First day of school, and the rest of my life

Denise just posted over at BlogHer about the first day of school, wanting to know who takes pictures of that annual milestone. Now, you know I don't have kids, but last September, I have to admit that I did take a picture on the first day of school: of myself.

It was my first day of graduate school at the University of Maryland, in journalism. I'd failed out of the program as an undergraduate approximately 18 years prior, although I stuck it out and graduated from the university in another major. It never felt right, though, never felt like I'd done what I set out to do there, so I was back to mark this off my list of things that hadn't worked out that I could control (much shorter list, as it turns out, than the other "can't control it" one.)

That is me, standing in front of one of the many statues of Maryland's mascot, Testudo the terrapin (not a turtle. NOT a turtle. Get it right or some asshole in a red and white sweatshirt will bring the beatdown. It won't be me, but that's what I'm supposed to say or they'll revoke my last season of basketball tickets and that is among the joys I discovered this year.)

This is part of the post I wrote about it then.

First day of school below. Dork! (And that's melted mascara combined with exhaustion...and a couple of happy tears that I may or may not admit to. Milestones, man. Gotta love 'em...sometimes.)

I actually tagged this "First day of school" on Flickr, which of course I said was a dorky thing to do, but it was a long-forgotten feeling to be that proud of myself, to have followed through on something that I really wanted to do, that I had an idea would change my life for the better after eight years of knocking around back in Maryland, never satisified, sadly more worried about what the man who'd spent a lot of that time with me was finally, oh God please finally, going to do. And then when he finally did it (something I supported, no matter what it meant for me) I was standing there with hands not entirely empty but holding nothing I wanted, and a head that was so confused I HAD NO IDEA ABOUT ANYTHING AT ALL.

I found photography and I honestly believe that saved my life. Photography and blogs were my anchor, and I moved into a world of words and pictures that increasingly had little to do with my day to day, with a job I liked but where I felt I didn't fit anymore. I had an idea that school could save me, give me the connections and the kick in the ass I needed to make the changes, so somehow in this confusion I filled out applications and did writing samples and got letters of recommendation with no idea what I was going to do about it if I got accepted into either of the two programs I thought would work for me. And then I got into both of them. After a brief consideration of giving into my newfound crush on New York and completely impoverishing myself in Manhattan, I decided to go back to where they kicked me out a long time ago.

It's a year later now, blahblahblah, and I only have the online news bureau to go in the fall and then I'm unbelievably done. I concentrated in online journalism, which I'm still glad I did, even though it's quite clear now that very few people  - including me - really know what that exactly means. I have no idea what I'm doing most of the time, besides defending blogs against the journalistic literati, including a 25 year old who quotes Pound with a very serious face. This is also why you'll often find me wasting my time on Facebook and laughing myself stupid over LOLcats and Top Chef recaps, which are helpful activities in spite of the fact that they deter me from new media domination, because I do not have to put down my wine glass to participate in them.

What I didn't know a year ago was extensive and nearly crippling and could and has filled many blog posts, text messages, Twitter updates, tearful phone conversations, dinners with more wine and late night deadline iChat rants. I have typed literally a million words, I think, deleted almost that many, taken approximately 10,000 pictures, and I just pray that Virginia the MacBook will make it to December (after Woolf, so I'm a lit dork too, yeah.)

I have been straight crazy for most of this year, it must be said. I have gained so much weight, too much for what my body is comfortable with. I have been to Vietnam. I have stood on a stage and read a very personal essay out loud to hundreds of people, which, as it happened, was a pretty big deal in my endless quest to not be crazy and to get used to participating in community where I find it. I have left a devastating but nonetheless seminal relationship behind and in that process been a messy and ridiculous mess of a person. More importantly, perhaps, I have learned not to care what other people think about that...so much, because it's just what happened for me and it's how I felt about it and that's the 5 W's of that. I have gone through the primary season without even a vague picture of what kind of world we'll have in a year and that scares me to death. I have pissed some people off and gotten into some less-than-stellar conversations that may in some quarters mark me as someone who needs her prescription refilled right now this minute. I have blown some important deadlines and been a lazy reporter. I've also gotten a few things right - I like the stuff I write online, for the most part. I've taken some pictures I'm proud of. I got a print magazine assignment that was a personal and professional milestone for me, which was kind of the point of all of this anyway.

I have also lost a grandmother and a dog since that September day, to what Elton John calls the circle of life, but I just call a big fucking hammer that comes at your head when you're the last one standing, when it's you dying of course, and to a lesser degree when you're the one watching it come down. (Yes, death wields a similar, slightly smaller hammer for bystanders. You just get to stay conscious for longer.)

Now they're sending me to the convention in Denver next week and I've started quietly freaking out about that too. I have never been more worn out in my life, but somehow, I have to wring the rag out and keep going. I don't see an endpoint here, which is no doubt a good thing, but damn am I tired a lot. I am a master procrastinator, I can whine, I am really good at getting on my own nerves.

Almost a year later I am older, and a little bit wiser, and certainly, yes, fatter and more recalcitrant. I am less prone to tears than I was this spring, but I'm still sad about the way things have gone in my personal life. I have four months to go til I'm unleashed out of the academic structure again, and I have no idea what I'm going to do. I am completely freaked out and at the same time oddly calm, much like descriptions of people who rob banks. I am still really impatient and occasionally I will call fellow highway drivers very, very bad names.

What I do know now though, as vague and changeable as it is, is what keeps me from completely imploding into myself. I know that no matter how difficult this process is, no matter how hard it has been as a woman in her late 30s to partially chuck a stable career and take on a project that has required emotional, physical and mental work for which I often feel quite ill-prepared, no matter how much I've felt like this was the worst and most incredibly stupid idea to ever be put into motion, I have never, not once, thought it was the wrong thing to do.

Never. And you'd have to be me or someone very close to me to know just how monumental that is. I think most decisions are wrong at some point. I analyze everything on a level that few normal people can withstand. I doubt and worry and ponder until my neurons are audible in their efforts to bail out of my brain for higher ground. I feel responsible for everything. Rest assured, if I know you, if we've had even one innocuous or perhaps awkward conversation, I felt responsible for how it went, or for your feelings, or for your need to get a cup of coffee or your next life decision. I believe, incorrectly, that I am in charge of the outcome for the world at large so I'd better get my shit together.   

This time I actually accomplished that in some small way. It was all for me, and it wasn't and still is not totally popular, and I did it anyway. So thank you, first day of school, 2007, which just like every day, but particularly that one, was the first day of the rest of my life. I'm sure I'll take a picture of the last first one, in a couple of weeks, which may or may not include Testudo. Or Kermit. 

(Jim Henson is my favorite fellow Maryland graduate, and this statue of him and Kermit is outside of the student union.)

Comments

[Denise]

Awesome, Laurie. Just awesome. :-)
Sending this to a couple of people who I think will understand and relate.

[gwendomama]

http://gwendomama.blogspot.com/2008/08/awards-links-speshulness.html

AWARDS TIME!!!

[joanna]

So Kermit's a Terp? Works for me.