27 January 1999

Having It All

Excerpted from an email to a journal buddy

It seems that in some ways we're in a similar pickle these days ...

I feel like crying right now myself.

I just gave notice at my job -- my first job out of college, to take a better paying position that will let me continue my graduate education.

This past week has been filled with indecision and doubt -- not knowing what was the right choice: dropping school or dropping work, staying where I felt safe and secure or moving on to try something new.

Finally last night after a long talk with one of the older (like my dad's age older) grad students, I realized that changing jobs was the best option for me.

I wound up backed into a corner you see:

I have to work full time in order to be able to pay off credit cards, pay rent, eat and all those basic necessities.

However, this leaves barely any extra money left over at all. Certainly not enough to pay for school.

So I applied for and got a research assistantship at the university I'm attending. Full tuition paid. Except that I have to take a full time course load. And do research 10 hours a week for a professor.

My grades just aren't as good as they should be, my work at work isn't stellar and I missed too many days and got in trouble with my boss.

But the full-time course load is a university requirement for all merit awards.

To boot, my house is a mess my relationship with my SO is fraying and I was averaging 4 hours of sleep per night and often forgetting to eat altogether.

On the up side I lost 10 pounds.

On the down side, I was well on my way to a nervous breakdown.

So I had to choose -- stuck as I was, I found a compromise solution which isn't the ideal for everyone.

I took the new job which is at another local university, pays a bit more than the one I'm at with a 5-10% raise in 3 months and 2 free classes per year at the university (consortia are wonderful things).

But I had to give up the research assistantship. I just couldn't carry a full course load any longer.

And I had to give notice at my current job.

For some odd reason these were both very hard things to do.

Last week I was crying because I couldn't find a way out of this mess. Now I'm crying because all of a sudden, the solution I found just doesn't seem good enough.

I guess the lesson simply is, that I just can't have it all, no matter how badly I want it.