Woe Is Me

Remember how I said, not too long ago, that I would soon find out what I would be doing with the next two years of my life? Well, I oversimplified. The idea was that, if I were admitted to the masters program I applied to, my next two years would be spent going to school. And, between the confidence of my boss and my boyfriend--and the program's relative obscurity--and the perceived non-shoddiness of my application--I thought I would be admitted. But I wasn't.

Now, what to do? I don't know. I have few ideas, fewer that sound easy and none that sound both easy and appealing.

I could stay at this job, and stay bored and mediocre (but comfortable!) for the rest of my life--but on second thought, I really couldn't. Another year, in fact, would be unbearable.

I could consider, in the future, applying to graduate schools in other parts of the country, knowing that accepting an (as yet hypothetical) offer from a faraway school would mean leaving someone with whom I can easily imagine spending a non-trivial portion of my life. (This is the secular skeptic's bet-hedging, anti-romantic, ultra-cautious version of "He's the One 4-ever! *gush*", I think). As far as options go, this one falls halfway between unattractive and unthinkable.

More appealingly, I could strengthen my candidacy and reapply. But I obviously didn't cut it the first time, and how much can really change in nine months?

M.'s answer is always the same: self-teach and publish. And then, go for a Ph.D.

I'll try, but I don't exactly have high expecations.

Part of my trouble is that my interests are a poor match with my temperament. My classes in college overrepresented certain populations: the frats, the sororities, and, more generally, the social types. My classmates were the kinds of people who studied politics because they wanted to be in politics, who studied international relations because they were interested in being international lawyers or businesspeople or diplomats or advocates for various causes. Such was my perception, at least. These kids spoke up in class, and participated in debate, and many of them went off to law or business school after they graduated. Those who decided to pursue politics spent their college years in a networking frenzy. They worked for their local Representatives, or at the Department of State. Meanwhile, I don't like politicians; I don't even think I like people who like politicians. I rarely like businesspeople. Hell, I don't even really like people.

I became interested in politics and IR from a theoretical, strategic, and ultimately, descriptive (as opposed to normative) perspective. I like studying, I like writing, and I like empiricism. M. says that for these reasons he thinks I am better off going into academia. But academia in the "softer" social sciences seems more political and more hierarchical than the harder sciences. And getting into an acceptable Ph.D. program would be so terribly, extremely difficult--much more difficult than the program that just rejected me.

Maybe I should look into developing new interests.

Or, if anyone reading this happens to be the editor of The Economist, I've read your Style Guide about a dozen times and I think I'd make a decent assistant copy editor.

---

At least I can't complain that it hasn't been a gorgeous winter.