Post-Grad De-fragging

(Note: I'm just filling the space until everyone posts, exploring the different directions to go with this PTSP blog: past memories of PTSP, academic experiences from UCLA, broader educational issues affecting community college transfers and the UC, and now this personal post-graduation de-frag.

I'm NOT going to drown out what other people have to say by making 2posts a day, so this'll be my last post till EVERYONE whose emailed me an emphatic YESSSSSS or COUNT ME IN like the vampire from Sesame Street actually starts posting on their own. I'm sick of talking, everyone else please speak up.)

It's been 2 and a half years since I got that B.A in Anthropology from UC of LA.

Every day that I spent unemployed, which has been about half the time of that 2 and a half years, there would be moments when I felt like such a motherfuckin' chump.

There wasn't a day that went by where I did not think at least one of the thoughts below: when am I going to stop being a pansy-ass and move out of this house? What kind of skills did I actually learn in 4 years of college? God, I should've stuck it out with math. God, I should've learned more Spanish. Where did all this theorizing and anthropologizing get me? Why the hell did I nail myself to such a new unproven project in PTSP Bayanihan and not get a real job and/or research experience? Where the hell are my hook-ups now? When am I just going to blast past all this shit and go to graduate school?

Things usually didn't get better hearing about how some grade and high school mates were doing awesome. One of them who was really involved in doing all kinds of crap in college and managed to stay employed, had already gone thru 3 jobs. She was some kind of auditor. One of them was a computer engineer who made almost as much as my mommy. A lot of my high school mates were in law school. Some doing other kinds of graduate school. A grip were/are in New York, Washington DC.

Meanwhile, I'm still in LA living in the incubator called my parents' house.

Inevitably in these 2 and a half years have been countless social functions with family, high school friends, and new friends, where I've had to explain myself to people.

"What are you doing now?"

"How much do you make?"

"Oh, I heard the County has great benefits!"

"Why don't you teach?"

"Why don't you look into the LAUSD?"

"Do you have a girlfriend now?"

Those days of unemployment were more of a daily grind than the time that I spent employed. Least when employed, I could mindlessly sink into a daily routine and had reason to go out and about afterward. I could confidently maintain in conversation with Acquaintence X or Sir Anonymous Muckety Muck Muck, "why yes, I do pick asses and brains for a living, ha ha ha, how 'bout yourself?"

But even though I was really anxious about being unemployed, those were very temporary. Extremely temporary. I said that I only had *moments* during the day when I'd think about all the crap that I didn't do yet. Rest of my day, I was farting out skittles and pissing out rainbows.

Cause I'd read other people's stories.

Here.

Here.

Here.

Here.

Here.

Here.

Here.

Here.

A story about a kid from Malawi building windmills from busted bicycle parts.



And last but not least a last lecture by a guy who knew he was going to die.