Dr. Abby Miller

Today I had an epiphany. As I was working hard at making dough this morning at work, with the smell of yeast in the air, and listening to the morning guys on U93, I began to think about my future. Considering this semester flew by (like they always do), I realized that after next semester, I only have one measly year left of college. Woah. Many things will be changing even within this year. Plans are being made that will affect my entire life. My life is moving forward. And that made me very apprehensive.

But then I began to think about school. I love school so much. I love learning about all the random things in my classes, including Russian art history. A few people have recently asked me if I was going to try for my Master's. And you know what, I think I want to. Why shouldn't I? I really like school and I'm getting better grades than I ever have before. I began to think about my future job. I realized that my dream job would be to do research with a group of other psychologists. Making people take surveys and doing experiments sounds like so much fun to me. Then I realized that those kind of people usually have a PhD. Then I thought, why couldn't I get a PhD?? What's stopping me? What's the worse that could happen? I know there's the money issue, but if I go broke, I know there will be people who love me so much that they would take care of me. Even if I fail, at least I tried to attain some sort of dream.

This idea got me extremely excited this morning. What would happen if I had a PhD? Would I make a lot of money doing what I would love doing? How awesome would that be!? It seems so out of the norm from what I'm used to. I always thought I would live the cookie-cutter life by graduating college, getting married, getting a mediocre job that I didn't really like but paid the bills, having kids, living in Bremen for the rest of my life... which doesn't sound bad, but it's just too "average." But now I realize that I don't have to live like that. I can do things out of the ordinary. I can get a PhD, move away, and maybe not even have kids. It's my life and I can do whatever I want with it. I'm so excited!! :D

On another, kind of random note... why do I think that my life hasn't "started yet" just because I haven't graduated college yet, I'm not married yet, and don't have kids yet? It's weird to think that I'm not "living" just because of those things. Why do we think that "life" is all about going to work and having a spouse/kids?? Is that the best we can do? I don't know, it was just a thought I had.

Things will be dramatically changing for me in the next two years or so. I used to be scared. Now, I'm ready!