Still thawing from my Yale tour...
It's February break. It's cold. It's snowy. It's grey and orange. So, what do I do? Go tromping around the frigid, hallowed halls of academia, of course!
The more I delve into the miry depths of the dizziness that we have deemed the "college process," the more I'm realizing that 1. Oh Shit. I'm not getting into school. and 2. This is really, really, really, scary. I'm pretty sorry to say it because I try to pretend that I'm not afraid of anything (with the exception of horror films *shiver*) but the truth is, I'm pretty afraid of this whole college thing. With every school I go to, I see more and more of these comfortable, confident people walking around, and I'm realizing more that I'm going to have to somehow either metamorphose into one of these people or use my best "becoming the character" skills and pretend. I know I'll forever be marking myself as a bona fide musical theatre dork when I say this, but maybe things are "moving too fast." Ok? I admit it. I've finally mastered this whole high school thing, and suddenly I'm thrust into thinking about not only the four years after I graduate, but where the hell I'm going to go after that. College, to me right now, is just this gaping "I DON'T KNOW" and, frankly, I can't deal with that.
My parents aren't making it much easier. They have this rosy picture of me getting into some Ivy League school and, upon arrival, coming to the sobering realization that theatre isn't my love and calling, it's biochemistry (or equivalent)! It figures though that I would pick the field in which my family has absolutely no connections in. Now I'm not talking about like "get me into college" connections, just the kind that are people who know what they're talking about and have the wisdom that comes from experience in the field. And yes, I know full well that I won't be making enough money in theatre (if, indeed, that's what I end up pursuing) to support a family in Briarcliff. But guess what? I don't want to. *GASP*
I keep on getting the message that finding the right college is supposed to be like a romantic comedy. You flounder around a bit, make a couple inconsequential mistakes, but end up making out underneath fireworks. Ok maybe not, but you get the idea. I hear all of these stories that are like, "I went there and fell in LOVE..." but I, apparently, haven't been so lucky. Even these online college-student matchmaking services have no answer. The College Board says that there is no college in existence that I would fit at, and the Princeton Review says my perfect match is the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Oh dear. The Worcester Polytechnic Institute? Seriously.
Now if Aileen ruled the world, she would make her own college, a franken-college if you will: Take Columbia, but put it in Yale's buildings, stick Tisch on, and keep the Columbia-Juilliard program, then (remembering that the entire place is housed in Yale architecture) juggle some stuff around until you can fit it in Greenwich Village. Ah. Isn't it beautiful? And on the seventh day, she rested... and wrote herself an acceptance letter.
Oh- and one more thing in Aileen's college: make sure that the boys that end up there are NYU boys (they are beautiful, and they are everywhere). Joey came up with the reason why NYU boys are so gorgeous: it's like an automatic Queer-eye. It's like hazing, NYU-style. If they get there and they're gay- fabulous. If they get there metro- more fabulous (sorry, boys). If they get there sub par- they are instantly Queer-eyed and are just as fabulous as the other two demographics.
So, to keep you all up to date:
Visited:
1. Columbia
2. NYU
3. Yale
(I think they're my top three, but I don't know in what order)
To Visit:
1. Northwestern
2. U Chicago
3. Brown
4. Carnegie-Mellon
5. U Penn
6. Boston Conservatory (?)
So there you have it, a college rant a la Aileen. How I love catharsis...
The more I delve into the miry depths of the dizziness that we have deemed the "college process," the more I'm realizing that 1. Oh Shit. I'm not getting into school. and 2. This is really, really, really, scary. I'm pretty sorry to say it because I try to pretend that I'm not afraid of anything (with the exception of horror films *shiver*) but the truth is, I'm pretty afraid of this whole college thing. With every school I go to, I see more and more of these comfortable, confident people walking around, and I'm realizing more that I'm going to have to somehow either metamorphose into one of these people or use my best "becoming the character" skills and pretend. I know I'll forever be marking myself as a bona fide musical theatre dork when I say this, but maybe things are "moving too fast." Ok? I admit it. I've finally mastered this whole high school thing, and suddenly I'm thrust into thinking about not only the four years after I graduate, but where the hell I'm going to go after that. College, to me right now, is just this gaping "I DON'T KNOW" and, frankly, I can't deal with that.
My parents aren't making it much easier. They have this rosy picture of me getting into some Ivy League school and, upon arrival, coming to the sobering realization that theatre isn't my love and calling, it's biochemistry (or equivalent)! It figures though that I would pick the field in which my family has absolutely no connections in. Now I'm not talking about like "get me into college" connections, just the kind that are people who know what they're talking about and have the wisdom that comes from experience in the field. And yes, I know full well that I won't be making enough money in theatre (if, indeed, that's what I end up pursuing) to support a family in Briarcliff. But guess what? I don't want to. *GASP*
I keep on getting the message that finding the right college is supposed to be like a romantic comedy. You flounder around a bit, make a couple inconsequential mistakes, but end up making out underneath fireworks. Ok maybe not, but you get the idea. I hear all of these stories that are like, "I went there and fell in LOVE..." but I, apparently, haven't been so lucky. Even these online college-student matchmaking services have no answer. The College Board says that there is no college in existence that I would fit at, and the Princeton Review says my perfect match is the Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Oh dear. The Worcester Polytechnic Institute? Seriously.
Now if Aileen ruled the world, she would make her own college, a franken-college if you will: Take Columbia, but put it in Yale's buildings, stick Tisch on, and keep the Columbia-Juilliard program, then (remembering that the entire place is housed in Yale architecture) juggle some stuff around until you can fit it in Greenwich Village. Ah. Isn't it beautiful? And on the seventh day, she rested... and wrote herself an acceptance letter.
Oh- and one more thing in Aileen's college: make sure that the boys that end up there are NYU boys (they are beautiful, and they are everywhere). Joey came up with the reason why NYU boys are so gorgeous: it's like an automatic Queer-eye. It's like hazing, NYU-style. If they get there and they're gay- fabulous. If they get there metro- more fabulous (sorry, boys). If they get there sub par- they are instantly Queer-eyed and are just as fabulous as the other two demographics.
So, to keep you all up to date:
Visited:
1. Columbia
2. NYU
3. Yale
(I think they're my top three, but I don't know in what order)
To Visit:
1. Northwestern
2. U Chicago
3. Brown
4. Carnegie-Mellon
5. U Penn
6. Boston Conservatory (?)
So there you have it, a college rant a la Aileen. How I love catharsis...