The truth about adulthood: there is no real world.

There is no real world, and I am obviously not talking about the glorious smut that is on MTV (San Diego is my favorite season, Shh). That show will live on forever. I am talking about the one that they promote in middle school and high school, and really even college.  They educate you on how to write a twelve page paper the night before, survive a week on ramen and exactly how late you can sleep and still be able to beat traffic to get to class on time. Oh wait are those just mine? Moving along, what they don’t tell you is that what is happening around you as you bust your ass writing that paper, this is your life. What is happening is the real world. There is no glorious change once you graduate. There is no magical floodgate of jobs that happens to open just because, you, special snowflake, now have a degree.  I’m not hating on those that have already completed higher education, the opposite in fact.

I am about a year out from finishing my first degree so that I may be employable. In this economy that we are in however, graduation lurking around the corner feels more like a death sentence than a release into the magical world portrayed by every sitcom about being in your mid-20’s ever made.  The cruelest joke of it all is that the majority of this generation was raised on the belief of get an education and the world is at your feet. 

Sadly, this is no longer true, we have an economy where people with bachelor degrees and masters are accepting jobs at McDonalds just to have employment.

Colleges are still treating students as if this is the gold standard, you will leave this institute anywhere from 10-100 grand in debt, but it will all be worth it because the day after graduation someone, maybe even your dream job will contact you and ask you to be employed with them for obscene amounts of money, and even healthcare! This is not the truth. The truth is the harsh reality of struggling in college carries over into what they have deemed the “Real World”. So students, start saving now, because it’s gonna be a harsh reality when the new real world slaps you with it’s open palm.

This post has been brought to you by June Gloom, George W. Bush Jr. and my growing daily college debt with graduation lurking around the corner.

spelling, grammar and other nuisances

At what point do we give up and just alter the meaning of words? We seem to be willing to create words easily enough..."wassup" was just recently added to the Oxford English dictionary (p.s. thanks, Budweiser!). I'm first to admit that my online etiquette when just casually chatting or browsing is not one that portrays an air of sophistication, but I don't think that internet memes and shorthand have changed my handle of the English language. I still know the difference between your and you're (and use them correctly unless character limits force me to use the dreaded "ur").

I'm actually trying very hard to resist the temptation to write in strictly non-caps (lower-case letters are just more aesthetically pleasing!).

At work, I have had to abandon my love for the serial comma and single spaces after a period (no serials unless absolutely necessary and 2 spaces after a period ALWAYS!!!).

I think we need to go back to the fundamentals.

-k.