The Independent Voice of Southern Methodist University Since 1915

The Daily Campus

The Daily Campus

The Independent Voice of Southern Methodist University Since 1915

The Daily Campus

The Independent Voice of Southern Methodist University Since 1915

The Daily Campus

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Brian Richardson, Contributor • March 28, 2024
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What are you doing after graduation?

 What are you doing after graduation?
What are you doing after graduation?

What are you doing after graduation?

While everyone is actively searching for a job this time of year, I’m still asking myself how important food is to me. I’m going to give this whole writing hallucination a go, and in the long run, I’m sure I’ll have to eat; but for now, I choose happiness over hunger pains. Call me crazy. Indeed, it’s been suggested before.

Being a senior renders many mixed feelings. On the one hand, you’re ready to get your diploma and get out, because after four years (five or six for some), you’re pretty burned out. You’re done. Through. You’re over it. You’re ready to move on to the next stage of your life, whatever that may be.

I tell everyone who is going to be a senior to be prepared to answer that one dreaded question: “What do you plan on doing after graduation?” And you don’t get asked just once or twice. You get asked this question on a regular basis. Everyone and their mother will ask you that question, and you feel like such a loser for saying, “I don’t know,” but that’s the truth. You really don’t have a clue.

In my case, when I tell people that I’m an engineering major and want to be a writer, I don’t get too many wonderful looks. Instead, I get even more questions. Sometimes I’m tempted to say that I’m a freshman and not a senior, just to make that Q & A process easier.

“What year are you?”

A freshman.

“What’s your major?”

Undecided.

It’s simple and easy. No explanation required.

At this point you’re ready to leave, but at the same time, you’re not ready to face reality quite yet. You’re not ready to be cut off from the parents just yet. As determined as I am to leave in May, they’ll probably have to pry my fingers from the rails on Dallas Hall.

Some choose to delay reality a bit more by going to grad school. But even then, at least you have some idea about what you’re doing, what you’re studying, what you hope to accomplish by doing so. It’s not as though you can declare “Undecided” in grad school.

Some get married after college. You’re happy for those who do, but in the back of your mind, you’re thinking how crazy. You, yourself, are already a commitment-phobe as it is. How on earth could you get married?

What is worse than being asked by others what you your plans are after college is the question you ask yourself: What am I going to do with the rest of my life? “Undecided” may have been a completely valid answer for those three out of the four years of your undergrad, but you’re approaching the point where you actually have to declare something. Anything.

I suppose we all end up where we need to be, as who we want to be. We get there eventually, but how we get there presents a series of other questions. We get trapped under the idea of efficiency. What is the quickest way to the rest of my life? Does the answer lie in a job, grad school, marriage?

I’ve surveyed some friends, and I’m glad that the general consensus is “I don’t know.” I’m not alone. I did have one friend who said he was giving some thought to becoming a cabana boy, but after much deliberation and parental intervention, he returned to his original answer, which was “I don’t know.”

Even after you’ve spent much of your life planning it, reality doesn’t quite play out the same way as it does on the blueprint. And realizing that the path you started with isn’t necessarily the path you have to finish with is the hardest part. Change is hard. But if change is for the better, then change isn’t such a bad thing. Perhaps it’s more like growth.

Well, here’s to the rest of our lives, which, little did we know, started a long time ago.

Ah crap.

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