So here it is...

Who had direction in college?

I don't mean from your advisers and the like.  I mean you had an idea of your future and you worked towards it, even if that plan changed a little or a lot, you weren't just listlessly floating in the collegiate abyss.

I have met a few of these floaters in my time.  They dream of doing this or that, they seem to know exactly what they want in life...but they have no ambition or direction to go get it.  Perhaps at some point even I was one of them.  I can't say one way or the other, but I would like to think that I always had a smidgen of direction. 

Perhaps it is just the changes in my life that is making me contemplate such things.  I got married in December.  Directly upon our return in January, we were hit with a very frightening financial crisis.  I had been loosely looking for a steady job since before the wedding, but my search was now becoming more serious.  I have a husband to help support.  I want to diet and lose weight.  I have interviews.  I have to clean the house.  I have to be supportive to my husband.  I have to be a wife.

As you can imagine, the stress piled up on me to the point where it actually started manifesting physically.  I was scared out of my wits because I had no understanding of what was going on.  My symptoms were very similar to those of a heart attack.  Not the horrible chest pain and numbness of the arm, but the chest tightness, heartburn...all of the like.  So finally I went to the doctor. 

I knew it wasn't a heart attack.  I knew that it was anxiety and stress causing the pain.  Still, better to be safe than sorry.  Everything checked out perfect, as it usually does when I go to the doctor.  So still no answer, but only a theory. 

Today I had a follow up.  This time the doctor focused more on my digestive tract.  He believes I am somewhere between GERD and Gastritis.  This isn't great, but it isn't that good either.  The doctor thinks I likely had it developing and it was enhanced and heightened by the super stress.

It is nice to have something to say it is.  At least I can reassure myself this way.  To be safe, they drew blood and will run some tests, but he is confident it is as he said.

So what does that have to do with direction? 

All my life I wanted to be an archaeologist.  I've known that since I was a child.  At the age of 6 I could say Australopithecus and explain to you how evolution went from Austrolopithecenes to Homo Habilis. 

Suddenly I am taking a desk job.  This is a large chapter in my life.  Priorities have changed.  I have changed.  My direction has not.