My So-Called Life: An Update

Yeah, yeah… I know.

I’ve only posted ONCE or TWICE in the last month, but there’s a good reason for that. I have been busy. School has started again (this is my last quarter of my BA), I’m back out in Washington (hopefully for a while), and my uneventful 29th birthday took place (btw, THANK YOU to everyone on Facebook who wished me a happy birthday– you guys are awesome!). Oh, and I might be homeless right before Christmas. Gotta love being broke, eh?

No, I’m serious: there’s a good chance I’ll be homeless after this quarter. I’m absolutely broke, I can’t find a job (everyone where I live works for the state– bad economy = hiring freeze, so there’s PLENTY of other people around here who are desperately trying to find a job), and my parents are too broke themselves to give me a handout (plus they have their own major problems to deal with). So yeah, I’m making a trade-off: I’ll be the first person in my family to have a degree BUT I’ll have nowhere to go until October 2012 when graduate school starts.

Now any reasonable person would ask: “Lisa, why would you go back to school for an extra quarter when you could have graduated in Spring and started graduate school that Fall?” There’s several reasons for this. First, I needed to strengthen my chances of getting some good letters of recommendations for grad school (this includes working with someone I have previous experience with as well as a new teacher who I need to prove myself to), I wanted to take time off so I can get away from the “school thing” (aka- take a break), etc. Basically, being an “untraditional student” means that most likely, one’s education will follow a different path than many of their classmates and in addition, life tends to get in the way of things more than it would if one was fresh out of high school.

If I’m correct, I’ve got 5 weeks left before D-Day (end of Fall quarter), and as the time goes by, the more scared and anxious I get. I’ve been handling things well, I should mention, but I literally just had my first panic attack Saturday night. Hopefully that’s a passing thing, but even if it isn’t, life goes on and so do I…. I just wish I knew where I was going to be and what I was going to do this December.

UPDATE: As I have composed this blog entry a couple of days ago, there’s a few things I want to mention. First, I have applied for a few more jobs, but with no results as of right now. Second, I have started having “secret” panic attacks. I say “secret” because unless I have said anything to someone, they wouldn’t know that inside I was freaking out as on the outside, I seem just fine as I continue to go on with things in a normal fashion. As mentioned above, I had a panic attack last Saturday night in addition to one this morning, but literally, my roommates have no idea because, as I have already said, on the outside I seem just fine (and I am, more or less) and I’m being productive as I normally would be.

Also, I would like to take a second to thank those on Twitter who have asked how I’m doing. I truly appreciate the kind words.