Starship Asterisk*

I'm feeling terrible about myself for having sat around for the last 5 years in New York doing next to nothing with my life. I'm 30 years old now and I am worried it is just too late to get into anything at this point. I know people will always tell you you can do whatever you want whenever you want but that doesn't stop the creeping feeling that it's still too late. I am not going to commit to staying in NYC for any longer than I need to and it looks like another year and a half maybe and Pat (my significant other) will be done with his fellowship and then we can get our butts in gear and move out of this overcrowded land. Therefore, I can't just start going to school right here. This city has been a major drain on me and it is very depressing so I just couldn't put myself through staying any longer than I have to. I'm not even sure where we are going to move when it's finally all done I hope to move to Oregon or some kind of forested, mountainous area.

Anyway, I don't feel like I even know anyone I can ask for advice from. I just don't know anyone to talk to. I haven't had a job for a while and I feel estranged from just about everyone other than people I've met online. I'm just hoping you guys are a lot more experienced and wiser than I am. Am I barking up the wrong tree, here? I probably am because I feel completely lost.

I want to try biology, I think, but it's hard to say since I just have had so little experience. I do, of course, also have a general interest in astronomy but I'm not sure how far that really goes. It's hard to say but I'd probably be better off in some kind of terrestrial science. I don't even know what it means to major in biology. What happens after that? I'm searching for something to keep me mentally stimulated and interested in life, not necessarily some job where the point is merely to make money in the day and go home at night.

How did I even get this way? I've gone from living in a very underwhelming, tiny town where I went to high school and college for my Associate's and didn't get to experience much beyond the basics of education to meeting Pat and moving to New York City where the people and all the buildings and things here are totally overwhelming and stifling to me. Please help me, interweb friends.

geckzilla wrote:Please help me, interweb friends.

A couple of questions: what is Pat going to do? Will he be in an academic environment? And are you interested in ultimately working in industry, academic research, education, or something else?

How about astrobiology ?


http://www.astrobiology.com/

It won't help you for a person in her sixties to tell you that 30 is just no age and that you can do pretty much anything that you choose to. But I'll say it anyway.

I've looked at your website and written to you about how good your art work is. How much enthusiasm do you have for that?

Now look, you've been really open here, so I'm going to be open back:

When I got disabled back in the nineties I was pretty cheesed off with the state of affairs, and the worst part of it was the BOREDOM of doing nothing. Not the pain, not the wheelchaitr. The lack of doing anything other than just washing and feeding myself. And no company.

And 'company' is not the same thing as people being around you physically. I have lived in London and have never felt so isolated as in those huge scurrying, over-busy crowds, all interested in things (money, status) that just have never been of any importance to me.

I got in a bad way with depression, and I'd love to be able to give a chipper tale of how I got myself out of it, but I can't. But I did realise that I had to get some movement of some kind going. I felt like a sailing boat stuck in the water with no wind. In that situation ANY movement is better than none.
So I volunteered for whatever I could manage to do (staffing the phones at a local charity) and took up bird- watching. And signed up for a year-long course in something. As it happens, it was pottery, but it could have been art, Serbo-croat, crocheting, drama - absolutely anything that would get me out of my head and out of my house for few hours a week.

And a year is a huge length of time - you can play with off-the-wall ideas whilst waiting for Pat to finish his commitment in NY.

OK. That's my two-pennyworth. Send a PM if you'd like to and I'll happily give you my email address.
Margarita

geckzilla wrote:I'm feeling terrible about myself for having sat around for the last 5 years in New York doing next to nothing with my life. I'm 30 years old now and I am worried it is just too late to get into anything at this point.

A couple of years ago, at the ripe old age of 63, I started to work on a degree, a science major no less, which looks like it will end up being Astrophysics. My goal is to be the oldest Astrophysics grad at this university, if not the oldest ever. So you won't get any sympathy from me for the idea that at 30 it might be too late. (But you do most sincerely get my sympathy for the general feeling you seem to have, of having wasted time. I know that one all too well!)

I would suggest, since you have more than a year available, and because you obviously have an interest in science, that you take the first year (or as much of it as you want) of a science degree. Such work is transferrable to other institutions (I would hope) so you needn't look at it as a multi-year committment to New York. And it will get you out and about, meeting new people, and stretching the mind (always a good exercise in and of itself.) I guarantee it will improve your mood enormously.

