Resolution

My name is Maria. I love reading and I love writing. I think I am a down-to-Earth person and I believe in ghosts.

When I was 18 I became pregnant with my son, who is now 5. I am currently enrolled full time in a PhD program for Psychology.

For the new year I hope to chronicle this experience every day. A conversation of sorts.

My status, this minute, coming out of my first semester is grim. I have seriously considered dropping out. Academia is not at all what I had expected. Not that I expected much. I was never looking for a place in the exclusive pool of information that forms in the higher education institutions in America. What I was seeking was respect. Plain and simple.

I wanted the highest degree possible so I could build a crystal stair, actually not a crystal stair but at least a stair with out splinters or loose boards. I wanted to make promises to my son I knew I could keep and I wanted my mom and dad to be proud. I fear I shamed them so much with my crisis pregnancy.

I currently am depressed, grad school has completely wasted my soul. I see no women in my immediate program with Phd's and children. My acne is atrocious. My son did not bathe for a whole week last month. My mother would kill me. I cried for a while when I realized this. Then I cried some more when I realized it had took me so long to realize.

I am going back to school in a few weeks for my second semester. I am trying to find myself amidst this mess.