Where do you see yourself in 5, even 10 years? Don't you hate it when people ask you this question? Doesn't it make you feel incompetent? It does for me. I don't think it's because I am unambitious, or won't get a job -- I think it's because I know that the answer I am going to say is an answer that is almost like admission of defeat. And it shouldn't feel like defeat, because I am probably going to have a very well-paying, challenging, stable job and a nice family. So why do I feel disappointed?
If you asked me when the last time I felt truly happy was, I think I would say it was the summer before university. I was working in staff program at a camp, and loved every minute of it. I could get six hours of sleep per night for an entire summer, and still feel full of energy and happy even when I was probably the most physically ill that I have ever been in my life. Why? I felt like I was doing something helpful to others. I was getting satisfaction out of the smallest things. I was being spontaneous and creative, and, best of all, I wasn't too locked up in schedule and the system to lose sight of the things around me that I felt were most important.
I am still happy now, but I'm finding it increasingly difficult to get the same sense of real happiness, instead of a drunken euphoria, or the relief that it's finally the weekend. I think the main problem is the impression that there's not enough time. In my program, I don't have time to really get into the stuff I'm learning. I'm pretty much cramming my head full of information as fast as I can to be prepped for a test, then forget it the day after. I feel like when I get through university, I will have a piece of paper, and know that I can memorize pretty much any biochemical pathway that you ask of me, just don't ask me! Yeah, I'm getting an education, but I'm losing sight of the world around me, and I can see it happening, and I feel like I can't help it. I wonder if other people can see it, or whether they didn't have the happiness that I had in the first place, so don't feel the loss.
I was raised weird compared to most other kids my age. I wasn't allowed the video games, the fruit roll-ups, and the co-ed birthday parties that made kids excited. I spent a lot of time playing outside, making my little brother be my hunter-gatherer as I prepared mock native American food (that was probably poisonous) in a depression in a rock on my front lawn. By the time I was in grade 2, I probably knew more about nature than a graduate biology student will now. I can go into the woods, and sit down, and identify most of the plants and rocks and droppings and tracks that I see, and I don't even know when I learned this stuff. I can probably talk for hours about bark and stars and bugs, but who really wants to hear it?
The people around me that I consider some of my best friends don't understand my wonder of the world around me. To them, I'm a keener, which is one of the most looked-down-upon positions in the post-secondary level. I ask questions in class, and I talk about science and school in everyday situations! But it's not because I'm trying to show the prof or my friends how smart I can be -- it's because I am genuinely excited.
I wonder if these people have been immunized to small wonders around them by an upbringing of fast-paced television and video games. What does it matter how big the bubbles in a boiling pot of water are? You're going to get the food either way. It just works because it does. Oh my god, reality TV is so thrilling because it just is.
These people just want to punch their ticket and get on to the next step. They can't find or make their own happiness -- they need it put in front of their face with surround sound. They move too fast to appreciate little details.