Rob

A friend of mine got his BS here(online). Take a look!
http://www.tesc.edu/
“If we did all the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves.” ~ Thomas A. Edison

Chris Peterson wrote:

geckzilla wrote:Please help me, interweb friends.

A couple of questions: what is Pat going to do? Will he be in an academic environment? And are you interested in ultimately working in industry, academic research, education, or something else?

He seems to like the ICU and critical care a lot and I know he wants to do that. I asked him and he doesn't have a preference as long as it involves critical care. But he has only ever been at an academic hospital so I'm not sure he'd know for sure until working outside of one. Despite that, people around him have pegged him as the academic type. Where he goes does definitely weigh heavily on where I go since he's already established himself in the world. But there's hospitals everywhere so it would seem like there should be a lot of convenient convergences and that it would only be a matter of finding the right spot. It would actually be really interesting if I could somehow do work that relates to his work but I'm not sure how that would happen since I have absolutely no interest in caring directly for sick people. I am having a hard time even coming up with options for what I want to do. I only know I don't want to service businesses because that kind of work feeds my cynicism which is not something I need more of.


Moonlady: hah, yeah, the best of both worlds, right?


Marg: Aw, thank you for your kind words about my work. You might have noticed I haven't done much art in the past few years, though. My interest in that subject has definitely waned. Hubble data processing is the most interesting thing in that area to me lately. I have run into a bit of a block in that too though because I lack some of the cool resources like alternative data to fill in gaps with and otherwise feel my lack of education holding me back as well. I often stare at them and wonder what I am really looking at and remember that it's a work of art second and a work of science first.

I'm sorry to hear about your disability. Things could definitely be worse for me, I see. I hope I don't seem too petulant.


Rob: I think I remember you mentioning that a while back. I'm definitely not going to look for sympathy from you, then! Haha, how are you liking it so far? I wonder if there are some kind of online courses I could do that could get some of the more basic things out of the way since I don't have a car or space for a car here to physically commute. Or does anyone take online class credits seriously? Hm...


Stephen: Yeah, some online courses might be helpful.

Pat could be in academia and critical care if he got a position at a teaching hospital. Teaching hospitals would also perhaps have biological research centers. The problem with working in research is it generally requires more advanced degrees. If you have any interest in chemistry, perhaps you could go into biochemistry or pharmacology.

The Pacific Northwest would be a wonderful place to be, especially west of the coastal mountains.

geckzilla wrote:Rob: I think I remember you mentioning that a while back. I'm definitely not going to look for sympathy from you, then! Haha, how are you liking it so far?...

It's been great, though not entirely free from difficulties. For one thing I had to do a fair amount of prep work, taking Pre-Calculus I & II, as well as both University Prep Chemistry and Physics, before enrolling in the big U. These are offered locally as refreshers for someone like me wanting to finally go to university. They cover the last two years of high school work. I'm VERY glad I took them -- things have changed since the 60s!

Then last year I signed up for first-year Calculus and Physics, thinking that if young students can manage five subjects at once, surely I could manage two. Hah! The old brain couldn't keep up with both, so I dropped Calculus and went on with Physics, which I passed. This year I ignored Calculus and took Intro to Astrophysics, doing very well. It's my geek spot. But now I have to face the music, so Sept. will find me back in the Calculus class. Assuming I get that over with, the following year I'll finish up my first-year work with English and Chemistry, or maybe Geology. Then, having taken four years to get one year of work done, I might speed up a little and try to get my second year done in only two years.

One of the best aspects of school is meeting new people who are interested in the same things I am. That didn't happen too much in the Physics class because there were over 100 students there. But Astrophysics had only 13 students, so I got to know a few of them fairly well. The odd aspect of these new friendships is that they will all be graduating about the time I finish my first couple of second-year courses.

One final observation, which may be unique to me for all I know. Back in the misty past I hated school. I find I still do. Back then I loved learning. I still do. I can't help but feel those two opposite-seeming reactions are linked somehow, but I try not to dwell on it. I'm more mature now, just a little, and I can get through the days without becoming worn down by the sillier aspects of 3-ring-binderism.

Rob

OK, that might be sneaky of me, posting that, but I think that is beautiful, and at least as good - to my eye - as half the images we have as Apods.

