Declaring your life

         From birth to 5 years old, our mothers and fathers were our first teachers, unless you were in preschool. They taught us our first lessons, “don’t touch a hot stove,” “look both ways before you cross the street,” and “there is no reason to bring an umbrella into the shower,” … or was that just me? Then between 5 and 6, you start elementary school, and the baton is handed over to the teachers. You learn to play the recorder, survive the Oregon trail, and spell boobies on the calculator (5318008); or boobless (55378008) if you are like my boyfriend. 

         You graduate and move to middle school, where you learn Latin, cite using MLA, and sow in life skills class. You start to piece together what intrigues you through electives like photography, cooking, and pipe cleaners’ class; once again, was that just me? Then high school comes, and you learn the importance of the Pythagorean theorem, photosynthesis, and how cute animals increase your focus. You were taught that too, right? And most importantly, we learned about fitness because how fit you are will be considered when calculating your GPA. 

        At last, you did it! You graduate, and you move onto college, where you need to declare a major. Declare what you want to be doing for the rest of your life, at the fucking age of 18. At that age, you can’t even rent a car! Not to mention drink alcohol and smoke tobacco products (wink wink), but I know we all found our way around that one. Maybe there is some leeway before declaring your major; you could get all your general education classes out of the way that buys you a year or year and a half, depending on how quickly you read SparkNotes and how many classes have an open book policy. So, let’s say you’re 19 when you’ve locked in your answer like they do on “Who wants to be a millionaire.” However, instead of gaining millions, you’re losing them. 

        According to our high school science class, the brain doesn’t fully develop until you are 25. Yet someone, somewhere (I will find you), thinks it’s a brilliant idea to make us decide on what we want to do for the rest of our lives before our brain is fully developed. Sounds like that person played hooky for that science lesson, huh?

         What if you graduated only to find out that you don’t want to do what you studied? Can you get a refund? What about credit? Maybe a discount? From where I stand, it seems like all you are left with is a broken soul and a bunch of debt that will linger over your head until you are in your 40’s. We should have all just started our influencer careers much earlier, don’t you think?

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