I Was So Impatient Because . . .?

This winter and spring, as I worked at a job I loathed and (im)patiently waited for letters of acceptance or rejection in order to know when, exactly, I could quit said job, I had a wonderfully idealized vision of what the graduate school experience would be like. (And when I say idealized, please know that I'm in no way, shape, or form exaggerating. I was expecting a large-scale experience that would phenomenally change my life.) I looked forward to the witty talk, the bantering with fellow students, the absorbing of new information, and--of course--me stunning my professors.

In the course of my undergraduate work, I was used to being one of the brightest, most vocal people in the class. The sort of student people think of as consistently intelligent with episodic epiphanies of brilliance. You know, nothing special.

And don't get me wrong: I don't hate graduate school. But I certainly wish someone had managed to completely quash my expectations. You know why? There isn't much witty talk and banter, and I highly doubt I'm stunning my professors. Rather, I'm now the student who is episodically intelligent but otherwise quiet.

As for the absorbing of new information: there is a lot of information involved in taking 3 graduate classes. A lot. Which is probably why we're not all witty and in bantering moods--we're tired from reading and reading and reading some more.

(Incidentally, my Composition Theory professor says that is what graduate students do: they read. And read. And read some more. And, every few hours, they look up from their texts to verify their own existence. Then they continue reading.)

It's interesting for me to think about my expectations for this experience, because they were far off the mark. The funny thing about school is this: junior high teachers attempt to prepare you for your high school workload by telling you that you'll have teachers who act like theirs is the only class. That didn't happen to me so much. High school was like junior high, but with more advanced materials.

Then high school teachers told me that undergraduate professors would act like their class is the only class in the world. And again, I didn't have that experience as an undergraduate. I did my fair share of work, sure, but it didn't seem that any of my professors harbored the delusion they taught the only class I was taking.

The undergraduate professors didn't really give me much feedback about how grad school works. But grad school is finally the point where professors acts like their class is the only class students are taking.

It makes for an interesting work load. I have yet to determine whether the job will or won't fall by the way side. I'm giving it a couple more weeks . . .