By the way, I hadn't realised that the fact of my being disabled was news - I wasn't wanting to lay a "oooh, my girl, you don't know how lucky you are!" message on you! (Err, we need a YUCK or BARF emoticon, please. Finger down throat image would do nicely!)

The point I was making is that sitting around doing nuthing leads to sitting around doing nuthing. My experience is that I had to get some activity going, and it didn't matter what. THEN some idea of what the direction was going to be began to emerge.

The college that Stephen posted looks very good - so much so that I've emailed them to see of they take non-US residents as students.

Keep us posted!
Margarita

Rob, you wrote

One final observation, which may be unique to me for all I know. Back in the misty past I hated school. I find I still do. Back then I loved learning. I still do. I can't help but feel those two opposite-seeming reactions are linked somehow

Have you read "The De- schooling of Society" by Ivan Illich?
It made such a lot of sense to me when I read it, oh, twenty-thirty years back. From what I remember - which, having a brain that is nearly 65 years old may have little to do with what Illich wrote - it was that the way education is organised is to funnel information into young brains and then stand back and expect it to be used during the rest of life. But we don't learn the stuff when we have a felt need for the knowledge so it goes in one ear, stays long enough to be off-loaded onto an exam paper, and then disappears.
But, when we have a felt need for some knowledge, we absorb it and make it part of us.

Another point, tho I'm not sure if it's his or mine, is that the process of learning gets perverted into the process of acquiring status medals that give access to careers. So the pure love of finding things out (now, WHO said that...?!} gets lost within the requirement to remember accurately the stuff that the examiners are likely to ask about.

During the time when I was flailing about trying to find a life that didn't involve being a social work manager, I took a university course in seventeenth century English history. I got really fascinated by the metaphysical poets and began asking questions about them. I was appalled that the teacher choked off the questions with, "You don't need to know about them - they won't come up in the exam." Without even the possibility of some extra-curricular study.

Mmm, this is a bit of a mither, and no help to Geckzilla!
Margarita

Rob: Was it the same for high school as university for you? For me I hated high school with very little exception. Not a lot of like-minded people around. I loved college, even though it was just a technical university and wasn't precisely what I needed in the end, I suppose, but that took a while for me to figure out. Still, being around qualified teachers and people who cared about things beyond carnal delights was great. Just to contrast my calculus experience with yours, I thought I hated math or was just not great at it until this one particular teacher (the aforementioned little exception to my disdain for the place) in high school. The man just had a way of teaching that corresponded with my way of learning and I did very well without much effort. Still, "AP" at that school was probably "average" at one of the more advanced high schools. Pat tells me his high school really strained him at times but I don't feel like I'm much smarter than him.

Marg: You didn't come off like that at all. You were just sharing your life experience with me. It does help to have some perspective on things. I guess we're both doing alright with food in our bellies and the right to do as we please in life within whatever boundaries have formed around us. At least we aren't being shunned by society for trying to be something other than kid factories.

At least we aren't being shunned by society for trying to be something other than kid factories.

When ever I feel sorry for myself I watch this video, and feel SO inspired at the effect just one small person can have.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCovWU3LuKE

I always loved school and learning. I was lucky in that I never found school particularly difficult. My lowest grades were always in classes I just wasn't interested in. Part of my success was a different approach to classes. Most of my friends were there to "make a grade". My approach was always to learn. The grades took care of themselves. I always hated classes and teachers who taught by rote and memorization. To me that just wasn't learning. I would love to find someone who would pay for me to go back to school. Books and tuition are just too expensive, anymore.

bystander wrote:I always loved school and learning. I was lucky in that I never found school particularly difficult. My lowest grades were always in classes I just wasn't interested in. Part of my success was a different approach to classes. Most of my friends were there to "make a grade". My approach was always to learn. The grades took care of themselves. I always hated classes and teachers who taught by rote and memorization. To me that just wasn't learning. I would love to find someone who would pay for me to go back to school. Books and tuition are just too expensive, anymore.

Yes! Yes!
I didn't have a standard education (hospital took precedence during childhood) but was able to catch up as a teenager. I was blessed with some wonderful teachers, at a tiny college in the sticks, who were able to generate in me a deep love and enthusiasm for their subjects that continued long after I'd completed the formal course.

I think that they set a really high standard which other teachers (including some at the prestigious university where I did my Master's degree) didn't always live up to.

Margarita

geckzilla wrote:Rob: Was it the same for high school as university for you?

