Grad School...2010?

The last time I wrote about grad school and the GRE, I was taking it in January and planning to make some February 1 deadlines. That totally didn’t happen for a number of reasons. To study for the GRE, prepare all application materials, and fine tune a writing sample of 25 pages in one month is just stupid. I was never going to make those deadlines. I only found two grad school programs that had Feb. 1 deadlines. All other deadlines were earlier. To apply to only two programs is just stupid.

I won’t be going to grad school in the fall. That’s a tough pill to swallow, but it is my entire fault. I grew complacent in the fall, thinking I could do this grad school application thing at the last minute. Bad idea. Months passed while I was thinking about grad school, but I wasn’t doing anything about it. The reality is that I am taking the GRE on April 30 now and if I do go to grad school, it will most likely be in the fall of 2010, with a graduation date in spring 2012 when I am 29 years old. 29 sounds so damn old.

So next year is up in the air, which is why a third year in Milwaukee is a possibility. As much as it pains me to say this, moving somewhere for one year with the possibility of just having to move somewhere else for grad school is ridiculous.

Milwaukee has grown on me. I really enjoy my job, but it’s part-time most of the time. My potential, whatever it is, isn’t being tapped. This may sound silly, but I want to be drained and overworked, at least for a little bit. Back to Milwaukee…I would describe it as a diamond in the rough. It has so much to offer, more than most places, but it doesn’t get the favorable press like Portland, which one could believe is the only cool city in the States to live. However, the nail in the coffin for this place is a lack of family and close friends. I am not a product of the Midwest—no one in my family is, not even close. Family and friends have always been closer. That is why the thousand and more miles that separate us seems like an ocean. We’ve made the trip a few times, but it must seem like an ocean for other people too because they haven’t made any crossings.

I feel that I have banished myself to another year of isolation. But the realistic/logical part of me thinks it isn’t that bad and things can only move up from here, right?