What a decade can do
I got together for coffee with two old friends from high school the other day. I have seen them since high school here and there, but hadn't sat down to chat in a while with either of them.
Perhaps one of my happiest days in university was when I discovered that I didn't have to do a thesis as part of my four-year bachelor degree. I realize this makes me seem like a commitment-phobe. Or indecisive at least. At the time it also made me feel, just..."less" somehow, but I stayed the course and remained thesis-free.
Well one of the friends I had coffee with, after doing his undergrad locally (and doing a thesis of course), a Masters stint at Tufts University and pursuing his doctorate across the Atlantic, has just submitted his 300-plus page Ph.D thesis to his folks at Cambridge. He's also preparing to start teaching a first-year university class in South Africa in the new year.
I look at this life of his and I am in awe. And a little ashamed at first glance.
I've stayed in the city in which I went to university. I even went to high school just fifteen minutes from where I now live. I will mention as an aside, though, that this city was a pretty big deal to me when I was a kid. I lived in a small farming town 40 minutes away. I distinctly remember one day in elementary school when I had stayed home sick. I couldn't have been too sick, though, because my mom took me to the mall in this city. It felt so far away and other-worldly. I remember I had an Orange Julius because I'd never had one before. I remember really not liking it. There was pulp involved and I hate pulp in juice. I like to drink - not chew - my juice.
Anyway, back to the more interesting part of this tale.
Dr. Friend's eyes sparkle when he talks about his life. He even laughed a little as he told us about the world he now inhabits since he's in as much disbelief at where he is as we are. Don't get me wrong - we both love this guy. But knowing what he was like in high school, one just really would not have laid out this path for him. I think back then I may have thought he'd have a career in the arts, maybe even make it onto t.v. given his personality and charisma.
Like me, the other friend I met with still lives in the same city. In fact she grew up here. Her life over the last ten years has been very different from our other friend's. No decade* of post-secondary education. [*I like using "decade" instead of "ten years" all the time. Decade is much more dramatic, and verging on melodramatic here, and sometimes it's just fun to be melodramatic.] No globetrotting, no world-changing theses. She does have three awesome kids, though. A job she really enjoys. A partner she loves.
And you know what? Her eyes sparkle when she talks about her life, too.
So what did these two old friends see when they looked at me in the coffee shop? Probably a confirmed homebody, albeit a very happily married one who just happens to be in possession (yes, possession) of two of the sweetest daughters to grace this earth. A job that, at the end of the day, is just a job - but it lets me see a fair bit of those three people I love.
No one waits outside of an auditorium to hear me lecture. No one is paying for my living accomodations on a far-off and intoxicating continent. No one froths at the mouth waiting for me to share my thoughts on international relations.
But, I'm thinking, my eyes probably also sparkle when I talk about my life. I may have avoided committing to a specific area of study at university, but I pretty readily decided to spend the rest of my life with a guy I'm pretty crazy about. I pretty firmly entered the world of parenthood. So maybe I'm not such a commitment-avoider.
If you'd asked anyone from my group of friends in high school if we thought our now-professor friend would be a lecturing academic in ten years, you would have had a pretty good chuckle for a response. Likewise, if you'd asked them if they thought I'd be married with two daughters and a mortgage you probably would have elicited a similar reaction. I really don't think I, or the other friend I met up with, would have been voted "most likely to be domestic". And yet, here we are.
If my two old friends weren't as nice as they are, maybe they would have laughed at my current position in life over coffee the other day. But I don't think it's generally considered kosher to laugh at mothers being motherly, so they didn't. Thanks, by the way, guys. But it may have seemed a little unlikely, given who I was ten years ago, when they last really knew me.
Regardless of who we once were, given the sparkle in the eyes of all three of us now, I'd say we're right where we're supposed to be, doing what we're meant to do.
Surprising? Yes. Shocking? Maybe a bit. Any doubts? Definitely not.
Perhaps one of my happiest days in university was when I discovered that I didn't have to do a thesis as part of my four-year bachelor degree. I realize this makes me seem like a commitment-phobe. Or indecisive at least. At the time it also made me feel, just..."less" somehow, but I stayed the course and remained thesis-free.
Well one of the friends I had coffee with, after doing his undergrad locally (and doing a thesis of course), a Masters stint at Tufts University and pursuing his doctorate across the Atlantic, has just submitted his 300-plus page Ph.D thesis to his folks at Cambridge. He's also preparing to start teaching a first-year university class in South Africa in the new year.
I look at this life of his and I am in awe. And a little ashamed at first glance.
I've stayed in the city in which I went to university. I even went to high school just fifteen minutes from where I now live. I will mention as an aside, though, that this city was a pretty big deal to me when I was a kid. I lived in a small farming town 40 minutes away. I distinctly remember one day in elementary school when I had stayed home sick. I couldn't have been too sick, though, because my mom took me to the mall in this city. It felt so far away and other-worldly. I remember I had an Orange Julius because I'd never had one before. I remember really not liking it. There was pulp involved and I hate pulp in juice. I like to drink - not chew - my juice.
Anyway, back to the more interesting part of this tale.
Dr. Friend's eyes sparkle when he talks about his life. He even laughed a little as he told us about the world he now inhabits since he's in as much disbelief at where he is as we are. Don't get me wrong - we both love this guy. But knowing what he was like in high school, one just really would not have laid out this path for him. I think back then I may have thought he'd have a career in the arts, maybe even make it onto t.v. given his personality and charisma.
Like me, the other friend I met with still lives in the same city. In fact she grew up here. Her life over the last ten years has been very different from our other friend's. No decade* of post-secondary education. [*I like using "decade" instead of "ten years" all the time. Decade is much more dramatic, and verging on melodramatic here, and sometimes it's just fun to be melodramatic.] No globetrotting, no world-changing theses. She does have three awesome kids, though. A job she really enjoys. A partner she loves.
And you know what? Her eyes sparkle when she talks about her life, too.
So what did these two old friends see when they looked at me in the coffee shop? Probably a confirmed homebody, albeit a very happily married one who just happens to be in possession (yes, possession) of two of the sweetest daughters to grace this earth. A job that, at the end of the day, is just a job - but it lets me see a fair bit of those three people I love.
No one waits outside of an auditorium to hear me lecture. No one is paying for my living accomodations on a far-off and intoxicating continent. No one froths at the mouth waiting for me to share my thoughts on international relations.
But, I'm thinking, my eyes probably also sparkle when I talk about my life. I may have avoided committing to a specific area of study at university, but I pretty readily decided to spend the rest of my life with a guy I'm pretty crazy about. I pretty firmly entered the world of parenthood. So maybe I'm not such a commitment-avoider.
If you'd asked anyone from my group of friends in high school if we thought our now-professor friend would be a lecturing academic in ten years, you would have had a pretty good chuckle for a response. Likewise, if you'd asked them if they thought I'd be married with two daughters and a mortgage you probably would have elicited a similar reaction. I really don't think I, or the other friend I met up with, would have been voted "most likely to be domestic". And yet, here we are.
If my two old friends weren't as nice as they are, maybe they would have laughed at my current position in life over coffee the other day. But I don't think it's generally considered kosher to laugh at mothers being motherly, so they didn't. Thanks, by the way, guys. But it may have seemed a little unlikely, given who I was ten years ago, when they last really knew me.
Regardless of who we once were, given the sparkle in the eyes of all three of us now, I'd say we're right where we're supposed to be, doing what we're meant to do.
Surprising? Yes. Shocking? Maybe a bit. Any doubts? Definitely not.
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