It hit me yesterday…I am one month away from being finished with college. How did I get here? I am one month away from needing a “real” job. What in the world am I going to do?
Susan and I talk about this a lot. We both see this necessity in not being “career oriented” once we have children. Whether or not you feel a wife and mom should stay at home is irrelevant to what I’m going to say (and I’m not here to debate that…so please, no mean posts, my feelings get hurt)…it is, however, important to the two of us. She’s given up a lot for Jimmy…PT school being one of them and she also made this huge leap of faith when she decided to stay and work at Harding for a guy she hadn’t really been dating that long. I guess the same can be said for Craig and me. Yes, we had been dating for a year when I transferred for Purdue, but I had a lot of “nay” sayers; I heard many times, this will not end well for you. Anytime a girl follows a guy around they always get dumped in the end. And I guess we’re not married yet, so it could still happen, but I’ve got my money on “highly unlikely” at this point.
I get asked this a lot: “When are you and Craig getting married?” Well, the answer is, we don’t know. But it will hopefully be no later than 2009, and possibly earlier. Which gets me back to the job thing.
I feel a lot of pressure to get a good career going as soon as possible. I feel like I have only five years to do it. I figure, one more year of rotations for Craig that I wil be working, then getting married, and we might make it five years before we have kids. And then I don’t want to work. Ever. Again.
And don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to be one of those women that sits at home all day and watches soap operas….I have plans. Plans for doing things that are a wee bit more “volunteer” oriented. Not to mention, I’m pretty sure God has some plans of His own…they may be the same as what I’m envisioning, they may cause me some epiphanies later on. But I’ve worked so hard to get my degree in a less-than-easy field…I just want to have the career I’ve always dreamed of for at least a little while. Is this so much to ask?
And I want to make it very clear that I WANT a career for a little while…I want to carry a briefcase and be in charge of a meeting and give a PowerPoint presentation on a weekly basis…I do. But here’s the other thing.
I grew up in a place where people don’t care what you do. You are not defined by your career or major and if you’re a stay-at-mom, that’s just fine too. I didn’t know what a master’s degree was when I left for Lipscomb four and a half years ago, because I’m not so sure I knew anyone that had such a thing. And it’s not like I grew up in a rural community…I grew up ten minutes out of Louisville, KY, one of the largest cities in the US. So I’m sure someone had one…we just didn’t talk about it because no one cared.
But Lafayette is different. And I’m sure Purdue is the reason. But I have felt like a perpetual failure since I’ve been here. Every time I get asked when I will graduate, the next question is always, “and then where do you want to go to grad school?” “I’m not planning on going.” “Oh…” Cue awkward silence. And what I think hurts me the most is that most of these conversations are with people at church. I want nothing more than to serve beside my brothers and sisters in a community where all are respected for each and every component of the Body that we make up. And thanks to Susan I know I’m not crazy for feeling this way.
But then this makes me consider the way I think toward others. Do I think less of someone because they didn’t graduate from high school? Probably. Do I think I’m better than a liberal arts major because I’m in the science department? Sadly, I think my answer is yes. And I realize…how much does my thinking this way hurt others the same way I’ve been hurt? And how much does this hurt the Kingdom?
Caste systems have no place in the Body of Christ, and I need to stop thinking that they do. All of us were created in the image of God; all of us have different jobs and qualities that add to the Kingdom. Some of us don’t know what those are yet and some of us are there to help each other figure that out. I will leave you with my favorite quote of all time:
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“For attractive lips, speak words of kindness. |
