Humble Pie

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, mostly because of the food. My favorite parts? Stuffing, leftovers and PIE. As we've transitioned into fall my excitement for the BBQ turkey and potato salad have been growing, but not nearly as much as my anticipation for dessert. I even did what I could to twist arms into baking extra pies simply so I could indulge even more. As I whet my palate for the nutmeg-filled, whipped-cream-topped, flakey-crusted pumpkin goodness that awaits me, I've been served a very different kind of pie: the humble kind.

You see, I've never met a challenge I couldn't beat. Granted, I haven't always handled them as gracefully as I would like (namely food for houseboats), but in the end, I somehow always pull through. The second (and third and fourth...) winds of energy flow from nowhere encouraging me to keep working and keep striving.

Until now.

I'm at a breaking point. I think. Four months ago I discovered the profession made for me. It's a long-standing, well established discipline and I'm now fighting to find my place in it. I have at least two years of prerequisites in order to simply have a chance of getting into the required schooling, which will take more than another few years. I'll exit only to find myself in an internship of sorts for the next two or more years. I figured I would simply waltz back into classes and suddenly find my place again. I've always been an A student, with an occasional B from a lack of trying and a total of 3 Cs in my lifetime. This may be all about to change. I spend my nights with my nose in textbooks, and instead of listening to music as I drive I listen to lectures on electron transfer and kinetechores (pronouced kinetic-whores -- I'm still trying to find a good mnemonic to help me remeber what it does, but I can't get the whore part out of my mind long enough to be serious). As much as I'm expecting my studying to pay off, it doesn't seem to be making a difference. My goal for the next two years was to get a perfect 4.0 or something really close to it. Now I'm struggling to get an A in any one of my classes. For one of the first times in my life, there's something that I want and I'm not sure how to go about getting it. Apparently this fall I'll be enjoying a nice big slice of humble pie right alongside my pumkin. Great. Bah Humbug.