Since my junior year of high school, I have been asked a series of questions that all pertain to college.
Where are you going to school? Have you picked a major yet? You do know that that career won't get you a ton of money, right? Been awarded any scholarships yet?
The questions terrified me, as I'm sure they terrify tons of other 16 and 17-year-olds who are having to decide on the path that will lead them through the rest of their life.
Around the time all of these questions started getting asked, I had decided what I wanted to do with my life, and I was really excited about it. But then I found out that my dream school did not have my major. (Texas A&M, get your act together and start a school for speech pathology.) I was still feeling good about the major part, but I had to pick a school now. And it wasn't like I could avoid answering those questions. My family, my teachers, my counselor, my coworkers; everyone was expecting an answer. I thought it would end once I got to college. I thought the constant questions would stop. But a whole new set of questions started.
How's school going? Honestly, it just depends on when you ask me this. If its at the beginning of the semester, I'm probably doing great. If you ask me at Thanksgiving dinner, I could start crying because finals start two weeks after this and I know absolutely nothing.
Making A's in all of your classes? Probably not. Physics is hard.
Are you sure you really want to be a speech pathologist? YES. You will not talk to me out of it, so just let me live my education-salary-but-i-love-kids life.
Been on any dates lately? I live in the library and the human services building, and that's not a place to meet guys, so no.
Still don't have any scholarships? I am aware that I still lack free money. Trust me. I don't want to think about it until it's time for the next scholarship application sign-up.
I get asked these questions on a daily basis. I don't know why answering them daily stresses me out so much, as I should probably just have a generic answer by now. But I don't. And I assume that most other college students don't have generic answers either. So while I would love it if all the adults in my life stopped asking some of the most difficult questions I have to answer, I know they ask because they want to know how I am doing. Even if I don't always respond honestly.
