The Last Thanksgiving Lunch

When you check the stats on your almost-abandoned blog, and realize that most of the referring URLs are out-of-country sites that McAfee doesn't approve of, it is probably a sign that you should give it up. But. I don't think I was ever writing this for anyone but myself anyway. I mean, I was and I wasn't. I was writing it for myself with the hope that what I had to say might someday help someone in a similar situation, the same way that I found solace in other people's blogs that I suspect were also written mainly for themselves. So here I am. If you came here looking for pictures of Big Tits, I'm not going to apologize for letting you down.

And besides, I am on a Facebook hiatus following the aftermath of the U.S. Presidential Election. I just couldn't take it, even the stuff I agreed with. I'm now mostly Facebook free, and loving it. The only problem is that I have way too much time on my hands. OMG WHAT CAN I POSSIBLY DO ONCE I HAVE ANSWERED ALL MY E-MAILS?! Hence this post.

Believe me, I've been wanting to write. It's just that my life was very complicated for a while, and there's no way I could have explained everything that was going on, and there's no way anyone would have wanted to listen to it anyway. Now my life is calm again. I can breathe. I'm happier than I have been in a long, long time.

I've been working with my daughter on summarizing events in a brief and concise way, so that I can ask her about a movie or a book without having to listen to an excruciatingly long play-by-play recap of the entire story. I usually ask her to tell me about the book in one sentence, and after she fails, I give her a few more. Five, max. By the end of five (very long, run-on) sentences, I usually have a pretty good sense of what's going on, so that's what I'll try to do here. So:

1. I've mentioned in previous posts that I've been working on a career change.
2. That career change was applying to PA (physician assistant) school. 
3. After 16 years of working toward this goal, including three years in graduate school in biology, followed by nine years teaching biology at a university level, I finally got it together enough to apply. 
4. I came really close, but in the end, I didn't get in. 
5. I thought I would be devastated by not getting in, and although I was/am sad, I am also extremely relieved. 

There are many reasons for me to NOT go to PA school, including things like I have young children and I'd basically have to be away from them for three years, I have a husband, I have a life (a GOOD life!), I have job (what many would consider a GOOD job), I'm 42 years old (and a less energetic 40-something than I used to be after my whole cancer ordeal), PA school is expensive, and I'm not exactly made of money, and... and... and... In contrast, there's really only one reason for me to go to PA school, and that is that I think I'd really like being a PA - and I think I would be a really good one. When I lay it out like this, part of me wants to scream at myself, WHAT IN GOD'S NAME WERE YOU THINKING?! And the answer is very simple: I have no idea what I was thinking. And I think when I got up to the interview, and suddenly my fantasy world became very real, I panicked a little, and thought, OMFG WHAT WAS I THINKING?! I do NOT belong here! 

I've had a while to reflect on this whole experience, and I'm still not quite sure what I think. On a practical level, I feel mostly relief. I only applied to one PA school, because there is only one program that is even close to do-able for me at this point in time. And even so, it was going to be tough. I would have had to spend weekdays away from my family, in a different city, for 2-3 years, AND they probably would have had to move into a different house because without my income AND trying to pay for PA school, we really couldn't afford our house, AND we'd need more money for babysitters and summer care for the kids, and... and.... and...

Most of my sadness comes not from not getting in, but from a feeling of personal failure. I knew that applying to only one school was an extremely long shot, because PA schools are extremely competitive. In a way I think it might have been easier if I had just been flat-out rejected, rather than making it to the interview stage and then being rejected. According to the PA program I applied to, they got over 1,700 applications, and 144 people got an interview. From those 144 interviewees, they choose a class of 44. So... not being chosen in the original phase is understandable, but making it past that first stage and then not being chosen... that just seems more personal. Especially for someone like me, whose strength should supposedly be in interviewing.

The other hard part is that Dr. T and his PA, Pamela, were sooooo supportive of my exploit, I almost feel... embarrassed? I shadowed Pamela and Dr. T for hours and hours and got to see some super amazing things that I will never regret being able to see, even if I never become a medical professional. Pamela used to be an interviewer for the PA program she attended, and really tried to help me prepare for the interview. So on top of feeling that I have let myself down, I feel that I have let so many other people down as well. That is a hard feeling to swallow.

Ultimately, I think it's a good thing I didn't get in. I definitely had my doubts, but if I had gotten in, I would have gone. (I mean, who would NOT accept a spot in a program with a 2.5% acceptance rate?!) And I'm not convinced going would have been a good thing. I think, more than anything, that I needed the possibility for change. I needed to dream, to imagine a different future. For many years, this possibility of a different future kept me going, kept me from being stagnant, able to work toward something new, something exciting. Now that that possibility isn't there, I've realized that just because I didn't get into PA school doesn't mean I have to be stagnant, that I can't work toward new and exciting things, even if those things aren't what I once imagined they might be. And, of course, I could always reapply.

