Time and Hard Work

“Gaga, you my best friend girl!” I look up and smile at my two-year-old god-daughter, Kylee. She’s watching her favorite cartoon “Doc McStuffins,” a show about the everyday adventures of a toy doctor, and she decided to hit me with the best line I’ve heard all day.

Gaga, short for god-mother, is the name she’s been calling me since she first learned to talk. Tall for her age with beautiful black, kinky hair and a feisty personality, this miniature human is easily my favorite person. In the living room of my mother’s home, sprawled across her big red sofa, I’ve been trying to finish my writing assignments for the last half hour. Adorably distracting, Kylee’s interruptions have been in constant rotation every 5 minutes, this last declaration being my favorite. I reply, “I know I am, and you are mine!” She laughs victoriously as if she just won a prize, then turns back to the television to talk to “Doc McStuffins.”

I put my homework away. It’s not happening right now. I have another three hours before I’m done babysitting. After which I’ll have to work one of my jobs as a retail sales associate until 10PM. My assignments are due in the morning. This means that I have a long night of fighting sleep and chugging Red Bulls ahead of me to get it done.  The life of a college student is full those nights. I wince a little at the knowledge that sleep will be minimal tonight. This is the life I’ve chosen.

Although my junior year at UW-Milwaukee has just started, it’s proving to be my most challenging yet. My schedule has been full with little to no downtime. With working not one, but two jobs, being in school full time, looking after Kylee a couple days a week, spending time with family and trying not to completely let my social life fall to the wayside, I’m being stretched thinner than a thin crusted pizza. Mmm, pizza. I think that will go nicely with my red bull tonight.

I’m not sure there’s anyone who has attended college that doesn’t use the word stressful in their list of adjectives used to describe it. Of course everyone’s experience is different, but it seems like stress is a mandatory part of it. For me, the stress comes with making time to finish homework and meet deadlines with so many other things going on around me. Time management is skill I am desperately trying to master. I struggle to find ways to balance it all without wearing myself out, but it’s overwhelming! I’m sure there a way to ease the tension; I just have to find it.

As I started to count down the hours of my sleepless night, I began to wonder, why am I doing this? Do I really need a degree? Do I really need to graduate? Of course I already knew the answer to these questions was “yes”. My degree will give me better opportunities for financial stability. In this day and age, you need a college degree to have a career that not only pays well, but pays well in the field of your choice. I want a career in fashion journalism. That’s why I am here. My time at UWM will significantly increase my chances at achieving that.

Sadly, there are lots of people that are stuck working a job that they despise just to make a living, simply because of their limited education. There are a lucky few who were able to beat the system and have financial freedom without furthering their education. Everyone isn’t able to live that life.  One of my worst fears is spending forty years of my life working a job, like my current one in retail sales, that does not fulfill me.

So, I go to class. I go to work and spend my lunch breaks catching up on homework. I squeeze in family and friend time when I can.  If I’ve had a busy week and am only left with one last night to finish an assignment, I stay up late, like tonight. This journey to my dream job as a fashion journalist has been long, and at times, grueling.  One thing my mother always taught me is that anything worth having takes time and hard work. In the end, when I can finally write professionally, I know it will all be worth it. In the mean time, I’ll finish watching the rest of “Doc McStuffins” with Kylee and prepare myself for another typical, homework filled night that I, as a college student, am all too familiar with.