Ambition

I've never been an ambitious person. I had one dream growing up, I wanted to go to UC Berkeley. That, as it turns out, was a fail. Sometime in the near future I will be applying to schools again, this time as a Graduate student looking to further my studies in linguistics. No doubt, Berkeley will be one of the schools I apply to, even if my chances for getting in are slim. I won't fool myself this time, my grades aren't great and my connections are even worse. I'm completely unimpressive.

But I love this shit. Ling is something I don't really tire of. For some reason I have this strange desire to know what language really is. A great deal of people, all vastly more clever than me, have made a great deal of progress explaining this, but their theories, all of them, contain numerous holes. And it's exciting to me, knowing there is so much out there I can still learn about, so much that I could potentially explain to the rest of the community.

I want to go to grad school, I want to get published in a linguistic journal, I want to produce works (PLURAL) that will make people think or look at things in a new way. And I want that goddamn phd. I used to dream about these things, wondering what it would be like. Not anymore, I want to do them. I can't really see myself doing anything else at this point, I've been trained to do nothing of any value in college, I mean I look at vast lists of words and note interesting things about them...how the fuck is that going to get me a job.

So I'm writing this to convince myself, finally, that my future is in academics. It is in research, and more school, and there really isn't any way around it. I won't ever be part of the elite, I won't ever be very distinguished even in my field, but if I can get paid to keep looking at words and noting interesting patterns it will be worth it. If I can get the things I enjoy published it will be worth it. I love this shit. And if I love it there must be someone out there who will enjoy my work too. If I can contribute in a small way like that, hell, that will be more than enough.

Chavy...

It was hard enough with Swisher being in pinstripes...you can't not root for Eric Chavez but...shit if he's making it tough.