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Apr 22, 2009

Fantasies and Delusions

Sometimes I think we all get carried away on this blog, going on and on about how much we love it here. The truth is, there are hard days, there are bad days, and there are days when all you can do is hop on a bus, head downtown, and buy yourself the most decadent bar of chocolate you can find. It’s ok. Those days happen to everyone, in every profession.

I find that my fellow grad students and I start fantasizing about other jobs we could have. These other jobs that we think about don’t have downsides when our experiments are failing and our advisors don’t like our physical explanations. No no, being an opera singer would be easy.

Personally, when I start to daydream about other career options, I don’t start wishing I had taken that consulting offer. If I’m going to leave grad school, it won’t be for anything that practical. If I leave, I’m going to take up the violin and become a fiddle player in a bluegrass band. Or maybe I’ll go play professional baseball.

I know I’m really frustrated with grad school when my delusions get a bit more real. Those are the times I find myself thinking, “My family has COOKED for the POPE. WHAT am I doing HERE?” It’s all planned out, you see. I open a restaurant (with what money, exactly?) where I cook my grandmother’s gnocchi and my mother’s meatballs. I make it big, maybe get a show on the Food Network (I almost forgot - having a show entitled “Cooking through Grad School” is another possible career option for me), and then I cook for the pope. It’s foolproof.

And then I think about how many restaurants fail and how I hate the minute details of business and could I really stand to chop garlic for the rest of my life? Usually by this time, it’s the next day, and my experiments are working a little better - or I at least understand why they’re failing.

But there’s always that part of me that wonders. Maybe I should have been a cook. I mean, you can’t make diodes for the pope.

The author has filed this entry under the "Uncategorized" category.

2 Responses To This Entry:

    may be you can decorate the church with designed LEDs that can make pope happy……;-)

    Posted by: marvell on May 7th, 2009 at 1:13 pm

    You know, a lot of Christmas lights these days are made from LEDs. And the pope celebrates Christmas…

    Posted by: ndilello on May 19th, 2009 at 4:21 pm

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