It has been a long year, and at the same time has gone by so fast. No, not 2008. Of course, it's almost 1/2 over already too! I'm talking about the year I took off from school. I can remember about 1 1/2 years ago, about, when I walked into my piano teacher's office crying. Being the wonderfully sympathetic teacher that he always is, he sat and listened to my frustrations.
I have always been a driven person. The problem is that I tend to sway from over-driven, to burn-out, just a bit too often. When I entered his office that day I had had enough. I had travelled to Wisconsin, Cincinnati, and took a mid-term exam, involving the memorization of all 32 Beethoven Sonata themes, all in about 2 weeks! I was plain exhausted and sick of school. After we talked, we agreed that time off from school was just what I needed. I needed to have a little fun in life, take a breather, and think about whether the DMA degree was really what I wanted.
Since then, as those of you who talk to me often already know, I have gone back and forth about a million times! Not only that, but I have been in and out of one very close relationship, and also swayed between getting married and going to school. I remember my friend Jaime saying to me back then, when I first made the decision. "It sounds like you know what you're doing. And if you aren't doing the right thing, God is great at making detours." Thanks for the advice Jaime, it's so true!
I have learned a few very important things in the past year.
1) Don't talk about marrying someone, and having kids with them, until you're sure you love them first. You only break their heart, and yours, and it's unecessary.
2) Don't be afraid to wait. When we try to push ourselves through something we cause more stress than is needed, and sometimes take 10x longer than if we just waited for God to help us through it.
3) Don't be afraid of change. I didn't know how I was going to handle it when I got 17 piano students in the Fall. But it was a great experience for me. Here I am just a couple of years into teaching and I already feel like I'm so much better at it. My people skills are better, and I've learned how to teach kids vs. teaching adults. It's been a very rewarding experience for me.
4) A break doesn't have to be a trip to the beach. It can be simple things like waking up and chatting with my mom at breakfast, sitting in my pjs for hours, not eating breakfast until lunch-time. b vggggggggggggggggm
ok, pause! I could delete the jibberish above, but I thought I'd keep it...that was my cat Tommy saying hello to you all while I stepped away from my computer! THANKS A LOT TOMMY! :) ..yes, another great thing about being home for a year..waking up to Mr. Thomas sitting on my head, giving me a head massage :)
Ok, anyway. I guess that's about it. I don't need to go on and on about this. I just wanted to share with you all that I am very grateful for the time I had off of school. I taught piano, played and directed at church, accompanied, had temp. office job, spent time with family and friends, and got to do some traveling to (mostly for auditions and MTNA conference, but it all still counts).
So, last night I e-mailed my teacher again and told him I had finally made up my mind to get my DMA. He was very happy. I have put my poor teacher through so much in the past year! (at least!). He has had to deal with, "I don't think I want my doctorate".."Well, maybe I do".."No, I don't".."Well, maybe yeah but not here"..."Well, I was rejected everywhere else, so maybe not".."Ok, WVU isn't so bad"..."But what if I meet Mr. Wonderful and he whisks me away...then I won't need it!" And FINALLY, "Ok, well, Mr. Wonderful isn't anywhere in sight...at least not yet, and times not going by any slower, so if I want this degree, I better do it now!"
I spent a lot of this morning organizing my summer teaching schedule, and printing off and reading all the graduate manuals and such for the DMA program...there is SO much involved! But instead of feeling overwhelmed, I'm actually excited about it...ok and a little overwhelmed too. I think the part I'm most afraid of is the comprehensive exams. They come after all the course work is finished, which is at least a year or two from now. I will hopefully have most of my 6 recitals done by then too, except for the last solo recital, and maybe another chamber recital. But when they do come around I have 1 week to complete a take-home bibliographic music history exam/project and a take-home theory exercise/project, in preparation for the following week. The following week I have a 3 hour history exam and 3 hour theory exam, all written, and both in a 6 hour period, in one day!!! The exam questions are specially crafted by my DMA committee. That's the part I'm really scared about. After that I have an oral-comprehensive exam with my 5 member committee.. sometime within a few days or weeks from the written exam. The entire take-home, written and oral all counts as 1 exam. If I don't pass the entire exam the first time around, I only get one more try, granted the committee grants me the 2nd try, and if you don't pass it after the 2nd try, you cannot continue the DMA degree. Granted all of that goes well, then I have to complete my thesis project prospectus with my advisor (probably my piano teacher) followed by an approval from the committee, and then the actual project, followed by lots and lots of revisions, followed by a meeting with my committee where I have to defend my paper, and FINALLY finished with my final solo degree recital....I am hoping to have all of this completed before I am 30 years old (if I do it in 4 school years, I'll be 29).
Yes, you can tell I'm rambling....which is because I had a 2 1/2 hour nap this afternoon and am not sleepy!! I have to be in morgantown tomorrow morning though. So, I better go to bed.
Thanks for reading! And also, thanks for everyone's prayers..of course I'll need more if I'm going to try to get this degree... :) But, I have felt a strong sense of peace in the decisions I have made, knowing that whatever I do with my life, God is making it work out. Now, when I find Mr. Wonderful, which hopefully I will, eventually, I can still get married and have kids.....I'll just be Dr. Mom :)
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