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another day, another question
From the question-a-day meme.
August 8: If money, time, and energy were no object, what university degree would you go back and get, just for fun?
I can hardly believe I'm saying this, but if I could choose to do something for the next four years and money, time, and energy were no object, I don't think I'd go back to school. I've always liked school and been good at school--I even enjoyed graduate school, for a certain value of enjoy that included developing (benign) cardiac symptoms from stress--but I'm 50, and I don't really want to go back to school now. I feel, honestly, like I've spent all my life working hard and I have very little to show for it. If I had four years and money was no object, I'd travel, and go to museums and the theater, and read and write more, and play games. Maybe I'd take those violin lessons I always wanted as a kid. (It's not learning I'm averse to. But the formal structure of school feels like a part of my life that is over.)
If all I was allowed to do with this four years of free time and money was go to school, then, I dunno. The fields I'm most interested in, such as history, are ones where I know enough already that it would be frustrating to be an undergraduate. Hmmm . . . maybe economics? I'd like to understand economics much better than I do. Assuming I could study it somewhere where a decent number of the professors would be critical of capitalism rather than shills for it. Or failing that, something history-adjacent but more technical, like archaeology or art history.
Now, if I could wind back time and start again from when I was applying to colleges . . . well, I still remember the moment at the end of my senior year of high school when I told one of my teachers that I was going to (a good liberal arts college with a certain reputation for artsiness), and he looked me in the eye and asked, "Why aren't you going to Harvard?" One reason I wasn't going to Harvard was that no one had ever told me they thought I could. If I'd known he thought I should, I would certainly have applied--I had a huge crush on him. I do wonder what my life would be like if I'd gone to Harvard or the equivalent, and studied something sensible rather than what I decided on at 16 in the most contrary rebel-without-a-cause phase of my life. (I turned 17 on my first full day at university. I wasn't too young for university intellectually, but a couple of years of maturer judgment might have improved some of my choices.) I've always been interested in science; maybe I could have done premed-MD-Ph.D. and gone into medical research. *shrugs*
August 8: If money, time, and energy were no object, what university degree would you go back and get, just for fun?
I can hardly believe I'm saying this, but if I could choose to do something for the next four years and money, time, and energy were no object, I don't think I'd go back to school. I've always liked school and been good at school--I even enjoyed graduate school, for a certain value of enjoy that included developing (benign) cardiac symptoms from stress--but I'm 50, and I don't really want to go back to school now. I feel, honestly, like I've spent all my life working hard and I have very little to show for it. If I had four years and money was no object, I'd travel, and go to museums and the theater, and read and write more, and play games. Maybe I'd take those violin lessons I always wanted as a kid. (It's not learning I'm averse to. But the formal structure of school feels like a part of my life that is over.)
If all I was allowed to do with this four years of free time and money was go to school, then, I dunno. The fields I'm most interested in, such as history, are ones where I know enough already that it would be frustrating to be an undergraduate. Hmmm . . . maybe economics? I'd like to understand economics much better than I do. Assuming I could study it somewhere where a decent number of the professors would be critical of capitalism rather than shills for it. Or failing that, something history-adjacent but more technical, like archaeology or art history.
Now, if I could wind back time and start again from when I was applying to colleges . . . well, I still remember the moment at the end of my senior year of high school when I told one of my teachers that I was going to (a good liberal arts college with a certain reputation for artsiness), and he looked me in the eye and asked, "Why aren't you going to Harvard?" One reason I wasn't going to Harvard was that no one had ever told me they thought I could. If I'd known he thought I should, I would certainly have applied--I had a huge crush on him. I do wonder what my life would be like if I'd gone to Harvard or the equivalent, and studied something sensible rather than what I decided on at 16 in the most contrary rebel-without-a-cause phase of my life. (I turned 17 on my first full day at university. I wasn't too young for university intellectually, but a couple of years of maturer judgment might have improved some of my choices.) I've always been interested in science; maybe I could have done premed-MD-Ph.D. and gone into medical research. *shrugs*
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Economic history! My economic history tutor spent a good bit of time ranting about the blind spots and preconceptions of economists. And all in a wonderful Brummie accent.
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