All about a sweatshirt (but not really)

I frowned at the bright red garment. I tend to wear the same sweatshirt as a jacket all week for walks, then rotate the next one through. This is a red week, but it would clash badly with my purple stripey sleepy pants. I considered switching the knit pants for another color, but realized I was closer to my coat closet. Perusing my never-used winter coats and my rarely-worn midweight jackets, I smiled and reached for a gray fleece pullover. Then I headed out to take a walk, pulling out a peppermint I left in the front pouch the last time I wore the soft shirt.

“Do you remember what you were like at 22?” I asked Friend some time ago. I can’t remember where we were, but I do remember glancing over at her. She smiled and made some affirmative noise.

“Did you have everything figured out?” I continued my inquiry.

“Of course.” She replied kindly. “I was going to be a doctor!”

Briefly distracted by the horrifying thought of what med school must be like, it took a second for my self-centered nature to kick back in.

“I knew everything.” I sighed. “What do you think happened between now and then?”

I arranged a pre-open house visit to my graduate campus on the day I turned 22. That will be 6 years ago next month. I woke very early in my parents’ house, opened my presents, received birthday hugs and kisses, then assured Dad we’d be careful. Mom and I got in the car and headed northish.

After several hours, she dropped me off at the designated door, squeezed my hand and wished me luck as I clutched the printed email in my hand. The other information – careful notes on specific labs, copies of my transcripts and glowing recommendations they already possessed with my application materials, a schedule that had been memorized in order to visualize the meetings, a list of questions when I only had one I needed answered - were tucked neatly in a folder.

I entered an insanely hot entryway – it was always overly warm in those few feet of space – and moved through one more door. Straight down a hallway where I paused to face the wall at my left. There was a glass case full of photos – all the members of the department. Faculty, staff, students. Post-docs were few and far between in my graduate department. I looked at the tiny head shots and thought of how smart they all must be. How lucky they were to have been accepted – to have gained entry in a group to which I desperately wanted to belong.

Undergrad had been good to me. I was finishing easily in 4 years after changing majors before beginning my third semester. I delighted in my Suma Cum Laude status – nearly assured even before beginning my final term. I had excelled in honors courses, felt moderate stress, but was always confident in my ability. My GRE scores didn’t put me in the genius category, but they were well above average. I’d had enough involvement in extracurriculars and volunteer groups. If we decided not to speak of the subject test of the GRE (and I prayed that we would decide exactly that throughout the day), I was an excellent candidate. I even came with a year of funding! Like a free gift with purchase!

But, well, I’m Katie and I’m a worrier. I didn’t know if they would allow me to study there. I entered the office and introduced myself – beginning a day of receiving guides and handbooks, papers and descriptions of labs that I would spend hours reading after my return home. I got an agenda on pretty stationary and ran my fingers over the raised seal at the top corner. I met the chair, whose name I had carefully practiced until the strange syllables rolled off my tongue more naturally. I would train other prospective students to say it in later years when I was involved in recruitment.

Then I met with the man who would share advising responsibilities for me throughout my first year. He also chaired the admissions committee and had invited me to visit alone – before the large group of students would appear to tour the department and make lab selections. He explained the process to me – finding a mentor who not only shared my interest, but had money with which to pay me. We discussed courses and how well my background was suited to their program. I was attentive and asked all the right questions, offered all the correct responses. But my stomach was tight with the need to know my status. The committee had finished meeting – they knew what they wanted. And I needed to have the knowledge as well.

“When will I know about the admission decision?” I bravely asked. Then rapidly backed away from the information, terribly frightened about being denied something I wanted so badly. “I don’t have to know now.” I said quickly, for he let silence hang in the air habitually and I would nervously seek to fill it. “I just wondered about the timeline. I so badly want to be here.” I finished, then sat as he nodded at me.

“Katie.” He finally said after considering me for a moment. “I wouldn’t have asked you to visit unless we very much wanted you to join us next year. You’re the ideal candidate, honestly, and we think you’ll do very well within the program. At this point, we’re hoping to give you enough information to make a good decision for yourself.”

“I want to be here.” I said, quickly, sincerely and with a growing feeling of joy.

“Then you’ll be here.” He smiled and I must have glowed from the relief and happiness and overwhelming confidence that the world was full of perfection. If something happened to go badly? That was fine! Because I had somehow landed here – the heartbreaking knowledge that I didn’t get the guy was replaced with the certainty that he would have screwed up the plan that landed me in that department at that time. If I had to move away from home, I was ready. This was worth it. Lovely. Exactly right.

At the end of the day, still having boundless energy and happiness, I opened the door to the car when Mom picked me up.

“I’m in!” I announced on a giggle before I had even closed the door behind me.

“What?” She asked, already smiling back at me.

“They want me to come here! I said I would! I’m in! It’s so amazing and wonderful and right!”

“Oh, Katie.” She breathed, turning to pull into traffic. “Congratulations. You deserve this and I’m so happy for you.”

“I’m happy too! Mom, everything led to this! I’m going to learn all this amazing stuff and do research and write papers. Everyone is so smart and welcoming, and I think I know where my desk will be. I picked two labs and both advisors are excited about me. About me!”

