I had it figured out

I am the typical teenager. I have received a baseline high school education and have enough experience to take care of myself. I pretty much have it all figured out. Right, Mom?

I could've smoked a pack a day!

It obviously doesn't quite work that way. But if there's one thing that I had figured out, it was what my high school counselors would refer to as "The College Process." I knew what I wanted. I didn't even visit schools. I went to Philadelphia once and checked out about eight different campuses while I was there, but that was a waste of time and money, albeit one my parents brought on themselves. You see, my brother is two years older than me and had already gone through the entire process. His objectivity and realism and borderline apathy carved out two years early the entire process for me. Along with my dad's sage advice (he is, in fact, the most down to earth being I have ever come across), I realized that in the end, it would not really matter where I go. "College is college," he would tell me. On that same note, he fully supported what I ever wanted to do, but I did not ever find a reason to put much stock into more than those three words. I wanted “the perfect place for contemplation” as well as a “protective environment within which to indulge” and nothing more (X638). I knew I could fulfill those ideals at almost any university in the country, so to be honest, I focused almost exclusively on three things: reputation, cost, and the attractiveness of the female contingency. In my mind, those were the only three criteria that I could use to discern one college from another. I was mailed at least six trees worth of literature in the form of college brochures, and they all said the same thing and had the same picture of a black, female political science major on the first page. Much like Jude Fawley, I "was an earnest and studious youth who is inspired by the example of the village school-teacher to set his heart on a place at Christminster” (X638). I could find an education anywhere, so why make that big of a deal out of it?

Well, she isn't exactly black, and this is a postgraduate brochure.
But that's the point: its dumb.

In the end I wasted a lot of time applying to way too many schools. I earned a spot on seven waitlists, was rejected at four schools, and accepted into three. So I didn't have the most successful application process, but I didn't care. I had finally heard back from the last of those schools on March 31 at exactly 4:00 p.m., and my deposit at UT was paid by 4:15.

Maybe I got lucky. Maybe its just that Plan II is that much cooler than advertised. Maybe I'm intrinsically miserable and that acid I dropped on my way down here was some good shit...oh wait... I don't do drugs... But I am happy here, and as far as I can tell, I am quite a bit happier than all of my friends at different universities. In a Jude-esque manner, I didn't quite have much success in the college process. For the minutes that existed between 4:00 and 4:o5 on that fateful last day in March, the year of our Lord two-thousand and eight, I sulked "with the awful sense" that I had "wholly disgraced" myself (Hardy 15). But that feeling of impotence, un-accomplishment, and disappointment was brief. In an anti-Jude-esque manner, I did have much success in the college process. I ended up here. Fuck Notre Dame, and I didn't even apply.

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