My daughter has been struggling a little academically, which has been part of my hesitation about committing to something as time-consuming as PA school. Even reading, which has always been a strong point for her, is difficult now that she is in fifth grade, and the expectations are much higher. She is supposed to be reading a book a week, but has been having trouble finding books that keep her interest. At our recent parent-teacher conference, her teacher said she had tried to get her to read Jennifer Murdley's Toad, a book she felt all her girls (and boys!) should read. I haven't read the book, but according to my daughter's teacher, it is a modern-day fairy tale about a girl who wants to be prettier, and has the opportunity to be prettier, but then realizes that the sacrifices she would have to make to be prettier aren't worth it, and ultimately realizes that she is happy the way she is.

In other words, it's my life, in a nutshell.

Not that I want to be prettier, but I want to be better in a lot of ways. (And, of course, I wouldn't mind being prettier, but it's not at the top of my wish list.)

I've never been a great mom, despite my best efforts, and I always assumed that my kids were better off spending their time with someone other than me. Maybe that's just a fancy way of saying I've felt minimal guilt in being a professional, working mom while rearing young children at the same time. However, something interesting happened yesterday. I dropped my daughter off at school, and as we were waiting for the bell to ring, I was standing around talking to some other moms. As we were talking, the son of one of the moms came up and whispered something quietly into his mom's ear. Eventually she said to him, 'Oh, okay, you want me to come have lunch with you today? I'll be there.' And I was reminded, at that point, that it was the Thursday before Thanksgiving, the Thursday when parents are invited to have a turkey lunch with their kids. My daughter had asked me to go, a few weeks ago when we were going over the school lunch menu, and I was non-committal about it, telling her, I'll make it if I can. She hadn't mentioned it since then, so I figured I was getting away with not going. And then the bell rang, so even if she had remembered that it was Thanksgiving Lunch Day, she didn't have the chance to run over to me and whisper in my ear.

So off I went to work. I gave a lecture, then had office hours, but the whole time I felt this pang of guilt, that I needed to be with my daughter for the Thanksgiving Lunch. My office hours ended at noon. Lunch was at 12:15. I could make it, maybe. I went back and forth in my mind, because I had so much fucking shit to do at work (pardon my French), and told myself that plenty of parents don't/can't go have lunch with their kids in the middle of the day in the middle of the work week, and besides, my daughter wasn't even expecting me. At the same time, I felt a sense of panic, a sense of urgency, a sense of You want change? Something better? WELL HERE IT IS!! So, at 11:57 AM, I decided, I am going to have lunch with my daughter. Because next year she'll be in middle school, and this is probably the last time she is going to want to have lunch with me at school, and it is a privilege that I have a job where I can go have lunch with her when she wants me to have lunch with her! I cut out of my office hours three minutes early so no one could trap me in my office, and I raced to my daughter's school.

I can't tell you how happy I am that I went to that lunch. It made so many things so much clearer in my mind. Unlike many parents at my daughter's school, I don't spend a lot of time at the school, so I feel like a bit of a stranger when I'm there during any time other than drop off or pick up. My daughter didn't know I was going to be there, so I felt insecure as I went onto the school grounds. I at least knew they had recess right before lunch, so I wanted to find her on the playground so she would guide me through the process of standing in the lunch line.

I was relieved to arrive at her school at 12:14, just enough time to scan the playground before the kids went into the gym for lunch. I was even more relieved that when she spotted me, she came running over to me and gave me a huge hug and wouldn't let go. When I told her I had come to have lunch with her, she thanked me over and over again, and held my hand all the way into the lunch room. She told me, I am so happy you made time to have lunch with me, and continued to thank me throughout the day, and thanked me numerous times before she went to bed that night - JUST FOR HAVING LUNCH WITH HER! I am crying just writing about it.

But here's the thing. I don't want anyone (as if anyone but me is reading this - but, you know, just in case!) to misinterpret my message as one of Hey women! You MUST stay home and take care of your babies! It's just more of a relief for me to understand that there are many paths to happiness, many of which are completely different from what I had imagined. Maybe I've never given motherhood a fair chance. Whatever the case may be, I feel almost giddy with the wide-open possibilities of a happy future.

Whether you are one of a few dear friends still reading this, or whether you are here looking for porn photos, Happy Thanksgiving to you all!