The Tough Question

So when you reach moments in life like this one, you have to ask yourself some tough questions. And sometimes it's hard even to know what those questions should be.

I've worked really hard to get here. I've given up a lot. I knew it was going to be hard. I knew I might be pretty miserable a lot of the time.

I didn't know it was going to be completely miserable all of the time. That I would have no life, no money, no fun. I didn't know that I was going to be spending all of my time studying neurology -- as if wanted to be a neuro surgeon, not a speech language pathologist.

Which brings me to my first tough question: Do I really want to be a speech language pathologist?

But I'm not ready for that question yet. I have to start smaller.

Let's get really simple. Bare bones:

What do you like to do?
Sing. Teach. Learn. Laugh. Run.

What are you good at?
Singing, teaching, learning, and laughing. Running, not so much.

What can you make money doing?
Singing. Teaching. (not much, but probably a living)

OK. Good start.

Now, back to the SLP question. How did this all begin?

I was miserable. Much like I am now. But worse -- soul killing miserable. I was working for attorneys, who worked to keep pharmaceutical drugs from going generic and becoming affordable to people like me. It was a hostile work environment. I didn't make enough money. I didn't enjoy my life because I was always working.

So I decided to run a marathon. I decided to do something that would help people. So I ran with Team in Training and raised a few thousand dollars for leukemia & lymphoma research. That felt good. (Other than the broken foot.)

Met an SLP - talked to me about what SLPs do. Decided I'd be good at it. Decided I wanted to have a career where I could help people. Took me a while, but I managed to come up with a plan. And that's what I did. That's what got me here.

But along the way I discovered Estill, the voice technique that, more than anything else, has changed my life.

Maybe the SLP thing was a way to get back to singing. Maybe that's all it is. And maybe that's why I feel like I'm wasting my time.

Grad School Sucks

No one knows. No one cares. And no one cares that no one knows or cares.

That's the bottom line.

The desks in the windowless room are too small. Painfully small. Hurt. Ouch.

There are roaches in the windlowless room, and now ants too. It's dirty. It never seems to get cleaned.

The teachers don't teach. The grading policies are bizarre. No one seems to care if you're actually learning. The neuro guy claims to, but I think it's all an act, and that really he just get off on torturing us.

I have no life. I have no fun. I'm not learning about anything I'm interested in. I'm not getting what I came for.

I'm about to meet with the head of the department, so I guess these are the things I'm going to tell him. And then we'll see. Maybe I'll quit. Maybe I won't.

Stay tuned...

Waiting to be Wowed

Do I look wowed?

Grad school is hard.

People will warn you about this. But you won't listen. Or you'll listen, but you'll think -- yes, but I'm extraordinarily smart. It'll be a breeze for me.

But listen to me when I tell you this. No matter how smart you are, no matter how many successes you've had in your life, no matter how many tall buildings you've leaped in a single bound...

Grad school is hard.

Last night I went to bed at 9:45 p.m. Not because I was sick. Not because someone else was in the bed and I wanted to cuddle. I went to bed at 9:45 because that was as long as I could hold out. I was just that tired.

This morning I woke up at 5:45, and before I could stop it, my brain started listing the many things it thought I should immediately stress out about. I still had 30 exquisite minutes of sleep before my alarm would go off. But instead I tossed and turned and worried and fretted. Good work brain!

And speaking of the trouble with having a brain, have I mentioned that I'm taking neurology? Here is the joke of the whole thing. I came here to learn about the voice. I came here to study speech language pathology. But of the five classes I'm taking this quarter, the only one in which I'm actually learning anything is -- wait for it -- neurology.

I have no interest in neurology. I mean, OK, that's not quite true. I think it's interesting, but I wouldn't have signed up for it by choice. I've watched documentaries on the brain, because -- let's face it -- it's important. It's always up there -- working away -- doing stuff -- making stuff happen. But I came here to learn about the voice. The rest of my classes are about speech and have to do with voice. Unfortunately, I'm not really learning anything in those classes.

But ask me about the brain -- what do you want to know? Do you want me to name the 12 cranial nerves? Do you want me to explain how the nervous system develops in the embryo? How about explaining the difference between Alzheimer's and Pick's disease? Go ahead -- ask me -- I've got it down.

But you wouldn't know it from my grades. Or anyone's for that matter. The class average in neurology is 68%. Gosh, there's nothing like studying for three days straight only to take an 8 question quiz and get a 72%. It's the best feeling EVER!

That's what I love about grad school so far. It's just one success after another. Don't even get me started on clinic. I love how we're in week five of the first quarter and no one has even bothered to show us around. Or told us about the MA lounge where we could study or sleep or eat lunch -- if we only knew where it was!!!

Did I mention that all of our classes are held in one room? A windowless room. In a basement. We never leave that room. The teachers come to us.

Monday morning, a roach crawled up my leg. There I was in neurology class taking a quiz. And a roach. Crawled. Up. My. Leg.

Neurology quizzes. Windowless rooms. Cockroaches. These are a few of my favorite things.

Do I sound bitter? Angry? Enraged, even? If I do, I suppose it's because I am. This is Ohio State, baby! This is supposed to be a great program. It's supposed to put other programs to shame. It should, considering what it costs. It's supposed to wow me.

I'm still waiting to be wowed.