Today's just been another one of those days that I really wanted to write something. I don't know why, it's been a typical day filled with classes and trying to keep Allie fro jumping on the furniture. You can also toss in a few instances of trying to decide whether I want to mix up the lasagna to go in the crock pot for supper, or if I just wanna finish off the chips and homemade salsa in the fridge instead.
So as I sit here trying to think of something I could write about, my mind drifts a little and I have this thought. If I'd had this many instances of having such a strong desire to write something, I probably would have been much better about writing stories previous to the week they were due back when I was a Creative Writing major. So I decided to talk about that for a while, not so much the insane procrastination that went into pretty much every short story and poem I had to write for my Creative Writing classes, but just my time as a Creative Writing major in general.
Side Note: I must remember to post some of these stories I wrote, and especially my ridiculous sloth poem which is so horrible that I love it. But that's for another blog, which may or may not be posted right after this one is finished. Keep checking.
There was never a time that I enjoyed school. Before Pre-K even started, I asked my mom for a pair of roller skates so I could fall and break my neck and not have to go to school. After she told me I'd still have to go, they'd just prop me up in my wheelchair in the corner, I decided it wasn't worth it. Fast forward to Senior year of high school and I was the kid who took the school calendar and student planner we were given and kept a daily count of how many days were left until graduation. Everyone always told me I'd miss high school, well guys, it'll be 6 years this May and guess what, if Ed McMahon rang my doorbell at this very instant and offered me one of the infamous great big checks with the only condition being that I had to go back in time and do high school all over again, I'd have to give him a Root Beer and bowl of homemade salsa and send him on his merry way.
I don't know why I hated school so much. I got good grades, I had great friends, I really just couldn't care less about learning stuff that I knew deep down (and have been proven right so far) that I'd never actually need to use. I knew the only way I'd ever have to use physics in a career would be if I were to become a physicist, and guess what, I was terrible at math, so crossed that idea off my list of possible careers a long time ago.
I say that to say this, I LOVE COLLEGE. I don't know why really, but it's so much better than high school. Probably because even on my longest days I'm not stuck in a classroom for 8 hours, and there's also a chance that I'll probably use a lot of this stuff I'm learning later on in life.
Because I love college so much, I hate the fact that I only have 3 semesters left before I graduate. I don't want to get into the real-world. I've been there, I hated it, and that's why I'm back in college. Yes folks, the real-world is for the birds. I also don't like birds, so this saying was even more appropriate than I initially realized. I was laying awake contemplating this one Saturday night not long before the start of last semester (the idea of graduating soon, not the whole bird analogy).
As is becoming pretty common in these things, lets pause for a moment. For you to better understand the following events, I need to give you a better idea of myself. I used to joke about having Insomnia, but the older I get the more I realize that I probably actually do have some sort of sleep disorder. In fact, after learning more about its signs and symptoms, I'm pretty sure that I've gone through at least half of my life sleep deprived. My sleep schedule often ranges anywhere from being close to that of an 80 year-old where I'll go to bed at 9 and get up at dawn. Or closer to that of a raccoon in which I go to bed at dawn and sleep until dusk. Thankfully, Allie has kept me on a pretty normal sleep schedule since I actually have to get up at a reasonable hour to take care of her every day. In fact, the latest I've slept in the last two-and-a-half weeks has been 12:30 and that's insane for me.
Anyway, strange things seem to happen when I can't sleep. They usually fall into one of two categories, online shopping, or contemplating major life decisions. Seriously, most of my ebay-ing is done on nights when I can't seem to fall asleep. I've bought a Carhartt, iPod, and numerous video games on nights when I either can't fall asleep, or wake up in the middle of the night and can't fall back to sleep. But on this night in particular fell in the "contemplating major life decisions" category.
You see, even though I hated school with every fiber of my being, I've always loved to write. I was always the nerdy kid in class that looked forward to writing essays. Because of that, when I decided to go back to college I knew I wanted to major in something that dealt with writing. Well as soon as I found out SFA had a Creative Writing program I was convinced that I'd found my calling.
When you major in Creative Writing, there's one question that you'll get from pretty much everyone you tell, "what are you going to do with that?" Well, the answer I gave everyone was that from what I'd read, you could do with a Creative Writing degree basically everything that you could do with a degree in Journalism (on the written side of the field anyway), so I figured I'd work for a newspaper or something. On that sleepless night I began to think of just how close I was getting to graduation and what on earth WAS I going to do after finishing school? Did I REALLY see myself working for a newspaper, or was that just something I told people so they wouldn't think I had these grand delusions of becoming some world-renowned author and planned to live in a cabin in the woods and write all day, learning how to hunt and trap wild game to eat and weave the furs into clothing since I wouldn't actually be making any money to afford the finer things in life like food and clothing?
I eventually came to the conclusion that even though I loved my major, the professors, and all the people I'd met through the program, that I needed to get a degree that might could actually get me a job after I graduate. So then came the task of figuring out what this degree would be. Other than writing, I realized there was really only one other thing that I enjoyed that could potentially work as a life-sustaining career. I decided I was going to become a professional video game player and make millions of dollars by playing Halo. Ok, unfortunately that's not true, but how awesome would that be? No, I decided that I should do something that dealt with computers. I figured that was a pretty safe bet since everything is computerized now-a-days, so surely those jobs would be in demand. My first thought was Computer Science, so I hopped on the SFA website and started looking at what was involved in that major. I saw that I'd have to take 4 more math classes and 3 more science classes and quickly determined that Computer Science wasn't for me. So I checked into IT (Information Technology) and saw that I'd pretty much be taking the same classes as I would with Computer Science, but thankfully without the extra maths and sciences. I was sold.
So that's how I went from a Creative Writing major to an IT major. I really only regret it when I have a program to write. I'm still not sure what I actually want to do as a career, but I have determine that programming ain't it, because it's hard. It definitely makes me miss the days when my homework was to write a story. It is a welcomed change to hear your professors tell you how many job opportunities will be waiting for you once you graduate, rather than how you're gonna have to find somehting else to do for a job because you're not going to make any money writing though, so I guess I'll stick with it.
Until next time, stay awesome.
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