We went for pizza. Talked and laughed over salads and campus specials – we were trying to fit in. It was the only time I ever had the campus special. When I had finished providing details about every person, lab, moment, she told me how she’d done some shopping, some driving around. She approved of the campus and general area. It was the right place for me to be.

When we returned the hotel, she handed me a shopping bag. “Happy birthday and congratulations.” She smiled.

And I peeked in the top to see my gray fleece shirt. It had a tiny seal on the left side, encircled by the name of the university. “Because you’re going to go here next year.” Mom said, her hand on my back as I pulled out the shirt to more closely examine its wonderfulness.

Whenever I wore it during that last semester of undergrad, I was reminded of how I’d figured out my life. I had a plan and though I didn’t have a job in mind, one – the right one – would certainly present itself. I would meet the right man – I had lost all the weight I needed to lose and was quite pretty. He would love me madly, of course, seeing all those qualities that the guys so far had somehow missed. It was all going to be fine. No, better than fine. Perfect.

At some point, I stopped wearing that sweatshirt. The peppermint I pulled out this morning? It was very, very old. I am different now than I was at 22. Not all the changes have been good, nor have they been all bad.

“I don’t know.” Charlie offered once. “I think the more you learn, the greater your ability to see how much more there is to know. It’s hard not to feel intimidated by that.”

I do know a tremendous amount – years of courses, research, training – both given and received...years of living have given me information and the ability to use it. I’m developing an educational plan – complete with classes I need to take – and am focused on topics I should learn. 5+ years after beginning focused study on this very topic, and I can make an impressive list of courses that I could really use. It’s hard not to feel inadequate.

And though my graduate experience was gentle compared to some (perhaps most) and my post-doctoral experience has been even more so, I’m left with all the feelings of being inadequate and wrong and lame. Maybe I didn’t deserve my degree, I mope. I don’t know how to do that! I whine. Why can’t I figure this out? I wail. It’s frustrating, and the idea that this was somehow meant to be – some great learning experience on the way to the next stage that is also meant to be? Not so much.

The job I knew would materialize and give me purpose along with more money than I could spend? It never showed up! I still don’t know what I’m doing. The man who was supposed to love me forever? Laughable. 6 years of crushes and dating, seeing friends and not being able to shift into romantic. Going to bars and deciding that wasn’t for me (though someone did once drunkenly profess his love for me. I ducked my head and walked by without making eye contact – I don’t enjoy drunk people – but perhaps that was ill-advised…), more blind dates than I care to number (though I did count them earlier - it was in February. You could click the arrow and see if it changes to a triangle!).

I think I slowly trained myself to accept the negative. The crushing feeling that I not only screwed up but that I was wrong about everything being right and wonderful? That’s just embarrassing. I hated being so wrong. And whether though self-fulfilling prophecy or just that the world sucks sometimes, expecting the worst means I’m most often right.

You won’t get that grant, I think. I don't share my negativity all that often - try mightily to remain peppy and sweet. That's probably why those feelings flow so easily on my blog. That paper is going to bounce back to you, needing revisions at best or rejected at worst, I predict. It’s hard to find faculty jobs and after you get one? That’s going to suck too. More time and energy and effort than any one person can reasonably produce.

He’s going to break up with her. She was just using him to fill time until someone better came along. They got married, but they’re likely unhappy. Isn’t she embarrassed that his job isn’t going well? See how he winced when she wore that dress to the department party! He'll cheat on her. She's delusional for believing otherwise.

People get sick. Patient 4 can’t participate in the study anymore because he’s in too much pain. The cancer came back. Do you know how frustrating and heartbreaking it is to study cancer on a clinical level? It makes me ill some days. The horror of that disease - of many diseases - just defies description.

My advisor wasn’t supportive. My computer is broken. I have another headache. I’m gaining weight again. How many times did I order pizza this week? My favorite TV show was cancelled. That book I eagerly anticipated wasn’t so good. This study should have been helpful, but the paper is indecipherable. That professor ignored me. This one made me cry.

So if I’m pushing away the negative at frequent intervals (aka all the time)? It’s because I trained myself to do otherwise. I got tired of being wrong and disappointed and decided to be right or surprised. The retraining - trying to find the balance between reasonable and positive - isn’t going to be as simple as I’d like. And while I miss facets of Katie at 22, she was also rather condescending and irritating. Perhaps by 34, I'll really hit my stride!

In the meantime, I've learned a lot. Made two amazing friends I love like sisters at 22. Published my first paper at 23 (from summer undergrad research). Left the country for the first time at 24. I found my Chienne online that same year. Went to Kyoto (gave my first conference talk) and London (all by myself!) at 25. I loved a wonderful man (but not enough), was awarded a doctoral degree and bought a house at 26. As for 27? I wrote a blog. I fell in love and it felt - for a while - exactly as I wanted. I submitted a grant (and I did work on it today). I published more of my graduate work. Connected with friends, though they're far away. Made a new one I enjoy very much (though I realized she was likely thinking "I also remember what it was like to be 27, you sanity-challenged weirdo." in the conversation I mentioned earlier).

But that's OK. At 27, I also started working on my mental health. And I still have over a month to learn to be more positive than I currently am before I start making the Age 28 list.