One class at a time
Juggling Life
Reign Gerritt
Issue date: 11/6/06 Section: Opinion
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I remember sitting cross-legged in the hallway waiting for my next class to start and noticing one of the instructors walking along talking with another student. The student was all smiles as she bounced alongside him and seemed to be on top of the world as she excitedly talked to him about her assignments. As I watched them, I remembered wondering what it would feel like to be that happy or to feel that carefree again.
Here I sat consumed, not really with what I had to do with my next class, but consumed with facing another very long day at the college. I fought with myself about whether or not I should just get up and leave and go home or stay and attend class (but in the back of my mind knowing if I did go home it would affect my grades). I did not want to fail a class because I had so many classes yet to complete that the thought of having to repeat even one class was too much to consider at this time.
My son was little, around 4-years-old, and it bothered me I could not be at home with him. I wanted to just be able to be a mom and had visions in my head of an old-fashioned "stay-at-home mom" baking cookies and playing with him and seeing his smiling face looking up at me.
I wanted to be the mom I was picturing in my mind, with the apron, twirling my son around, hearing him giggle and seeing his smile. Instead I found myself having to leave him for long periods of time to attend classes in order to work towards a degree. Sometimes I didn't feel like I was a good mom because I had to leave him.
"How did I end up a single mom?" I repeatedly asked myself. "How did I end up out here in college in my 30s?"
What a change from what I thought life would end up like. I silently resented that my former job experience and all that I thought I had worked for had not paid off, and I had to start over again. I also knew that at the end of this day as I left my last class, I would have to trudge out and get into an old vehicle with balding tires and a broken gas gauge that always read full so I never knew exactly how much gas I had to rely on. Each night leaving the college, the old car would make creaking sounds, like an old rocking chair would make, and many times I wondered if I would make it home safely.
Here I sat consumed, not really with what I had to do with my next class, but consumed with facing another very long day at the college. I fought with myself about whether or not I should just get up and leave and go home or stay and attend class (but in the back of my mind knowing if I did go home it would affect my grades). I did not want to fail a class because I had so many classes yet to complete that the thought of having to repeat even one class was too much to consider at this time.
My son was little, around 4-years-old, and it bothered me I could not be at home with him. I wanted to just be able to be a mom and had visions in my head of an old-fashioned "stay-at-home mom" baking cookies and playing with him and seeing his smiling face looking up at me.
I wanted to be the mom I was picturing in my mind, with the apron, twirling my son around, hearing him giggle and seeing his smile. Instead I found myself having to leave him for long periods of time to attend classes in order to work towards a degree. Sometimes I didn't feel like I was a good mom because I had to leave him.
"How did I end up a single mom?" I repeatedly asked myself. "How did I end up out here in college in my 30s?"
What a change from what I thought life would end up like. I silently resented that my former job experience and all that I thought I had worked for had not paid off, and I had to start over again. I also knew that at the end of this day as I left my last class, I would have to trudge out and get into an old vehicle with balding tires and a broken gas gauge that always read full so I never knew exactly how much gas I had to rely on. Each night leaving the college, the old car would make creaking sounds, like an old rocking chair would make, and many times I wondered if I would make it home safely.
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