The view from the top

In one word, i have senioritis. I'm ready to be done with graduate school. Yeah, i've been done with taking all the classes i'll ever have to take in my life two years ago but i'm seriously starting to think my tour of duty in graduate school should come to an end. You see, i've been in graduate school for-fucking-ever. Three years in Chicago and i got a candy-ass masters degree in psychology which only serves as a prop for my party-jokes about being qualified to psychoanalyze people for cash, and now i'm starting year 5 of my quest toward a doctoral degree in neuroscience. And year 5 is when i'm supposed to graduate in this program. Now i'm pretty much on schedule to finish this year. I've got my required publications, finished all but one of my crappy experiments, and have a small, convoluted story to tell about phenotypic plasticity in a eusocial mammal (sounds pretty awesome when i can use big words to say "spine growth in naked mole-rats.") So what's the problem then? Well, i have to meet with my committee and convince them that i'm ready to be done, which may be more of a problem in my head than in actuality. Its stressful trying to summarize 5 years of research into a 2-hour meeting time but i'm sure they are sick of hearing from me as much i'm sick of these meetings. But my most concerning issue is that i've realized that i have no motivation about what i should do after graduation. I mean, i know i have to work. Staying home and raising the kids and tending to the farm is not an option for me. But i dont want a job either. I like my current schedule because it affords me flexibility and i can be home every day by 4:30 to spend time with the Dude. A real job might actually put limits on my schedule. I've already decided to get as far fucking away from basic research as i possibly can and will pursue a clinical post-doc, which in turn will help me get as far fucking away from academic science as possible by opening up a world of industry, administration, and private funding. You see, i want to work 9 to 5. I want weekends off. When i'm not at work, i dont want to think about work. I dont want to travel much. When i'm at work, i'll work fucking hard. I want to write a lot and manage large groups of people and i want to be an expert in regulations and procedures and use my skills to design and plan things. I want a lot of responsibility and I want to talk to scientists and businessmen and politicians and translate between these different languages. And i want to make a fuck-ton of money. I dont want to run experiments, or teach, or be a part of the bullshit tenure race. I'm not interested in the creative process of generating Nobel-prize winning research ideas. I want someone to give me a goal, and I'll show them to achieve it in the most awesome manner possible. I'm not a creative ideas person. That's my husband. I'm a realist and a problem solver. I need something concrete to work with, which is why i'll never excel in basic science, because i just cant pull good ideas out of my ass. However, if someone gives me a great idea, no matter how wild or far-fetched it is, i can make it reality. And i can get more done Monday through Friday 9-5 than most people can during an 80 hour week.

Perhaps that is why i hesitate to graduate. I know what i want to do and what i'm good at, but i dont see my dream job waiting in the wings. I'm pretty sure that it is out there too--its just that graduate study at an academic institution has a certain agenda, a certain assumption that we are being groomed to go on in our academic parent's footsteps and be a faculty researcher running the grants and tenure race while being underpaid and overworked. So my dream career options arent obvious, often hidden by administrators and mentors and people who want to perpetuate this great academic agenda and their research legacy, and it may take me a few years of playing "the Man's Game" to find my career. And its absolutely appalling that the PhD is the highest academic degree obtainable, but a post-doc position pays less than many factory workers make. I really have trouble accepting that I can be called Dr. Lady Head, and still make less than a high-school drop-out. And how do they justify this? By saying that you are working hard and getting shit pay because you love what you do and you're receiving this amazing mentorship. Fuck that. I believe a post-doc is just a fucking job, and if its gonna pay shitty, then the hours at least better be decent.

Yes, my graduate program has created a monster. They've produced many lovely drones, but mutations are high in inbred societies and this little aberration wants out.