Like many college students today, when I am asked my major I give a ridiculously long answer. “Why hello Aunt I see once a year…yes, college is going well…oh…oh my major? Well *deep breath* I am a…Technology Student in Information and Logistics, specializing in Digital Media with an emphasis in Motion Media and eCommerce, with an entrepreneurial certificate in Business and another in Technology….at the University of Houston” Doing a second emphasis is the same amount of work as doing a Minor I explain to, well, nearly everyone. This, plus the certificates, means I will do 2 Junior years. Currently, I am in my first Junior year.
A not so subtle shift has begun to happen, marked in this Spring semester as a shift in moods, anxiety, headaches and an unhealthy level of caffeine to blood ratio. In every class at the beginning of this semester we have had guest speakers. From counselors to career advisors my classes have been bombarded with a word. That word that seems so innocent but a word for those of us who are paying attention fear the most, a word that would hide in plain sight for years and then slap us across the face when we are least suspecting, a word that haunts many of us from a young age…. MORE! They want more; more clubs, more volunteer hours, more extra classes, more languages, more internships, more job interview training sessions, more skills. More is all I have heard from Professors and guest lecturers for the past few weeks. “We expect, no, we demand more.”
The word more is spinning in my head as I stumble out of the 3-hour lab on the psychology of design. As I make my way to my little white VW Passat and pull out my iPhone (in what feels like a week at the least) to text my friend about how ridiculous our program has become and how my list of things to do just went from loaded to massive. I sit and cry because I have anxiety and I don’t want to wake up to a panic attack at 2 in the morning. So instead I cry, and I sit for a minute, I breathe, and open Facebook only to find that my timeline has exploded. Articles, pictures, hateful comments, memes, and blame thrown in every direction.
And one picture.
One photo in one picture group on my timeline hits me right in my heart. My whole World stops in that moment and I am suddenly changed. There in all of this political chaos is a picture of a father crying as he holds his daughter and 2 of his 3 sons. Behind him looking dirty and tired are people unloading from a raft sitting on dark water. The father though, it’s his face that causes me to sit and once again begin to cry. I imagine the strength he had to pull his wife and children from the destruction in Syria and put them on a raft. I imagine his fear in the night, his fear about what they would eat, where they would sleep, if they would even make it alive and together. I imagine what it must feel like to sit with your whole World in the dark waters as wave after wave crashes into your raft. I imagine him making it to that shore and finally breaking as a camera swings up to capture the moment I am now seeing half a World away…in my VW Passat…on my iPhone…as I leave college.
I cry again, but not for me this time. I cry for him. I cry because I feel as though I have no power, no money, no influence to change what has happened to this family. I cry because I don’t know the answer to many very complicated questions. Legitimate questions of hate, fear, love, safety, compassion, and hope, questions of right and wrong. All I see is his pain. I don’t feel political in that moment. I feel human. I vow to myself to raise my voice for this family…to DO MORE. Suddenly, I see my own “more” as something entirely different. I see the privilege of my more. I see my stress, my anxiety, and my pressure and I welcome it. I raise my head, wipe my eyes, and drive away with the word more in my head once again.
