When to Crush Dreams

I shudder to think about where I would be if I had gotten what I wanted.

I was reminded of this truth and my own dumb luck while reading a CNN.com list of the ten most worthless degrees a person can get... and discovered that I held two of them.

The reminder served a purpose, however.  I decided to sort out exactly how I managed to land on my feet despite my attraction to apparently-worthless degrees.  The story I reconstructed made me think of Mr. Magoo stumbling around a construction site without getting a scratch on him as onlookers prepared to witness the gruesome end of a man destined to die in a brutal way.

The story started when I was determined to become a doctor like my father.  He talked me out of that by explaining how stressful it was and how hard he worked and how much liability could attach to him for the most innocent of mistakes.  He basically sold me on working in the toy department, and I gladly took the bait.  It was the only time I could remember him advocating an easy way and I jumped on it quick.

Thus began my pursuit of a career in sports journalism.  I set goals and knocked them down as always when an end result comes to focus.  I badgered my way on the Campus Press as a freshman, found an unpaid internship, then paid internships, traveled to New York for a better internship, worked nights, graduated and found work as an editor of a sports publication.

Somewhere in there I got spooked by the journalism job prospects and added Political Science as a degree, which bought me a fifth year of college.  Political Science felt more academic and served to fill the gaps left by the trade-school like Journalism classes.  For whatever reason, I chose to "cover my bases" with a degree that really only prepares a person to become conversant in a topic (the Cold War mostly) that, although interesting, applies very little to the world today.


I must give the Poly Sci department due credit, though, because it revealed a very important fact to me through the voice of Edward Rozek.  Prof. Rozek inspired me in many ways, but his first such feat was unintentional.  He challenged each of us to write down our life's goal, laminate it and put it on a key chain or hang it on a wall. Mine was going to say Sports Illustrated.  And I never did it. At first I meant to.  Then I elected to think on it.  Then, I decided I could not do it.  Then the goal started to feel shallow.  I didn't want it seen on my keychain.  I wanted more.  I wanted something worthy of the shoes I always wanted to fill.  Something more "meaningful."  He showed me what I didn't really want before I had any idea.

In short, Prof. Rozek force-shifted my paradigm.   From that point on, journalism became a short-term plan.


So, to be clear (and get back to the story)... I graduated with two degrees that would later be designated "worthless" in a top-notch fashion (and probably were at the time as well).

About the same time I added Political Science, Jen faced a similar dilemma.  Her choices were between Psychology and Computer Science.  Because of my apparent irrational love of dreamworld scenarios, I argued hard for Jen to choose Psychology (another proud entrant in the top-ten of futility).  Her reason for choosing correctly involved money.  I remember arguing that finances should not be a deciding factor.

(read that last sentence again... sigh).

Had I gotten what I wanted, Jen and I would have marched down the aisle of matrimony with three of the ten most worthless degrees a person can buy (and boy are they expensive!).  Yikes.  This is like when Mr. Magoo steps from one dangling steel beam to another about 50 feet in the air.

So, I graduated.  Jen made money and I made peanuts for three years and I started to feel the pull of graduate school.

This may sound shocking, but working in the toy department is not fulfilling.  Not even a little bit.  It does, however, convert something a person enjoys for leisure into a job and a distasteful pastime.

The reader might think at this point that I would have decided right then and there to correct my thinking and pursue something with great job prospects.  Instead, Mr. Magoo (me) just kept stumbling his way miraculously across the entire construction site.  That's right, I started to prepare my eventual application to graduate school to pursue a masters degree in political science.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is when Prof. Rozek slapped some sense into me.

My favorite professor, and a man I admired as much as any other person I had known, refused to write a recommendation for me unless I promised (unless I would swear!) to apply for law school.  I'm not going to lie... that was a bit rough.

He then gave me the best math lesson I ever received.  He explained how many applicants the university expected to receive for his soon-to-be open professor position (professor Rozek retired shortly after he wrote my letter).  As many as 300 applicants were expected.  All would have a masters degree.  Many would have a Ph D.  Many would also have experience teaching.  And one of them would become the next professor of Political Science at CU.

I applied to law school and completely gave up on graduate school. Prof. Rozek used the word "perspicacious" in my letter of recommendation, which I am certain impressed the heck out of someone who read it and probably got me into law school.  My path was set.  I didn't even take the GRE.  And, much like Mr. Magoo stepping safely onto solid ground from a beam suspended by rope by a slip knot, I managed to find myself a living and was the last one to know how close I came to disaster.

So, what is the lesson?

I may have a stressful job, and I may work hard, and I may have to worry about liability.  But, I do fulfilling work that feels worthy of my opportunities and I am happy doing what I do.  I may have two of the ten worst undergraduate degrees a person can have, but I traversed the construction site because someone had the guts to crush my dream and show me reality before I fell on my head.

Thank God I didn't get what I wanted.

Jacob just "graduated" from kindergarten (how I feel about a graduation from kindergarten is a post for another day).  I want him to fulfill his dreams.  I want him to be happy and live a fulfilling life.  I want him to achieve.  I will give him every opportunity I can.  And, because I want all of that for him, I will not hesitate to stomp his dream if he starts stumbling around construction sites like Mr. Magoo.  I won't pay for certain degrees.  I don't care what line of work he chooses to prepare for so long as it has a future.

My philosophy in this area may not be popular, but my job as a parent is not about that.  My job is to help an extremely bright kid find his way in the world as I know it.  To do that, I will have to remind him of factors not usually considered by twenty-somethings who make career choices (including but not limited to "how will I make enough money to survive?").

None of us consider the basics when we dream. I didn't. We all need help to see that.  The paradigm shift can be rough, but I know many people who were eventually grateful for it even if it was infuriating at the time.