decide what the hell I would like to do with the rest of my life

So I’m thinking about grad school and what I want to go for. I don’t really know anymore.
The possibilities, in no particular order, are:
-museum curation
-film studies
-media studies with a focus in television studies
-American history
-library science

I have about a year and a half before I graduate and need to know what I’m doing. I know technically I don’t have to think about this right now, as I have a bunch of friends who are graduating in June who don’t know what they’re doing. My parents are just so straight-forward planning people that it’s hard for me not to know. I guess it’s genetic.

So lately I’ve been thinking of moving out of the country for a little bit when I graduate. At first it was Berlin, or somewhere else in Germany, but now I’m thinking Scotland. It’d be a nice change. (Plus, from what I understand, they have Irn Bru at McDonalds!) Still, I feel like moving out of the country puts me so far behind on getting a job, since I hope to be a college professor. My area of focus is American Studies, so studying abroad wouldn’t really be possible. I could probably do some work somewhere else in a related field, like media studies or film, but I’m not sure if that’s what I want to do.

Went to the career adviser today, which was a waste of a half hour that could have been spent working on final papers. She basically told me everything I already knew about my major, and didn’t have answers to any of my questions.

I’m confident and satisfied with being an American Studies major and going on to grad school and teaching at a college level. What scares me is that I was that way for five years about being a music journalist, and now the idea repulses me. I guess it’s one of those things where only time will tell what ends up making me happy, but unfortunately, that doesn’t make my parents happy now.

So instead of going to grad school right away, I’m thinking of moving to Berlin for two or three years. I love the city and I think that after graduating would be the time to go. Otherwise, I’m just going to get bogged down with life and will never do that.

Tenative 10 year plan:
August 2007-make permanent move from Minneapolis to Chicago
June 2009-graduate from college
January 2010-move to Berlin (or Munich, or Stuttgart or wherever I feel)
Early winter 2012-move back to United States (location TBD)
Fall 2013-start grad school?
Summer 2017-graduate from grad school, ideally start teaching career

Hope that works…

I was reading in my bedroom last night and my roommate stopped in. She noted I was studying, which I sort of was (about Buddhism when I should have been reading a novel for my espionage history class). She didn’t know I had a spy class, or that I dropped my journalism major at spring break.

It’s been weird with that, because I came to college knowing what I was going to major in, and I was so confident about it. People are sort of weirded out when they find out I’m no longer a journalism major (and equally confused when they find out that I was a double major with American Studies before that).

I don’t really know what I’m getting at with this, it’s just weird to me that people identified me so much with my major.

I know I have a bit of time before I decide what I want to go to grad school for, but I keep thinking of new options. Today, I really got into the idea of library science, though I also still love American studies more. Someday I’ll figure this out.