So I just got back from driving a total of about 8 hours today along urban freeways in order to achieve what is either a selfless act of responsible parenting or a bourgeois indulgence flaunting the access and privilege of an already over-indulged generation: the high-school senior college campus tour.
Given that it was to a school that includes freshman dormitories with ocean views, I'm inclined to incline toward the latter.
I mean, I took a whole day of fully paid leave off from the secure job I've held for almost a decade to personally drive my kid about 320 miles (round trip) in weekday traffic, directly through the heart of Los Angeles en route, America's second largest city by population, but always first in the hearts of those who would willingly murder another human for improper use of their turn signals. It seemed like it was a right and important thing to do. But then of course attaching a moral component to it automatically implies judgement and failure for those who can't or won't do the same. My mother certainly never did anything like this for me, but in fairness, I finished high school with the type of GPA that suggested less higher education and more a career as a pickpocket in Fagin's gang. College visits would have served little point beyond maybe identifying some decent marks.
This was the third visit for my nearly-college-aged manboy of an oldest son. He's 17 and due to start his senior year of high school this coming week. One of them involved an airplane flight out of state. The long-term smart parenting tack is to remain as impartial as possible so as to not attempt to influence his choice, which of course I could only do in negative terms. There's no way "I think you should go to [School X]" would result in anything other than him realizing pressure suddenly to feel one way or another about it. But seriously, one of them I paid for airfare. We're fucking preferring that one and that's final.
But well, of course, at the moment his first choice is the one on the beach and where (I swear I am not making this up) the campus tour guide was sure to mention the free professional masseuses employed several times a year on campus. What is a father supposed to do in the face of that kind of an unassailable sales pitch? Offer not to pay for it if he doesn't go where I want? Well, the public knowledge of my inability to actually pay for any of it cuts the legs right out from that leverage point anyway. I'm starting to think my former policy of responding to every attempted discussion of anything college related with an arm-waving, full-volume screeching of "AND WHO'S SUPPOSED TO PAY FOR ALL THAT?!" might have been overplaying my position.
In fairness to myself, it is 2016. I finished by undergraduate degree at a state-run public school as a transfer student from community college--so really only 2.5 years total time in the full university--in 1997 and I am still to this day paying off student loans. So my own child's tuition payment starting to overlap mine seems a little obscene. But so far my long-term strategy to deal with this--namely marrying and procreating with a person who had enough sense to get a degree in something more practical than 16th century political and social history in Wales*--seems to be paying off. My backup plan is to vote for a lady president. That one seemed like more of a longshot just a few weeks ago, but I have to say, I'm feeling better about it all the time.
---
*I understand this is not helpful as the example implies a list that includes ALL OTHER DEGREES.
Thursday, August 4, 2016
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
2 comments:
I dunno, I got a degree in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, with a focus on the Armenian language, and wrote a thesis about the cultural implications of the creation of the Armenian alphabet in the year 301. I'm pretty sure that's at least on par in terms of practicality with your degree on the 16th century political and social history in Wales....
With respect, I think we can, as humanities-educated adult American people, agree that yours is objectively way, way worse. Like, five to seven times more limiting from any metric for practicality. There's no way your parents didn't look at what you were studying as anything other than either an act of pure defiance or blatant self-sabotage.
I think what pulls me ahead, though, is the way I then retreated from the work force for almost nine years immediately after achieving my worthless degree. I mean, you can pick a crazy, specific-to-the-point-of-incomprehensible area of focus, but I put in the YEARS to make myself as unmarketable as possible on top of that. Your effort is not to be discounted, though. It was a valiant one.
Post a Comment