Do you know what I want?
I want a degree. Innn Biology, No radiology, NO, Marine Biology!!!!
Actually NO Bloody - idea - at - all - ology ….
I’ve spent years convincing myself I don’t want one. Or need one. But I do. It's like a heady out of reach, tantalising award that I've never quite gotten within stretching distance of. I tried. Oh yes siree-bob I tried. I questioned what in the sweet Sidney Crosby I was doing at Uni at the time. But I did go. And started training to be a teacher & could not have been more terrified. I suddenly realised that at the tender age of 19, I had the responsibility for children’s education. Bloody hell!!! My brain, shrinking backwards in my head was screaming - 'You'd better get this right you oversized tree, otherwise you're about to screw over a bunch of year 2 children who will carry bad teaching with them through-out their school career!' Now, overly dramatic you may think. But, cast your mind back to when you were taught & I bet a bad teacher sticks out in your mind like a tack that needs banging into a piece of wood. I couldn't take the responsibility. THEN I realised how shockingly little I KNEW as an adult in my own knowledge base and education, and well, I bolted, because my brain had shut the doors on learning, and put up a groovey ‘gone fishing’ sign.
I had such an appalling time trying to study that I don’t know why I want a degree as badly as I do. I obviously have some massive insecurity within myself that fosters this need to prove that I can do this. To own this glorious piece of paper, that declares I can retain knowledge & regurgitate it for an examination. (This statement is know as a giant tar brush statement. Don't get snippety with it) You know what I wanted to study? I wanted to study music. I’m actually bloody good at music. But not all of it. I SUCK at theory. It took me three attempts to pass my grade 5 theory for the Royal School of Music Exams. And the theory at college was worse. Bloody Demi-Semi Quavers and compound, simple time, consecutive octaves and banned open fifths. (HONESTLY if the wonderful and masterful Vaughan Williams can do it in the Sky Above the Roof, then why the hell my college tutor had a problem with it I will never know. BACH does NOT know everything, and Mahler is not the best composer in the world!!!!! PS I don’t care how clever it was that Beethoven was still composing whilst going deaf. ANYTHING written in C# Minor is very depressing.)
*looks around and ceases shouting*
*Ahem*
The thing that has stopped me in my tracks though from doing this, is the self-crippling fear of failure. And boy. Do I fail on an epic scale when it comes to me, and academic institutions. It's not that I am scared of appearing stupid. I am not stupid. Far from it. I am scared of being proved right in the doubt I have of my own intellect and ability to learn. Or, moreover of being proved a fake. A con artist. That although I may ‘appear’ intelligent, that someone will pull back the film lid and go, ‘Ah, I thought so. Not really so clever. Most average’. That I am more ‘pot noodle’ than ‘Tuna sashimi.’ I think it doesn't help that I am a wanna be perfectionist. I want to be perfect in what I do. But never quite manage to pull it off.......Or so I've been told. M A N Y T I M E S.
Most of my friends know me as a fair to middling, competent so and so. I know stuff. I know stuff other people don’t. I can also keep up with stuff other people are talking about. Including very basic quantum physics. Schrödinger’s cat…………I also enjoy debating theories on time, space, multiverse, Alternate realities, string theory, Chaos theory, Teleportation and EM Shields and I could go on. My brain has no end of curiosity. That is NOT the problem I am like the proverbial cat. And I do have an almost child like wonderment of all things sciencey…….
In the group of friends I have, there are those who blow my mind with their ability to absorb. One is a stunning Lass who has a Masters and is studying towards her PHD. And I am So envious I could spit. She has a degree, has a masters, and is all Phd'ey, and she has a gorgeous baby as well. I’m jealous of her. I love her very much. But I am jealous of the ability she possess to put herself through that gruelling thing called learning. And she bloody well retains the knowledge that she learns! I am also sickeningly proud of her, and have wished on many occasions I was of her gene pool. Or married to her. Or at least had her waist. Its tiny.
Me? I think I have a sieve for a head. I struggle to take on board information when I am in an environment where I am expected to learn something. I can take on board water, tea, coffee and wine with no effort whatsoever (but apparently not iron.....I am currently on supplements for that. Is there a supplement for brainspongeyness? *ponders*) But if you want me to be able to explain the difference between Mitosis & Meiosis? Settle in campers because we are going to be here for a while. But I do know things. When I was doing Credit Control, I knew the Late Payment of Commercial Debts Act like the back of my hand and the increase the company needed on a 90 day debtor (which was in line with the base rate of the Bank of England and varied on how long the debt was overdue yadeyah) I knew the small claims court process like I had written it. But it appears that anything that requires detailed and finite knowledge escapes me. Literally.
I think it's because, and this sounds daft. It's really really hard. And like most, I don’t particularly enjoy doing things that are arduous. Which is stupid, because as a manager I do hard and nasty things all the time. I don’t like them, but they are part of my job. A job I do extremely well. But it's hands on. I often have to pull on reserves that I didn’t know I had and many occasions where I have to rely solely on my own judgement at the time with the information available to me. But I just do it. I don't doubt myself. I get on and do it.
So why does the mere thought of a degree bloody well scare me? Why does it send icey cold shivers of clenching horrors down my spine when I even CONTEMPLATE going back to university?
I think its because deep down I believe I’m a hack. And I believe that by going through higher education that this will be proven for all to see, and that some how, I will be tossed aside in a heap. It was drummed into me from an early age that I would never get through the front door on things. That I would always need a side door, because people wouldn’t see that I could do it. I would always have to ‘prove’ that I was capable, before being deemed capable. And how shockingly tragic is that? I can sit and play you Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata. I can even play you Debussy's Clair De Lune. In fact, my real 'talent' if it were to be called is that I can play by ear. I can hear something on the radio, and in about ooooooh 30mins to an hour, play it on the piano. Sometimes the time frame is longer, but mostly, relatively quickly. Its not music note accurate. But you know what bloody tune it is. Or you want me to accompany you but we haven't the time to learn the piece? Right, does it have guitar tab on it? Excellent, I'll make it up from that. Basically I can wing it. You want it? I'll wing it. DO it to me in C# Minor though and I maaaaay kill you.
I digress. Basically? I really want my degree in music. I want to inspire others to embrace it. Taste it, feel it, be motivated by it. Understand it. The layers, the juxtapositions within the relationships of the instruments. The question and answers between a flute and a clarinet. The thrum of a timpani and why it's important to have that pull underneath a piece. How a horn can sound mournful if it's only in the right key. How a tenor sax is one of the most gorgeous sensual sounds I’ve ever heard, and it's even more amazing when a talented saxophonist makes it laugh. A trill on a piano doesn't have to be annoying it can be a graceful addition to a piece. A violin isn't always a cat being strangled, and that the bassoon is BLOODY hard to get a note out of.
Mostly I miss music. Proper musician's, who aren’t up their own arse and think that they are bloody perfect because they understand how to right a fucking Bach Choral. (Mark Bellis you have a LOT to answer for tutor of mine) The musicians that like Jamming. Exploring the tonal ranges within a mixolydian scale!!!!!! DAMMIT! You know what I see looming on the horizon? One of those, ‘Feel the Fear and Fucking get on with it’ moments. Tragically I am guessing I will pretty much enjoy the vent. Play my guitar. And look for another managerial post elsewhere.
Because, well. I couldn't possibly go back to university..... Could I?
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