Every graduate and professional student knows the feeling. You know, that feeling of dread when someone tells you that you have to leave the safe confines of your school’s building to find a library book, register your car, or get an ID. The Main Library? Are you sure? Can’t I just find that book at the Law Library? C’mon, I know that place like the back of my left hand. The librarians even gave me a tour and everything. What I am describing is just another part of the isolated life of a graduate student. Not isolated in the normal sense, but isolated in that your life revolves around your particular school- and nothing else.
Everything about graduate and professional school is different from the undergraduate experience. At undergraduate orientation, they gave you a map, and you reveled in the idea that with just this one piece of paper you could find the perfect place to study, go shopping, and buy books. In the isolated world of professional and graduate school, this is not the case. When I mastered the art of knowing every location at the law school, I was set. I was satisfied with shopping anywhere in walking distance, studying at the law library, and was experienced enough to know that buying books was the equivalent of throwing a thousand dollars into a money-eating dumpster.
Meeting people is different, too. Gone are the days of awkward icebreakers about choosing a major or learning someone’s hometown. Meeting friends in graduate school is strategic. Not strategic in a cold way, but strategic in that you are well aware of the fact that the people you meet can potentially become your study partners, or more importantly, they may be the people who accompany you to bar review every Thursday night. Your grades (and perhaps your safe ride home) depend on these people! Thus, while someone may seem like a nice person to befriend, their habit of studying with an iPod can be a real deal breaker.
Meeting neighbors can be a bit strange as well. Living Grad Housing is great, but the silence is deafening. Outside of an occasional scrabble game on the second floor, most people stay to themselves or hang around their small group of trusted, iPod-less study partners. The only thing I know about my neighbor is that he showers at 3AM and has a bad habit of vacuuming in the morning. Could I walk over, and get to know him better? Sure, but I don’t think he’s in the law school, so I doubt he’d be interested.
In all honesty, I do not think that the isolated life is all that bad. Having a small group of friends who have the same goals and attend the same events is often a good thing. However, every now and then, I can’t help but feel like maybe I am missing the opportunity to make some great friends or missing the chance to see some great sights when I am hastily trekking back and forth between the law school and home.
No comments:
Post a Comment