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July 18, 2005

Maybe if the HD position had included making bulletin boards, I would have lasted till May...

Today, as I was paging through Martha Stewart Living (hey, everyone needs a packing break, and I could justify this one because I was going to throw it away when I was done), I found myself tearing out ads for alcohol and setting them aside "for when I do that One Last Drink bulletin board again." And then it hit me. I'm really never going to be an RA again. I will never again have the opportunity to use my skills in cheesy displays of Important Valuable Information for the rest of my life.

I became an RA because it seemed like a very Me thing to do. It involved knowing more than my residents, being a listening ear for scared freshmen, getting a large single room, and best of all, creating the world's cheesiest bulletin boards and door decorations. It was so easy to disguise my love of clipart and shadowed block lettering under the guise of a "requirement". I was able to impart information that I actually cared about while pretending I was just fulfilling a requirement of the position. I could make the bulletin boards as cheesy as I wanted, because that's what they're supposed to be. I could secretly spend hours upon hours holed up in my room making the most ridiculously complicated door decs without anyone realizing that I lived for that crap.

I don't have anything like that to relax me these days, something to mindlessly focus all my nervous energy on while completely ignoring all the stress of the rest of my life. Maybe that's what I've really been missing for the last two years. Maybe I don't need meditation or exercise or reading or bad reality television. Maybe despite the emotional torture that came with some of the other parts of my RA job, it was worth putting up with.

Maybe I should consider a career as a kindergarten teacher after all...

Posted to Oberlin at July 18, 2005 09:07 PM

Comments

Yes, go ahead and link to me. Use whatever name you like. :)

I'll link right back to you. :)

Posted by: Stacia at July 21, 2005 09:26 AM