Molly Raley, Managing Editor
For 18 years, I have been waiting for this day, college graduation. I started school when I was six years old and have been going ever since.
I made it through elementary school with the help of some amazing teachers. They taught me how to read and write, how to do math and essentially, how to socialize.
Then came middle school, a very scary time for any pre-teen. Junior high is where you really learn about what kind of person you might become. It was during these years that I really found my love, my passion, sports.
Some students are bookworms, some are interested in computers or gaming systems and others are, dare I say, jocks. I always found myself in the “jock” category. I never had a problem with it except for the dumb part.
For one, I never saw myself as completely dumb. And two, not all athletes are dumb. As a matter of fact, I always saw myself growing up to become a very successful dentist. And one does not become a dentist by being dumb.
Eventually, I moved into high school and I was still into sports as before, but maybe a little more. Being a dentist when I grow up was still on my mind but had been pushed a little further back because of my very busy life as a high school student.
The closer I got to high school graduation the more I got the ever-dreaded question: “What are your plans after high school?”
Because I always knew I wanted to be a dentist my plans were very clear. Go to Southeastern, major in chemistry and biology, graduate with a bachelor’s degree in science and go to the University of Oklahoma School of Dentistry.
Well, let’s just say, life happened. I started my first year at Southeastern full of excitement and curiosity. I ended my first year with newfound friends but a lack of want to.
I started my second year at Southeastern with somewhat of a hole in my heart. I had always wanted to be a dentist so thinking about changing my mind would not only disappoint myself but I thought it would also disappoint my parents and loved ones.
After a long conversation with my family, I finally decided that science or dentistry to be more specific was probably not for me. In middle school, I fell in love with one thing and I never could shake it. I fell in love with sports.
My whole life I had been involved in sports. I played sports all through middle school and high school and after graduation I stayed involved as much as I could. But what could someone like me do for a living?
That’s when I decided I would go into sports broadcasting. I kept thinking to myself, “I could get paid to watch different sporting events all day every day.” I would be getting paid to do something that I already love to do. How awesome would that be?
I had finally made the decision to change my major to broadcasting. It was a very scary time but something I knew had to be done.
Life went on and I am still on my path to a broadcasting degree. Slowly but surely I am getting there and with only a few days left of the semester I am finding myself getting closer than ever. I will finally graduate in December 2014.
What an accomplishment this is for me. I have gone from a major that I thought I absolutely had to do in order to make my family proud to a person that goes to school excited everyday. But there is one thing that is still looming over me. “What are my plans after graduation?”
I get asked this question at least three times a day and the more I get asked the more I start to feel scared. I know most of you won’t know this feeling until you are there but some of you may. The feeling that you absolutely have to make the right life decision after graduation is on my mind constantly.
Not only do I have to worry about myself and how I am going to pay my bills and unfortunately my student loans but I also have to worry about my son. The decision that I make for my career will not only affect me but it will also affect my son.
If I move, he moves. If I am broke, he is broke. I think about these things constantly. The closer Dec. 13 gets the more I start to worry.
I know I made the right decision by changing my major to broadcasting but what I want to do with it, I have no idea.
Maybe one day I will wake up and know exactly what I should be doing, but until then I just apply for jobs and pray that I am given a chance.
Applying for jobs can also be scary because of the “experience necessary” part of the application. How are we supposed to get experience without actually having a job to gain experience from? This is something else that I am dealing with. Another item on the list of worry.
I know that I will eventually be where I am supposed to be and where God intended for me to be. But until then I will just sit back, relax, enjoy these last few days of, what I like to call, freedom, because soon my whole life will change. A life that I have known since I was six will no longer be in effect.
They say that when you graduate high school you have to “become an adult”, but sometimes that’s not the case. High school graduation is a stepping-stone into adulthood. College graduation, on the other hand, is a full on leap of faith into the world of the unknown.
It’s finally time to take what I was taught in elementary, middle school, high school and even college: work hard, do your best and love life, because you never know what can happen unless you really give it your all.
Don’t be afraid of graduation and what lies ahead. There is a whole world of possibilities and graduating from college is just the beginning of an incredible journey.
