blah blah…I would have made differently. I accept that. I was frustrated. Now I accept that in the 5 stages of mourning kind of way. I am not depressed about it. It is what it is. It is time to take my own advice, if you can’t change it accept it. Well, acceptance doesn’t have to be joyous. I am hoping next year will be better. I know it will. And, this year is almost done. I have one more week of class and then finals and then a vacation which I need more than a nun needs a good lay.

Not Rolling with It

So lately I have come to realize that, in fact, I am not rolling with it. I am not going with the flow. I am a rock, and not in a zen buddhist way. I am not a little rock in a little zen garden with happy tranquil rake patterns around me. I am an angry little rock, with a painted on frown, that is pissed about the water crashing on to it. Yeah, this sh*t is not rolling off right now. That is the easiest way to say it. What I could normally just let roll off me, take in stride, be a team player, put up the good fight, put on a brave face…pick the cliche, but it isnt working.

I need a vacation.

Work. School. Work. School.

A friend of mine from work offered an observation that I think it quite apropos. She suggested that maybe since Dave will be graduating a semester earlier than originally anticipated (which means the same time as me) that I am actually freaking out about this. I know I have been joking about that, but this may be more real of an issue than I thought. Maybe I am struggling with school as a way to rebel against the pressure of graduating. Yes, this is self defeating behavior, and sounds insane, but it doesn’t mean it isn’t true.

I can’t answer the questions: What are you going to do after graduating? What is Dave going to do? Are you going to stay at your current job? where will/would you go? what do you want to do? will the house be ready? are you ready to sell the house? will you be ready by the time you graduate? what about getting married? what about babies? You always said you would do that when you finished school…countdown has started.

Here is my answer. I don’t know.

Now stop asking.

My mom, who is very perceptive, is treating me to a day at the spa. So on Saturday I am getting a massage, a facial and 30 minutes in the hot tub. This will be good. I need to unwind.

I should say that again, I need to unwind.

The Final is Finally Fini

About an hour ago I finished my final for Operational Management. Finally it is done! Brutal!

This entire class has been brutal. I was hoping for a nice change of pace after statistics finished last semester. The first week into the class, I was feeling ok. But as we dove into week 2 I realized…hey this is statistics light! WTF??? I started having significantly less fun. Not because of the realization, but because of the topic. Lets just say that statistics and I aren’t really friends.

So I trudged through the material. Of course the most frustrating part of this class was that I got it! I understood it. I understood the formulas and the graphs and the theories. I got it….but you would not know that from my grades. All my quiz scores made it look like I was a remedial student. Which, if you have read this blog you will know about my Adventures in Hypnotherapy to help deal with my little testing problem. I would say that the hypnotherapy was successful. I did not get hypnotized and start getting straight A’s, but I did start doing better. Ok, I only had one more quiz after my hypno session, but I did much better on that!

As for my final, it was satisfactory. But I was jubilant because not only am I done with the horrid class but I believe I have secured myself a B in the class! Yay me!!!!

I now move on to Managerial Economics. I hope this is a little better than statistics. I have a week off and then back to the books. The one good thing about having 1 class every 6 weeks, is that the bad ones don’t last too long and you really get to feel like you are flying through the program! I am now 33% done with the program! WOOO!!!!

A phrase that was prevalent at Smith, when I was an undergrad, has been on a loop inside my head:

“Done is better than good.”

For most people, they don’t understand that. Basically what it means, is sometimes no matter what you do, it will never be perfect. Sometimes, with the time you have, the tools available to you, and the obstacles that you have had to overcome, you have to accept that there is a point when you just have to say, this is as good as it gets. But not only do you have to say this, you have to accept it and be satisfied with that. Sometimes we just have to push through and let go.

You know, getting an MBA as a full time student and working full time is not as easy as it looks!  Though, maybe I am not making it look very easy.  Hmm, a quandry.

The Frustration of Ignorance

I have been working on my school work. I read the material and thought, hey, I am getting this. Then I tried to do the math. Let me answer the first question, no I do not have a problem with math. I did well in calculus. Hell, I liked trig. But I am doing statistical math in my Operations Management class. I F-ing HATE IT!!!! I HATE STATISTICS!!! IF I WANTED TO BE A F-ING STATISTICIAN I WOULD HAVE MAJORED IN STATISTICS. F!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I am fighting with this F-ING math and my numbers make no sense. I look at what my team mates have done, and theirs make more sense. I still cant see how they get there. Breaking down their formulas in excel, I see what they did. I dont get why. WHY? Why do their forumulas not seem to match what is in the book? But they match with each other, so WHAT ARE THEY DOING?????

I am so frustrated. I just want to throw my computer across the room, scream and break into tears. It is frustration that bubbles up from within you. I DON’T UNDERSTAND!! and I don’t understand why I don’t understand. This is the part that makes you want to rip your face off. I hate it! I HATE IT!

I have always had a huge problem with not “getting it.” Maybe this is why I went to Smith College and have become a plethora of useless information. I had a need to understand. I actually get angry when I don’t. It makes me feel incapable and stupid. The ignorance is like being trapped inside a sound proof glass box. You can scream if you want, but it doesnt matter. All that you have is this visceral, tangible, physical anger in your own impotence.

I hate feeling incapable.

I am sure I will figure this out tomorrow.