I know technically there is still a week left until Autumn, but the change in weather makes me want to pull out my woolly scarves! For the first time in my life September represents the end of an academic year. I complete my Masters at the end of this week *yay*! I’m in my early 20’s and starting to feel the panic of stepping into the unknown that is adult life and leaving education and the care free student living that comes along with it behind. So where to from here?
Don’t get me wrong, I am not a complete novice at living as a self-sufficient ‘adult’. I have had a taste of the ‘adult’ lifestyle in the year I took out after completing my undergrad and before staring my postgrad. Suffice to say, after a month in a full-time nine-to-five job (along with working three evening a week volunteering as an English and Maths tutor and part-time weekends in a retail outlet in busy Central London) I was knackered but satisfied. As much as I love working and keeping busy, I do ask myself ‘when do I get time to myself’? Even when you’re not at work you are working, meeting deadlines and completing tasks. It’s almost heart-breaking to see your social life board a one-way train to oblivion whilst you mournfully stare after the departing train with your nose pressed up against the window.
‘Let me know when your entire life goes up in smoke: then it’s time for a promotion.’- The Devil Wears Prada (2006).
The MA gave me one last opportunity to be carefree and so I took it!
It is absolutely shocking how living gets very very expensive very very fast once you cease to be a student. There are suddenly endless things that need paying from tax and rent to helping out with a million-and-one bills, travel (good-bye student discount!) and of course paying for your own personal upkeep. But the plus side to this is that you feel like an individual in charge of your own life. Yes, of course you miss the care free days of being a student when all you had to worry about was planning your next budget trip with your friends, and a fish-finger sandwich was considered a meal. But the transition from student to adult is not a bad one (once you get over a huge chunk of your salary disappearing every week/month), I guess it’s all about finding a job that will inspire and motivate you as well as discovering the right balance between work and play.
Let the job-hunt commence!
The Coffeehouse Blogger 