I was told by a friend the other day “you haven’t blogged in a while.”  Are we already there?  Have I already lost interest?

Maybe.  Then again, writing for an audience is a little daunting.  When I write my novels, I’m writing for myself because I’ve been too chicken to send them to someone to tear apart and reject (it’s an artist’s curse, eh?).  I’ve had friends and a couple first draft readers check them out, of course, but writing to the far reaching, intangible mystery audience can be terrifying.

My website stats even say I’m big in Germany.  Thanks, 12 people in Germany.

Moreso than it is daunting, though, the blog does kind of feel like writing a paper in college.  Now college for me was many moons ago, as old people are wont to say.  I graduated in 2010, a year late because I switched majors in my junior year (I was an education major who was finally like “uh-oh, I hate kids and now that I’m in the schools I hate them more AND I hate bureaucracy, so big uh-oh”).  When I wrote a paper, I believe it was usually a minimum of 500 words or 3 pages (you know your girl got creative with some spacing) and I actually typed it up and then printed it off for submission to the most adorable little English Lit professor in the world (Dr. Wahlstrom, wherever you are, I hope you and your cats are well).

When I switched majors, I was immediately welcomed into the English Lit world.  They were my weirdos and that was different than the music and education weirdos.  It was a good thing.  One of the first classes I had, Dr. Wahsltrom walked in and conversationally said “oh hello, wasn’t that frightful storm we had?  I expect we were all hunkered down in our various domiciles.”  We all chuckled and politely murmured in agreement.  She continued to unpack her tote bag or books and continues: “the poor squirrels were simply in their trees going AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!”  There was arm waving and unhinged screaming.  Oh yeah.  These were my people.

College was a bit of a double edged sword, though.  I loved switching to English Lit and I loved the classes and the papers and I didn’t love Shakespeare at all but I passed.  I didn’t miss the music and education department, but I did still have a soft spot for music and kept it as a minor.  I think I could have double majored but you see, college was my first experience in going “meh, it’s all the same, so good enough.”  Missed graduating with honors by like .1 but past Molly was right.  It didn’t really matter.  I got a music minor instead of a general music major and it didn’t really matter.  That’s because the best thing I got out of college was learning that I could say “no” and that all the opinions being spat at me over my years there didn’t have to become mine and I could step back and say “yo, this is fucked.” (and subsequently get told I’ll never succeed because I used the F word)

I didn’t come to this blog to trash my college experience.  Quite the contrary.  I had lovely friends.  Lovely experiences.  We didn’t have doordash or delivery robots so we had to walk to the café for food, or order Marco’s and pay with quarters and tip in booze and leftover Halloween candy (sorry, Fourtner).  Taco Bell required having someone with a car who was also sober enough to cross town and get us there.  One of my fondest memories is my room mate and friends and I sitting in the dorm and just yelling “KAREN!!!!!!!” hoping that our friend Karen two doors down would show up to take us to Taco Bell and she showed up exasperated like ten seconds later.  “Oh my God, fine, buy me a chalupa, though.”

In all fairness to Karen and the English Dept. and Shakespeare, I’m not entirely sure these life lessons were worth fifty thousand dollars, but we are a little late for that.

There were some life lessons that were well worth the money, however, and they happened AFTER I graduated, in fact.  Most of my friends in college were two years below me.  Not quite sure how that worked, but the class of 2007 was pretty cool.  So naturally, after I graduated and was waitressing ad delivering pizza, I came back to visit my friends on campus, since I was only about a half hour away and forgot how to make adult friends back home.

I went back for one friend’s senior music recital (it was lovely) and brought her a bar stool we had painted green and added ghosts to (we were weird) for a prop.  I have a memory of it falling apart on stage but I could have made that up.  After the recital was the cordial meet and greet and congratulatory lines where they make you feel like the deserved star that you are for getting up in front of people and performing.  To this day, I don’t know how I ever did that, considering going to the grocery store gets stressful and requires prep work.

