My best job-friend, Charlie, asked me if I'm voting, to which I replied with an enthusiastic, "Yes, I did!" To which he responded, "How? The polls don't open until six a.m." To which I responded with my best smile, "I mailed in my ballot last Friday!" Another co-jobber whisper-asked about the election being today, to which I responded, "Yes, it is! Are you or did you vote?" To which she responded, "I can't. I am not a citizen. But I wish I could." And then she asked me who I will vote for, and I said, "I already voted for Kamala Harris."

REMEMBER TO VOTE!

if you haven't already

TODAY IS THE DAY!

The Drafting* of a Personal Statement | Draft 1

In These United States, being poor means that one lacks Capital (money &or access to financing) and Connections (well-connected people), and the thing about These United States is that there is nobody stopping you from reaching beyond one's membership in the Poorsy Class.

The other thing about These United States is that there is really nobody helping you either.

And so, what These United States possess that other countries that aspire to be like us (or destroy us) is meritocracy. Sure, meritocracy seems like a lie, to certain people, but it's not that it's a lie so much that it's Elitist. The lie is not that meritocracy does not exist. The lie is that meritocracy is available to everyone. 

Meritocracy does exist. It is within These United States where a person, someone, anyone can go to college, become educated in a field wherein earnings beyond that which are possible through hourly-wage labor is attainable. No education, no wages beyond the hourly. 

Another lie is that an Undergraduate degree is enough to reach the wages that are beyond-hourly wages, because the reality is that one must attain a Graduate-level education in order to be guaranteed professional-class wages. The thing about Graduate-level education is that it's specifically reserved for those who are deemed "smart enough" to use only their brains for their job, and as we've learned, everyone isn't born with the brains to do the types of jobs that can only be attained by obtaining a Graduate-level degree. 

An Undergrad degree can get some people into some "professional-level" jobs, but this is also another facet of the lie. I have lots of friends who graduated with Undergrad degrees, and they are working in corporate office spaces wherein they believe that they are of the "professional" class, but what they're really part of is the top of the wage-labor class. They are still doled out wages by an employer.

Professionals are the people whose skills are their business. Construction workers, I would argue, are part of the Professional Class. Anyone who possesses a skill that they then commercialize is part of the Professional Class. Regular Folk who show up to some job to get paid out in hourly/salaried wages are part of the Working Class. 90% of all American families are Working Class ... not Middle Class. I'd argue that the Professional Class is the Middle Class in America, today.

As a person born into a Poor Family who was adopted into a Working Class family, who has been a Working-Class citizen of These United States her entire young-adult/adult-jobbing history, I am going back to school so that I can be catapulted into the Middle Class. And school is the only option available to me as a poor member of the Working Class, meaning I have no Capital (in a wealthy sense) and no Connections (i don't know anyone, personally, who does what i want to do). So school is it.

And school it is. 

Graduate School is an available option for me, right now, without anymore schooling, because I performed well in high school (auto-accepted into every state school in colorado due simply to the relationship between my GPA and SAT/ACT test scores; all i had to do was accept), and completed my Undergraduate degree. If I needed to complete my Undergraduate degree, I would not be pursuing Graduate School, I would be pursuing my Undergraduate degree. If I needed to complete high school, then I wouldn't be pursuing my Undergraduate degree either, because I would be focused on completing high school. 

The thing about "completion" is that some people have it in their heads that like you're "supposed to" go to school during some specific time in one's life. This is absurd. 

I graduated from Undergrad six years after I completed high school, and it only took me five years of school. I took a year off between junior and senior year, but then had to do a super-senior lap because I switched majors late into the game. According to them, you're "supposed to" graduate in four.

I was invited into the World of Art History during my last year as an undergrad, and I declined because I did not want to pursue an academic career in Art History. I very muchly enjoyed studying art and its history while I was studying it, but there was no way I was going to dedicate my life to the studying of art and its history. No way.

