This is not what this blog is for

I started this blog as a way to share my joy, confusion, and frustration stemming from strange, unexpected, and surreal events occurring in my new home Kingdom. It's post #3, and I've already strayed from that mission. Sorry, but I've been sitting on this for a couple of days, and I just couldn't resist. And if you make it all the way to the end, it's sort of topical.

Several days ago, my Mom (hi, Mom!) sent me this article about Ivy League grads from the New York Times. I imagine many of you may have seen it, too. If not, then feel free to take a quick peek, although if you're a recent college grad, you likely know more about the subject than the author (or, honestly, any of the people being interviewed).

My normal reaction to an article like this is to bring it up at dinner with friends. Since I eat dinner here with people who don't speak English, I thought that might be a little tough. Hence the rant below.

Almost from day one at Princeton, people joked about it: “So, are you going to sell your soul and work on Wall Street when you graduate?” It was something you knew a lot of people did, but you thought you were superior to them, and that you would never succumb to that machine. You were unique. You wanted to do something beautiful and earth-shattering when you graduated. You somehow also didn't want to work more than forty hours per week. And you certainly weren't tempted by that “Lure of a Big Paycheck.”

Then senior fall came around, and you were terrified. Terrified that you didn't know what the next step was; terrified that there were no beautiful, earth-shattering things to do upon graduation; terrified that you might be forced to wait tables forever because you were better than only two quintiles of Princetonians (gasp!).

So what do you do next? You ask for advice from the people who are paid to give it to you: Career Services. You trust Career Services for an informed, balanced opinion. You trust them even though they failed to lure a single major corporation in the automotive, aerospace, or power generation industries to the Science & Technology Job Fair. You trust them even though, nine months later, their Senior Exit Survey will fail to include a check box for a post-graduate service/teaching/international fellowship, an option which, between PiA, PiAf, PiLa, P'55, TFA, Fulbright, Rhodes, etc., about ten percent of the graduating class will choose (I think... who will ever know?). You trust them even though they have less of clue than you do about why graduation is terrifying or about what will make you happy. You trust them, even though you recognize the irony of accepting career advice from people who hold dead-end jobs giving career advice at a university.

And what do they do? They point you to the people who do know what you want, and who know how to give it to you. This is the unstoppable “recruiting juggernaut,” which in most cases is five parts life advice and one part “come work for me.” I didn't go to many corporate info sessions, but I distinctly remember leaving Bain's being much less terrified of graduating and much more excited about what I was capable of; I felt good about the Company, but I felt really good about myself, which is something that Career Services just couldn't pull off.

A recent graduate from a small, community-based college in New England remarked in the article: “We came to Harvard as freshmen to change the world, and we’re leaving to become investment bankers — why is this?”

Because, doofus, as a freshman you are convinced that school will teach you everything, and as a senior you realize that you still know nothing. How the hell am I – that's me! – supposed to change the world? Once you realize that you're not one of three people of your generation to have a truly revolutionary idea, once you realize that there's no fast-track to world salvation, and once you face the reality that you actually have to do something after graduation, you realize that you just don't know where to begin.

But corporate (and frankly, fellowship) recruiters do! They tell you that they will surround you with brilliant people who will stimulate you intellectually, something that is rare outside of Fitzrandolph Gate. They promise to challenge you and to help you to grow. They tell you that they will give you the tools that you need to understand companies, people, and systems, to run businesses and not-for-profits, and most of all, they show you a place where you can make a difference. They convince you, once again, that you can save the world – you just need to do a 2-3 year stint in serious business (or an alien environment) first. Maybe it's all bullshit, but maybe it's not! It's exactly what you want to hear, and well shit, what else are you going to do?

Most intelligent people wouldn't endure 120-hour weeks on Wall St. if an $80k bonus wasn't laid out ahead of them, and I am sure that a few with a "poverty of ambition" pick finance or consulting only because it is lucrative. But that's not really the point. I don't think anyone who is fortunate enough to graduate from college (especially from places like Princeton and that other school up north) is really scared that they're not going to be able to make enough money to lead a good life and be happy. But I think a lot of people are petrified by the thought of leading a meaningless, meandering, misguided, myopic, and mundane life. We all want to have a great purpose, and I think that very few believe that that purpose is money. The best corporations and fellowships lead you to believe that they will help you find that purpose and achieve whatever ends you choose. I just hope they're right, since nobody else is compelling me to believe anything.