Pre-life Crisis

I heard a discussion on NPR a few months ago how many of today's college students struggle with having too many options -- too many things that they could do with their lives -- which was certainly not the case for past generations and surprising considering the lack of job opportunities in today's economy. You'd think that the recent graduates who were lucky enough to get jobs would be desperate to keep them, but I can't think of many people I know that want to be doing what they're doing now in two years.

I know that's the case for me. I always thought that I would do something really awesome when I was older, and graduating from Princeton solidified the idea in my head that I would be successful. A part of me has always wanted to be an editor and journalist, but I feel that dream slipping away whenever I see the lists of publications on the resumes of people I knew from high school newspaper. I chose to go the practical route in college, focusing on engineering and quitting the newspaper for lack of time and interest (who wants to write stories about snowball fights on campus?). I knew engineering was the right thing to study if you want a job post-undergrad, but is it practical if you don't actually want to work as an engineer once you get out? Maybe not, but the money I make may buy me some time to figure it out.

Today is the one year anniversary of my start date, and I've started to browse the internet for jobs. I applied for a position with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission as an engineer, and getting it would be really great as I would be minutes away from my family and boyfriend. I'm scared though because unlike this job, that's a job I could see myself sticking with for several years, even until retirement. A comfortable government position. I hear my boyfriend talk about the older people that work in his office at the Department of Homeland Security, just doing the minimum to get by. I'm scared of that. I don't want to feel less successful when I'm 60 than I do at 23.