I have been quiet for a while. I have also been down, depressed, disappointed, frustrated and apathetic about this whole school thing (and not only that, but that’s a whole other topic for discussion that I won’t go into at this point). I guess I am really having trouble with adjustment – but it’s the adjustment of my expectations rather than getting used to my new surroundings that is giving me the pains. I do not like the program – to put it as simply as I can. What on paper promised to be an academically rigorous top level education, in practice proved to lack challenge and be as full of bullshit as everything else. I’d follow Tamara’s advice and try to create my own learning path in this whole schooling process. In fact it looks like the only thing I can do in order to survive the next two semesters or so. And yet, at the same time, I cannot hold down the whole “what the fuck” question – the somewhat petty, but at the same time rather tangible and legitimate concern of mine – the financial cost. To pay a fortune for what does not hold to its promise? Am I simply paying for the name rather than quality? Am I buying rather than earning this degree? Surely it’s not groundbreaking news that education is some kind of business in its own way – but can’t you be at least a little subtle about it?

At this point I’m not sure what to do about what seems to cause me such great frustration and pain. Of course I could always quit, go back to Richmond, or home, or anywhere else for that matter, get a more or less satisfying job, do something I’ve always been good at doing – the mundane, repetitive everyday tasks, without expecting any immediate rewards. Or work for a non-profit, grassroots, community based development something or another – honestly, I don’t even NEED a degree to be able to do that – so what the hell am I doing wasting time and money?

But then, what little rationality I have insists that I give it at least another month or two, bite the bullet and go on, finish what I have started because, just like my boss told me– all I need is a piece of paper saying that I’ve got a degree, I’ll be better off with it than without it. But then, I have to question how good I am in playing along the pretense game and how I will feel about myself when all is done and finished. A hypocrite? A conformist? A hopeless cynic? All of the above? I do know bullshit when I see it. I recognize it from miles and miles away. As hard as I try, I cannot quite ignore it – at this point it’s only a matter of further exercising my skills to cope with it.

Maybe I will, after all, get something out of this on top of master’s degree – the perfected skill of coping with bullshit that can always come in handy in all aspects of life. Will it be worth forty grand? I guess only time will tell.