During my year-long break from college, I was invited into the World of Professional Ballet after completing the trainee program at the small ballet company that invited me. Even though I love to dance more than any other form of body movement, it doesn't challenge my brain in the way that satisfies me. Don't get me wrong, ballet is plenty mentally challenging, but it also isn't after a certain point of mastery, etc., and so, that's when I returned to school to finish my Undergraduate degree.

As a high schooler, I was welcomed with open arms into the World of Medicine, but medicine and I did & do not get along. I am no scientist. I am an artist. This I know with unwavering certainty. And so, as soon as I started learning about Medicine at the college level, I was out. I am no scientist. 

So then, of what World do I want to be a part?  

[to be continued ... cause i still have to show up to some fucking day{night}job, so i gotta stop this thing here, for the time being, so that i can quickly, loosely-edit and then post it, and then go off to my goddamn job *blech*]

*if you're here and you've been here before, then you know that i am a writer, and as a writer, i am beginning to draft my personal statement for my law school application. i am only allotted 500 words (a loose maximum, i've been informed) that being said, the task of whittling down the answer to the questions, "why law school and why this law school?" into 500 words will be an exercise in specifics. i need to be able to nail down the exact specifics of my "wanting" without any unnecessary elaboration, etc. so, naturally, the first task becomes writing down all of the things i want to say in as many words as i want/need to say it. then i can look at it and see what "the point" is ... one hopes. and they're drafts, as opposed to sketches, because for me, as an artist, drafts connote a sort of imbued notion that the thing will be edited; a sketch is a sketch, and although sketches can be edited, my idea of a sketch is for the thing to exist as it was sketched, not really to be edited but rather, to exist in its purest form as a reminder.

When known data exist about the correlation b/t women's equity and domestic violence, that 'Julia Roberts' set of ads seems like very libtarded messaging brought to us by the party 'for women,' cause if you think about both the messaging and the message of these ads, it's quite simple to see that the Libtard Left has given these magamen a target if/when Harris takes the Oval, &that target is THE WIVES OF THESE MAGAMEN. Like. Duh. Like, how fucking libtarded does a party have to be to think that this type of ad-messaging is 'good' for the country? Fuck you! You don't care about the well-being of women, &now it's #facts &I'm sending out my sincerest apologies to the women out there who are already suffering at the hands of violent men. I'm very sorry for the ignorance of the Libtards. I understand why you would not join them. They are not Empowering you. They are Targeting you. &I'm very, very sorry.

Sailor's Log | Law School Application Weeks 1 + 2 [excluding the prelude week when we took the campus tour]

From the looks of it, the Law School application process is ... extensive but not unruly. It basically requires a third-party credential collector + the application to whatever (or whichever) school(s) one plans on attending, etc. Both steps can sort of be accomplished simultaneously but only after the first step is officially started, and last week, I officially started the first step. 

The first step (for the specific school to which i am applying) is to compile all of my credentials through the third-party credential collector. All together, I have to gather all of my undergraduate &or graduate transcripts (i only have undergrad degrees), obtain two letters of recommendation, take/submit an LSAT score, and write a personal statement. 

Then I apply to Law School.

The Law School then pulls my credentials from the third-party credential collector. And there's other stuff required on that application, but we'll cross that bridge when my brain is not mush.

I secured my undergraduate-granting transcript in the middle of October, around the time we toured the school, and then I had to order two other transcripts to ensure that I would be ordering the correct transcripts for the third-party credential collector, etc., and after those transcripts arrived, I submitted my institutions (that cannot be changed once submitted) and paid the one-time registration fee. 

I also secured both of my letter-of-recommendation writers around the same time as all of my transcripts were being ordered and delivered, and I submitted one of them to the third-party credential collector, and I am waiting for the other to return from vacation so that I can get him the details. 

That leaves the LSAT and a personal statement. 

