a mezzo-soprano's perspective on music, college, and well … everything!

i might actually have it figured out. possibly.

three months to graduation and all of us seniors are trying to figure out what to do with our lives. as i’ve expressed on this blog before, i have so many interests it’s not only hard to decide what to do at what time, but also what i should make a career and what i should maintain as a hobby.

i’m in this lovely class called senior seminar which is geared specifically toward communications majors (i’m a minor, but i needed to substitute a class to finish the requirements). here’s a quick look at the class from another blog i contribute to:

“I don’t know what I want to do with my life.”

“This just isn’t what I expected I’d be doing by now.”

“I just can’t seem to make up my mind!”

“I really want to go for it, but I’m afraid I’ll fail, and then what?”

That is just a minute chunk from my Senior Seminar yesterday, in which we all unloaded our anxieties surrounding our graduation and eventual plunge into the workforce or grad school. It was not a pretty sight: emotions splattered across the room like a horrific scene from CSI. But for a moment, as I heard eleven other people speak the same words that have been racing through my mind for the past few weeks, nay, the past few years, it was refreshing (I’d say “like the crisp lemon-lime taste of Sprite”, but I think that would be going a bit far with the product placement for one paragraph).

so last class my fellow students made lists of things they do NOT want (i missed out on this activity because i was out with the stomach flu, so i did a quick catch-up in class today) and then finding the flip side, things they do want. we fleshed that out today, and then our teacher asked to pick three or four things from the flip side, the things we DO want, that are the most important. i came up with:

• find something fun and challenging
• learn to be independent
• figure out how to balance my relationship (w/ my boyfriend) as a priority against the rest of my life
• cultivate my passions

we all shared these points, and then our teacher asked if these priorities fit in with careers we have considered. for example, someone who wants to have weekends free probably shouldn’t be an event planner. we have started compiling ideas of people we’d like to job shadow, for a project we’ll be doing later this month. this got my mind going, and i drifted off into my own little place, planning out my life. here’s what i’m looking at…

first, specifically looking at the point about balancing my personal life with the rest of my life. i realized a couple of weeks ago that while my career aspirations have fluctuated throughout my life, one thing has remained constant. since i’ve been a kid, i’ve wanted to grow up, get married, have kids, the works. relationships are really important to me, and i’m not about to throw away something good for a possible chance at a glamorous career. keeping that in mind, i think i’ve come to terms with the fact that i would not make a good true professional opera singer – one who travels the majority of the year from state to state and country to country. i’d get lonely, as silly as that sounds. it would be fun for the first year maybe, but ultimately i’d want to be home with my boyfriend/husband (and my kids if i had them). ideally i would prefer to make a career as a singer solely in the bay area, with possibly the occasional excursion outside.

i’ve also considered the stress of making money with music, and i really don’t know that i could handle it. think about it: you’re depending on singing to pay the bills – if you’re not cutting it, you’re going to be without a roof and nursing a rumbling tummy. perhaps i’m just chickening out, but singing could be better for me as a major passion and hobby.

that being said, i don’t intend on abandoning singing and music, and i still want to pursue singing as a career. i actually have some fabulous ideas of what i could do – i won’t get into those now. but i do have a plan. that plan is to graduate (yay!) and try to make the music thing work. spend a couple of years at that. if it works out, wonderful. if not, i can pursue another interest that i developed a few years ago: special education. i worked at a school for developmentally disabled students for three summers as an instructional assistant, and absolutely loved it. i loved the kids, i loved the work. it was fabulous. i can see myself being happy as a teacher by day, and pursing musical interests in the evenings and on weekends, maybe being in a choir or two, organizing occasional recitals for fun, possibly even having my own group (that is sort of related to my earlier comment of the music ideas i’ve had). my teaching would pay the bills, and leave me time to still pursue music in various forms, and spend time with my family. i’d work toward my master’s degree and my credential at the same time.

someone very smart told me that if i can do anything else beside singing very well, that i should do that (i think someone very smart told him that as well). i’ve also been apprised of the risks and sacrifices and so forth that come with pursuing a professional music career, and considering my personality and my priorities, i may not be prepared to do such things. what’s important to me is that i cultivate my passions as well as my relationships, and if it comes down to it, i’d rather maintain a passion as a serious hobby rather than let that passion become a career that destroys my relationships. it’s all still a big ball of confusion, but somehow, as graduation moves closer, aspects of this mess become very clear – and the rest of it just gets more and more convoluted. oy vey!