With Blue Lights & Green Bearings

I don’t agree with the decisions parents are making for their children.

Halfway through my Senior year, my parents had started talking to me about going to college. The subject came up more frequently, since they had already been putting the idea through my head when I started high school. Of course, with no idea as to what I wanted to pursue, I made something up in a desperate attempt to Graduate. You needed three letters of recommendation, a letter to the school explaining what you wanted to do, and what experience you had that would qualify you for that particular career, and a letter explaining why you “deserve” to graduate. In my honest opinion, you have absolutely NO idea what you’re doing there. You’re there only to make small decisions. I BS’d my way to graduation. I didn’t want to be left behind. And of course, that’s not the only obstacle I had to get past to finally get myself together.

Shortly after I graduated, I took a placement test for the community college, near where I live: Rogue Community College. If I even wanted to go to any college, it would have been SOU, which is about 50 miles from here. Accordingto my mom, financial aid and grants would never cover the tuition (which she was VERY wrong about). Not to mention Southern Oregon University had much more opportunity, as well as a wider variety of classes and transfer programs. But because I’m the only one on my mom’s side of the family who’s even gotten past the placement test, I registered myself to RCC as a Criminal Justice major. It was an idea that came up to me a few months before the semester would start and I thought I would finally have found my niche and be happy with what I would be spending the rest of my life doing.

Next thing I know, I’m calling my boyfriend at 2 in the morning, in tears and heavy-hearted, not knowing what I should do. I had completely lost interest in the career in which I was attempting to pursue. One more year, and I would’ve completed classes that would allow me to receive my Bachelor’s in Criminal Justice. It wasn’t just this particular night. Going on to my third semester, I had starting doubting myself; second-guessing my decisions through college.

Right now I’m looking for work; trying to get on my feet, find a place of my own, save up money. I may not be working now, and struggling to find it, but it’s much more satisfying putting effort into my life, rather than putting half-hearted effort into something that would’ve made everyone else proud.