Not to be cocky, but as a person who has been a writing practitioner for the better part of two decades, I am not sweating the personal statement. A few bullet points have already revealed themselves, and for the past week, nothing new or more has revealed itself. Thus, I will most likely get a first stab at the thing jotted down sometime this coming week.

And so, the final piece of the hoop (that then must be jumped through *iroll*), an LSAT score.

The Law School I wish to attend accepts either an LSAT or GRE score, and so, I've opted to take the GRE. I honestly don't know which one is "better" or whatever, but when we (the bodybuddy/lifemate&i) were still mulling this thing, we bought a GRE test-prep book (is thick), and so, I'm going to take the GRE. If I had to take the LSAT, I would go out and buy an LSAT test-prep book, but since I have this GRE book, I'm taking the GRE *claps hands together to rid herself of riddance* 

And so, there must be some way to bypass the required LSAT score, and so, I need to send an email to the very friendly admissions person I met two weeks ago *jots down note on to-do list*

Fortunately, I do have enough time to take the GRE twice, if need be, but goddamn, I literally haven't taken a math class since my freshman year of college, which *ahem* was in the tender year of 2004. 

OH MY FUCKING GOD!

*starts breathing heavily*

*hyperventilates*

*sits on yoga mat until sanity returns*

So yea, I was an accelerated K-12 student. By the time my senior year of high school rolled around, I had run out of required math classes, so I didn't take a math class in the fall of my senior year. According to the three transcripts I received (one community college [10.5 credits obtained while in high school], one private university [attended from freshman year 2004 through junior year 2007], and the flagship state-school from which I graduated [attended from fall 2008 to graduation in spring 2010]), I got an "A" in College Algebra in the spring semester of 2004, the last semester of my high school career. And then, in the spring of 2005, the freshman year of my college career, I got a "B+" in Pre-Calculus Math, and that was the last time I took a math class requiring more knowledge then basic addition/subtraction/multiplication/division (in the spring of 2006, i got an "A" in financial accounting, but accounting is very straightforward, mathematically speaking). 

And I took zero math classes at my graduating institution.

Like I said, it's been a long-fucking time since I've done any math beyond the elementary basics, and so, I'm a bit rusty. 

I also job a management-level job that I am supposed to job full-time. 

I obviously submitted a request for a temporary schedule change due to my striving toward "higher education," etc., and none of my higher-ups had any issues with it (i'm very efficient). I already worked fewer than 40 hours, but now I have official clearance to be unavailable 8 hours/week for the next few months. 

And so, I present my current job-schedule + study schedule ::

Temporary Jobbing Schedule (until no later than 05Feb25)

Monday :: 8-hour shift
Tuesday :: 4-5-hour shift
Wednesday :: 8-9-hour shift
Thursday :: 4-hour shift

Friday :: 8-hour shift

Study Schedule | Week 1 October 21 - 27

Tuesday :: ~4 hrs before jobbing

Thursday :: ~3 hrs after jobbing

Saturday :: [was scheduled as a study day, but i passed out so hard on friday, slept for twelve hours, and then for three hours on two separate occasions throughout the night/morning, so no studying happened on saturday]

Sunday :: ~6 hrs

Study Schedule | Week 2 October 28 - November 03 (current week)

Tuesday :: ~5 hrs before jobbing

Thursday :: (learned my lesson and took the second-half of this day off as my rest day)

Saturday :: 4 hrs + 2 hrs (the bodybuddy/lifemate is upping me to two-a-days, so we went for a run in between sets today, and now i'm done with my studies, and i'm writing this thing, today being the saturday being referenced right now, and i am so fucking tired)

Sunday :: [scheduled] 4 hrs + 3 hrs or whatever amount of time is needed to complete two sets 

As I build up my stamina, the two-a-days will hopefully become easier, and I will finish the GRE test-prep book with enough time to also review the book again before taking the first stab at the GRE in mid-December.

So, if you're wondering what I'm up to, I'm neck-deep in bringing my sexy-math mind back.

*peace*