I was sitting in my room one night, knee-deep in papers on Shakespeare and art of the Renaissance, when it suddenly occurred to me that since I've gotten to college, I've done a lot more writing about art than producing art. It's not only art, though ? I feel like I have been unproductive in general. I feel as if the world has been passing me by, and I merely get to sit and watch it go as I trudge through useless classes of Economics and English.
I suppose this is just another complaint of "why do we need to know this?" but I can't help but feel that I'm useless, and it's not all my fault or my laziness. It's as if I am too busy writing papers about art to be able to actually do anything worthwhile myself. Who's to say that I couldn't have written something worthy of the Pulitzer Prize in the time that I've been writing papers about Othello and Keats? I could have filled art galleries if I'd been painting and drawing instead of writing about Albrecht Durer and Michelangelo. It's not just a matter of time either; it's about energy. Who has the energy to do anything else after writing pages and pages of papers or studying for tests? And after writing pages of papers, the last thing I want to do is sit down and write some more, even if it's just for me.
The problem I am finding with college is that it's just a lot of talk. There's very little action and everything I am doing for college is pretty worthless and useless. I'm sure you have all heard complaints about the high cost of education. I can't go home without my mother asking me where the hell her $17,000 per semester is going towards. It's not that I don't think I've learned anything, because I have (although memorizing my Social Security number is still my biggest accomplishment in college). I just don't feel that 1) I'm learning enough to be paying all the money I am and 2) that I'm doing anything at all. Face it, we're college students. A large part of my life, and probably yours, involves sitting around lazily, watching movies and eating pizza and Chinese food.
I'm not quite sure what we're all working towards. It's as if we're all in this huge race towards a 4.0 GPA, but what is really the point of that? I came to college to learn, to better myself, to get an education, but I feel like I'm just working to get an A on my next paper. I feel like a sellout, like I would write anything to get an A, even if I don't agree with it. I'm just regurgitating knowledge from my professors, from books, from Sparknotes; I'm not being creative or original in any way. I thought college was about finding an opinion and having enough education and knowledge to back it up. I never expected to turn into just another student working towards a 4.0, and being upset with myself when my GPA is significantly lower than that.
I feel like this past semester, I've done more work and improved my writing than in other any semester so far in college. Yet my grades this past semester were lower than in previous ones. And it's not because I didn't do enough work or that I took easier classes. This leaves me with an incredible dilemma ? have I been successful because I feel my writing has improved? Or was I a failure for not getting good grades? And I guess this is the great college dilemma- what makes you a success? Because I don't think it's the good grades ? we came to college to get an education, not grades. But somehow, it seems that success has become defined through one's GPA, instead of knowledge.
I came to college to learn, to make a difference in the world. Unless the next paper I write changes the course of literature forever, I really doubt that's going to happen. And if you're anything like my mother, you're just going to argue that I'm lazy and should get off my butt and do something worthwhile. Unfortunately, I don't think I can. You see, I have to go back to work to get that 4.0 GPA because then maybe my parents will think they're not wasting the $17,000 they're spending on me each semester.
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