All the way through, in fact. I was sent home from Kindergarten for telling a friend, a little too loudly, what I thought of spending time doing "I'm a little tea pot...". I got the strap in Grade 7 -- back in the good ol' days when teachers were allowed to beat children they couldn't reach -- for expressing my boredom in overly colourful language where the principal could hear me. I regularly hopped out the window, really, in high school chemistry class to go and do something useful: play pool for money. So a stellar student I never was. Though when the mood struck -- that is, when the subject was interesting and the teacher and I clicked -- I could ace most anything I put my mind to.

The one thing that drove me to distraction then, and does still, is memory work for its own sake. There's always an excuse, but the real reason for it is so the teacher/school has something measurable to test. That is still the case, even in university. I did well in Physics last year because there was a significant proportion of on-line homework, as well as labs, so I could work at my pace until I understood the work. And in the exams we were given a sheet of formulae to use, not being expected to remember them all. Very sensible. But Calculus! Nothing but memory work from beginning to end. I actually understood the concepts quite well, but 85% of the final mark came from the two exams, and I can't remember that much abstraction that quickly, on demand, so I withdrew before getting an F. I'm sussing out alternative Calc courses/profs right now, in hopes of getting the credit and moving on to more interesting things.

I don't want to make school sound as bad as I just made it sound. There were a host of reasons for my behaviour back then, the ways of schooling being only part of the picture. I do love learning, so I'm determined to make the system work for me -- this time.

Rob

Doesn't Feynman say something extremely caustic in one of his books about the wasteful nature of being required to memorise lists of facts?
Margarita

At least we aren't being shunned by society for trying to be something other than kid factories.

Dont let yourself reduce to something you dont want to! Lots of people around us tell how and why we should live.
If you got motivation to take classes at a college, do it, start in a department where you think you will have fun and if that's not what you like,
try others.

I went to schools in a country with a unique public education system, you know the cast system in India? Its similar.
In Germany kids are divided after elementary into three categories (besides the enabled ones).
The first category is for basic knowledge, which is totally useless later, graduation is after nine years,
a teenager hardly gets a chance for an apprenticeship. The most school drop outs are from this category.
The second category was better off in the nineties, besides basic knowledge and better books, the
focus is not only in manual craft training but to analyse a little, graduation is after ten years.
The third category is for kids which were good in elementary school, get from the fifth school year better
education. Graduation is after thirteen years.
The Division of the kids into more homogenic groups from early age blocks kids to develope better.
Its nearly impossible to change later in the years from the first and second category into the third category, because
the lack of knowledge is too big. The group dynamics have a big role in the behavior of teenager.
In the first category students are from families who have emigrated and the parents usually dont have a good education and
cant speak German.
the teachers are confronted with frustrated kids and come from families who cant help their kids even in the elementary school.


I went to the school from the second category from the fifth grade on, till I graduated after ten years.
My teachers actually wanted me to go to the first category where all kids from emigrated families go,
they said that I would have to marry because my parents are traditional and very religious and that I should
not make trouble because I want to go to the second category school.

As a kid I couldnt speak German well, but at one point, I didnt want to give up my life, I started to listen
German news carefully and later I found a German dictionary which I red as if it was a novel.
I wanted to go to highschool and after some dispute with my headmaster
and passing some tests, I went to high school.
I had to repeat the eleventh grade, the gap of knowledge was too big, my marks were not
bad but the teachers thought, if I would be patient enough to repeat the year, I could pass the final
exam.
My parents wanted me to marry when I was 16 years old. I wanted education and independence. THey didnt think I would pass the tests at school.
I had most of the time actually fun at highschool, though it wasnt easy for me. I took classes not only because of my interests but I knew some
teachers and their teaching skills, so I quit taking chemistry as one of the major subject.
I loved to do research and writing papers, I learned that way the most. I wrote extra papers for better marks.

Since my parents didnt want to support me, I worked at weekends and school holidays in a nursing home.
Besides money, I had first hand information about the WWII from the seniors.
I had to volunteer in the mosque, where my sisters are preachers at weekends, my time for school
was limited, but I did the best I could under the circumstance.

