:: The Blurst of Times ::

:: 8.22.2004 ::

On On Liberty

So I graduated from college. Big deal. And I got a job with a big [faceless?] corporation. Big deal. And I’m very apprehensive about the future. Big deal. This happens to everybody, Fred. You aren’t the first kid to wonder how many more times you’re going to see the Price is Right now that you work five days a week. You’re not the first one to go from thinking about buying plane tickets to Europe to thinking about buying a living room lamp that matches your sofa. You’re not even the first one to fret about your future and what is in store for you, wondering if you will ever live up to what you told yourself you would become.

No, I’m not the first. But that didn’t stop me from thinking about why I’m apprehensive, why it feels different to graduate from college than it does to do any other thing I have ever done before. And I think I’ve pegged it.

Learning has come as easily to me and breathing. For this, I know I have been blessed, and I have been grateful for it every day of my life and have never allowed myself to take this ability for granted. Since the beginning, I knew that I could learn everything that I wanted and all I had to do was open my mind to it. And for the first 23 years of my life, I placed myself in an academic setting - an environment specifically created to educate. There was nothing to it. All I had to do was show up and people were standing there with big buckets of knowledge (or small buckets, depending on who was standing there) ready to dump into my gourd.

Now, I am out of that academic setting. I’m scared that I’m going to stop learning. Someone once told me that if you aren’t green (referring to being new, inexperienced, young, or learning), you’re dying. It made sense in that classroom and it’s words I take to heart today. I always want to be green, but now that I am outside the academic community, I’m afraid that I won’t And it’s easy to say ‘Well, Fred, for chrissake, just keep learning.’ But it isn’t that easy. On the outside, you lose the forum, you lose the constant battle of ideas, you lose the midnight involuntary brainstorming that comes from constant deadlines and unachievable goals. As compromised and devoid of originality as the academic community I was in sometimes seemed, there was always a challenge if you allowed yourself to face it. And I enjoyed facing that challenge, challenging myself and others if I could.

So I read Mill, and Nietzsche is next, and after that I have Plato, the Christian Bible, and James Joyce to conquer. I’m intimidated, but I plan on taking it on as a learning experience. If there is anyone out there who would like to participate in a forum about any of this with me, I welcome (with open and hopefully arms) all comment, public and private, critical and analytical, anything to re-create the academic atmosphere.

I doubt that I’m able to stay out of school for much more than five years, no matter what happens. There is too much I want to be, to learn, to see, and to do. But I cannot allow myself to be sucked into a routine based around my job alone. I will use this blog as the fodder for the public forum, so I hope everyone out there has something to say and says it.

“Max sees his world through the brightness, eyes to learn, hope to glow in the dark...”
:: Freddy F. at 10:02 PM [+] ::