An Old Journal Entry...

I love to journal...

So I was going through my journal, and I found an entry that I wrote just weeks before I graduated from A&M with my Master's Degree.  It's so cool to be able to go back and read what I was thinking.  This particular entry is in the form of a story.

Enjoy a little insight into my head during that time when the world was just full of possibilities!  :)

"She sat all alone in her room, lying on the bed, playing with the cat...his name was Taro.  Then she pulled out her computer to catch up on the TV shows she had missed during the week.  To Stephanie Jessen, watching TV shows was an escape.  Deep down, she always wanted to do something dangerous - learn how to fight and defend herself, shoot a gun, find out she had a supernatural ability, meet and fall in love with a supernatural being...

Stephanie wanted adventure.  To be known for something.  And yet here she was, laying in her bed just contemplating how she was going to complete her take-home-final for Dr. Hurlebaus.  Not a very exciting way to spend the afternoon, or the rest of her life for that matter.

You see, Stephanie Jessen was about to graduate from Texas A&M university with her master's degree in structural engineering, after which, she will find a job as an engineer-in-training and be subjected to complex tasks which require her to think more than she wants to for the rest of her life.  

Oftentimes, Stephanie felt like she was trapped in one career path that she was afraid she would hate.  But of course, she had no job experience relating to structural engineering which was what kept her feeling ok about it.  She kept telling herself that it was just the schoolwork that she hated and that things won't be as stressful when she is out in the real world.

And then there was Cody.  They had been going together now for six years and nine months.  Cody could always make her laugh and feel important and smart and good about herself.  She missed him a lot lately.  He had finished his four year degree in August and moved back home to Sherman, leaving Stephanie all alone in College Station.  But Stephanie was keeping busy.  When she wasn't doing school work or working at the computer lab, she was at the gym trying to get in shape.  She had also made frequent weekend trips home to Sherman this semester.

Tears of happiness threatened to flood her face as she thought about the things that were finally going to happen in the coming weeks of her life.  She would finally be done with school, after 23 years.  Thoughts of the new things she would be able to do now that she would no longer have to study every night and that she could afford to do now danced through her mind as she stared at the ceiling in her room.

She was determined to lead an interesting life.  Not to end up as just another normal, regular person who doesn't do anything to make a difference in the world.

But, all her dreaming and planning would have to wait until she finished the last take-home exam of her educational career, thus closing that chapter of her life."    - Stephanie Jessen, December 12, 2010, 3:43PM

If only she knew then that once she got into the 'real world' she would no longer have time to just sit in bed, contemplating life, and worse, she would have to start paying bills upon bills upon bills.

However, I will say that my life today is a BILLION times better than it was in college.  Just sayin'

:)