Saturday, March 27, 2010

Teacher in Heels Part Two

Part One is here.

My parents did a lot of things to protect me when I was a kid. They sacrificed a lot of things so that my brother and I could go to the best schools, so we wouldn't worry, so we would be safe.

I didn't live in a bubble, though. The specifics were vague, but I knew I had it good and I worried a lot about "the real world." When I went off to college I actually thought that laundry took days to complete. Really, I had no idea what even went on in laundry room. I'd also done a bang-up job at ignoring sweeping, dish washing, and mopping.

When I began thinking about my future, I kept this in mind. I was, at best, moderately good at retail jobs and knew that if I had a shot in life I was going to have to get a job doing something that made decent money. Preferably something that involved cute shoes.

I figured I'd become a lawyer. There were lots of lawyers in my family. I liked a good discussion. Lawyers make good money. Suits can be very flattering. It felt like a perfect fit. To be really safe, I intended to major in Accounting in college. Accounting also seemed like a good bet--never mind that math class made my eyes roll back in my head. I figured I'd powered through high school and I could power through some accounting--school wasn't supposed to be fun, right?

Turns out, I never got a degree in accounting, never went to law school, never even took the LSAT. Life had different plans for me--I just didn't know it yet.