After highschool, my parents thought I would give in and marry, my older sisters were extremely jealous that
I graduated from highschool. When I announced that I wanted to go to the university to study biology,
they made my life more terrible. I studied three years biology.
I quit because of financial problems.
After some time passed I got a stipend for medical school and become a nurse for intensive care unit.
My family wasnt happy because I became financial independend and had a better education and knowledge
they couldnt control.
After my graduation I left my family, actually I fled and hide because I wasnt allowed to make my own judgement and choices
and my views about politics and believes are totally different from theirs , I had to leave the clinic I worked because
they wouldnt let me be in peace.

I went back to university to study human medicine, I was 28 years old when I started.
Had to quit after three years because of financial problems.

My health didnt allow me to work full time, I got pain everywhere, psychosomatic, my physicians and therapists were shocked
to see me like that and made me retire from my profession for a limited time so I can recover completely.

I had positive feedback from fellow students at medical school after they knew that I was the oldest in my class. I was 'the mom'
I had positive feedback too when I went to university again around my thirties.

If I would get the opportunity in the future to finance a study at a university, I wouldnt hesitate a second. I would like to
get finally a degree/master in biology / neuroscience.

Oh, Moonlady. My mouth has dropped wide open.

With shock,
- with admiration.
---- What a STAR you are!

We tend not to do this on this forum, but
{{{{A BIG HUG}}}}

X Margarita

I'm so, so, so impressed, Moonlady.

The obstacles you've had to face and the courage and perseverance you have had to muster in order to overcome them is - well, I'm awestruck.

Indeed, what a star you are, Moonlady! We are honored to have you on board the good ship Asterisk*.

And you deserve a big hug indeed!!!

Ann

Thanks for your kind words

I give myself credit for being very 'bullheaded'

Too bad it's kind of a pain in the butt to get around this place from where I live without a car. There's some neat looking volunteer work available at the NY Botanical Garden. So close, yet so far away. It's only 15 miles but it would take nearly two hours by bus plus subway.

geckzilla wrote:Too bad it's kind of a pain in the butt to get around this place from where I live without a car. There's some neat looking volunteer work available at the NY Botanical Garden. So close, yet so far away. It's only 15 miles but it would take nearly two hours by bus plus subway.

Amazing, isn't it?

Since starting at university I've been able to compare modes of transport here, in the fairly small city of Halifax. I can bicycle to school (9 km) in 30 minutes, drive in 25 minutes (on a good day, and not during rush hour), or take the bus for a little over an hour. City planners are constantly trying to encourage people to take public transit, but with stats like that it's hard to take them seriously. Luckily (if that's the word I'm looking for) I need to exercise more, so the bike wins out most days -- except in winter.

15 miles by bike?

Rob

geckzilla wrote:Too bad it's kind of a pain in the butt to get around this place from where I live without a car. There's some neat looking volunteer work available at the NY Botanical Garden. So close, yet so far away. It's only 15 miles but it would take nearly two hours by bus plus subway.

-Do you have such things as mopeds (tiny, non-scary, motorised bicycles) in the States?
-Is a pedal bike an option? Or is that a stupid suggestion?
-Can you tell the Botanical Gardens that you want to volunteer and see if there is anyone who could help you with transport?

-Could you just decide to enjoy and make good use of the time on the bus/subway and get some books to read? A Kindle could pack a library of books - some of which you could get for nothing from Project Gutenberg.

I was stuck in bed for about three months last year and managed to read pretty much all of the works of Charles Darwin during that time, as well as catching up on a lot of history that I wanted to get clarified. The Darwin works were free, the history books bought from Amazon. But I also just explored Gutenberg's shelves, as it were, so read Lucian, Plutarch, Cicero, and was amazed to discover that they were good reads.

But Darwin - if you haven't read him already - is a MUST. I think that he gives one a better grounding in what is truly meant by the scientific method than anything else I know. And he is such a very nice person!

My two- pennyworth.
Margarita

Word of advice: Getting the mind out of a rut is as important as getting the body moving.

Yeah, there are mopeds. There are plenty of people who ride a bike or small thing such as that in this city but I am not one of those. I have a lot of irrational fears, I guess. Then again there are signs at dangerous intersections in this city stating how many pedestrians have been mowed down by hit and runs. I think there must be a lot of people who get away with vehicular manslaughter just because they ran away and no one caught their plates. To be perfectly honest nearly everything in this city intimidates the crap out of me and it has nothing to do with fear of becoming roadkill. I'm a timid little mouse. I go out and my heart races. Haha, I must sound so ridiculous. I must have some kind of agoraphobia. Excuses, excuses...