Most students realize about halfway through their high school career that they are ready to migrate to some far away land, better known to the rest of us as college. Of course you have the few students who can't wait to drop out of high school, and the thought of paying to go to more classes will never appeal to them. There is always the other students that seemed like they were ready for Harvard in the second grade; but anyways, so we all arrived at graduation last summer. I didn't have the slightest clue what that diploma really meant as I carried it away from the stage. At last I was free from adolescent bondage, homework, and detention! The summer passed so quickly I honestly don't even recall what it was I spent my time doing. So again the cycle of school and work began before I knew it. .
I had my entire future mapped out before July arrived. I applied and was accepted into The Art Institute of Houston, and I planned to conquer the three year interior design program. Watch out "Trading Spaces," you have yet to see the talent of Melissa Meehan. Well actually, I hate painting walls, and unfourtantly I still am not sure that's really what I want to do. All I knew is that art controlled my brain 95% of the time, and I should use it and make some money. It was quite a surprise when I learned how many loans I would have to take to pay for this "higher education." As a young adult with not very much credit or financial independence, a $60,000 commitment was too overwealming. My carefully laid plan was quickly replaced with a hurried scramble to find a school that I could still register for. That's how I came to find myself sitting in front of an advisor at University of Houston.
I selected my classes the day before school began, so just finding open sections was frustrating. I arrived at school with 3 add-in forms for classes, hoping to persuade some professors into letting me join. After my first two encounters with some less than helpful instructors, I was just about ready to cry.