Momentary Bliss

The euphoria, resulting from my acceptance to Cal State LA has dissolved. Fizzled. Collapsed. What can I say? The cynical side of my brain is telling me: "I told you so." I was wrong to give into what the optimistic side of my heart would have me believe. I had been living in dream land -- lala land, and now I'm back to reality.

The nursing department at CSULA operates much like the one at my current school. They don't do a lottery, but they only select 50 students each fall. Only the ones with the best applications will be received -- high GPA in prereq's, high overall GPA, most quality volunteer experiences/high number of hours spent volunteering/health occupational experience, and so on and so forth. My overall GPA is adequate, but my GPA in the prereq's are not too great (I completed my prerequisites when I wasn't a fully committed student), and because I've been working more than full-time while carrying a full-time class load, I haven't had a chance to volunteer at all.

Even if I were to have hopes (which would be ridiculously naive of me to do so), but nursing program begins in the fall, and you are expected to graduate in three years. Not three years or less, but three years. I am assuming it is because of Calif's financial situation (cutting down of classes, cutting instructors, etc.) -- there just won't be room for everyone to take all the classes they should each semester. Since I have been accepted for the Winter semester, that means even if I am to get into the nursing program on my first attempt, it would be three and half years minimum before I graduate. Prospects are grim. I can't be going to a 4 year university full time for three and half years without working (nursing program is still rigorous and students are not expected to work).

Doesn't life just SUCK? I am recalling a line from the British sitcom, "Couplings": "I am Sally Harper, and there is nothing in my life too good that I can't screw it up." well, I'm feeling a bit like Sally Harper right now. Except that episode ended on a happy note. Mine's ending in a rather sad note. A dumpy note. I feel dumped. I feel duped. Life's double-crossed me. It's played a dirty trick on my situation.

I have no urgent need to contemplate about graduate school, as I won't be going in the near future. I am back to where I was before, utterly lost without hope. All I can say is, I should have seen it coming. I was too happy. The emotion "happy" doesn't belong in my life. "Content" maybe, but not happy. Not elated. Not joyful. I should have known when I felt so happy that I was walking in uncharted territory -- territory that would never be part of my life. That's just the way it is. I am doomed. My fate is to be the most wretched being on the face of this planet, and that is one goal I've reached over and over. If you ask me, I've outdone myself over and over in being the most wretched soul one can imagine. It wouldn't have been so bad if my life was just this horrible thing; it is much worse when life keeps throwing a false sense of hope in your way. It's like a carrot on a stick -- only every time you reach for the carrot, you are severely beaten with the stick.

No words of pity can console me. Nobody can pat me on the back and say "there, there -- good things will come your way, you'll see." I am Haemi Lee, and nothing good comes my way. Maybe I should get comfy with Harold Kushner -- "When Bad Things Happen to Good People." (The Book of Job, is the book I absolutely despise, actually, but we'll talk religion when I'm feeling not so damned.) If there is god(s), then he is an evil one. I absolutely refuse to accept that my immense grief is part of some marvelous plan.

I should have seen it coming -- but no. I let my guard down and became openly happy, and I let it hit me with my guards down. I wasn't prepared to accept the ill-news. I wasn't ready. Like Pearl Harbor. Like 9-11.

This really gets me to a point where I have to start thinking about what the meaning of my life is. I am living in a country where I'm not accepted and I'm not wanted. I can't work legally. I can't do anything I want because everything and anything I want to do is somehow blocked from my reach. I'm poor. I have so much potential but none of it will ever see the light. I can't even add advertisements by Google to my blog because I am not allowed to earn money, however small. I can't go back to Korea, because that would be like moving to a foreign land. A vast majority of college graduates are unemployed -- what would I be able to do? Work at one of the Wal-Marts?

I hate the fact that I have this life. I hate the fact that I am powerless to change it. I hate the fact that I am so gifted and talented with so much potential, but I have no reason to hope. I hate that I am such an optimistic person and I keep on hoping, as though the act of hoping would bring positive prospects. I hate that my life is full of false sense of possibilities, like mirages. I hate that I can't have a normal life. I hate that I've tasted so much of the fine things in life that I can never ever go back to being insignificant.

But above all this, the absolute worst part of it was that I had to tell my mother. My poor mother. Oh Mother. Why did you give birth to your source of sadness?