I was standing around kind of awkwardly.  I knew so many people in the room but I had graduated and was that dork that came back and didn’t have any great cool stories to talk about like so many others seemed to.  I was sitting on a couch, waiting for my friend to get done receiving her accolades (and to get my bar stool back, let’s be real) and I saw a professor from the music department that I knew well talking to a girl that I recognized, but did not know well.  I don’t remember her name but let’s just call her Becky.  In fact, the only thing I knew about Becky was that she had some sort of “nervous breakdown” from the pressure of music school and had to leave for a while.  I don’t believe she dropped out, I believe it was simply time off.  The professor was asking what Becky had been up to with her time away from school and she responded to him that she was trying to relax and get herself healthy again and had been working at a gas station but recently found a better paying job at McDonalds.

This professor pat her on the arm and said in the most condescending, fake jovial fashion: “oh well look at you moving up in the world!  Speedway to McDonalds!  I bet you get free fries and everything.”  To this day I kind of hate myself for not just interrupting and playing hero and saying “honey, you’re fine, this old snob can get bent.”  Instead I watched her take it in stride, with a little palpable sadness, and say her goodbyes.  The best I could muster was channeling the show choir best I could and giving him the meanest expression I could and walking past in a dramatic loud rude huff.  It’s okay, 2011, Molly.  You’ll open your mouth later.  I promise.

As I walked away, I ran into a professor I adored and she greeted me, said she was glad to see me, and asked what I was up to these days.  I lied horribly and said I was the general manager of a fine Italian dining restaurant (I really truly might have said “Marco, uh, pizzettis” – it’s very fine dining, you’ve probably never heard of it).  Dumb?  Yeah, of course, but I just watched poor Becky get absolutely destroyed and even though I was talking to a woman with much more class than the other guy, I was still too scared to say out loud “yeah, I deliver pizzas and have no idea what I’m doing, but at least I get free cheesy bread.”

The year prior, I had a similar encounter as Becky did, as I was getting ready to graduate, though the professor involved wasn’t nearly as mean spirited.  I was taking instrument lessons still, for my music minor credit, and during one of the last ones was asked if I was continuing music school like I had planned (I had some cockamamie plan to finish my English degree and then go back to music school elsewhere?  Like money and financial aid and jobs just grew on jobies?).  I told him no, that I hadn’t gotten financial aid since I already was graduating with the English degree and that I would simply be graduating and going home and working at the truck stop until I figured out what’s next.  This professor simply nodded and finally said “that sucks.”  I don’t think I stuck up for myself.  I think I just shrugged and said “yeah.”

But you know what, sir?  It didn’t suck.  None of it post-college sucked.  Or at the very least it sucked less than having self-important assholes turning their nose down to one’s life decisions simply because it, what?  Disappointed them?  Sounded horrible to them?  Wasn’t prestigious enough for them?

I’m proud to announce that I have moved up in the world.  So did the girl working at McDonalds, for that matter (as long as she didn’t go back and cater to the opinion of these people).  I wouldn’t give up those taco trips for the world because every single thing we do makes up who we are today, for better or worse.

I did learn to open my mouth when something was unfair, even if it meant being a pariah to the whole institution.  I was a good kid in my small town, blue collar farm centric high school and suddenly a mouthy bad kid in college with an attitude problem and “colorful language.”  In college, I learned there are some mean people out there who only want to bring you down to feel better about themselves.  I learned that bullying wasn’t reserved solely for twelve year old boys.  I learned that standing up for yourself and standing up for others was the best practice, because the silence otherwise is deafening.

And just like my college papers?  I have no idea how to end these things, but at least I cleared my 500 words.

Music you should be listening to:
The Fiddler and the Devil– Bella’s Bartok
I Wanna Get Better – Bleachers
For No One – Houndmouth

As always, this panhandling starving artists works for tips.  Think of it like busking.  With text.

Venmo – @Molly-Finch-7
Cashapp – $mfinch09
Paypal – @molly2009