Here we go … it’s college season again.
My kid is finishing up her junior year in high school, so it’s that uniquely American season when parents vie for bragging rights by dragging their kids hither and yon, trying to convince them to go to this amazing school where everyone who graduates gets a great job!!
Or worse, tries to convince their kid to go to the school they went to.
Pure laziness, folks.
Kind of dumb, too.
The hardest thing to do when this time of life arrives is get out of the way and let the kid sniff around long enough to find something that feels mostly right. To them.
My parents weren’t über-evolved, ahead-of-their-time people when they gave me the car keys and told me to go check out the schools I was interested in in Maine (we lived in upstate New York) when it was college season, but they were doing me a service, even in their disinterest. Parents back then took a hands-off approach because they had other shit to do, or they understood on some basic level that college was a young person’s domain and that it was the kid who needed to like it if they were going to spend four years there. As far as I can recall, nobody’s parents took them to visit colleges back then. We did it with our friends, often going to visit friends who were at college already.
I’ve heard it all and seen it all: parents schlepping their kid all over the east coast while the kid keeps telling everyone who will actually listen I really want to go to school in California.
Parents rattling off the list of names of Ivy League schools they took their kid to see, demurely ending with … I’m so shocked that a kid of mine would even want to go to a school like Duke … flutter flutter flutter eyelashes.
Good grief, please.
There is a reason why kids today are so lost when it comes to college choice and that’s because their parents and other adults have been telling them what to do and how to do it for 18 years. If you think a teenager can then pivot and choose one college out of the approximately five thousand schools of higher learning in this land, hardy har har and btw, you made that confused, anxious and worried kid standing in front of you.
We just never get out of our kids’ way long enough for them to show us who they are and what they love and where they want to be. We think we’re supposed to mold them and watch every move they make and then release them to tremendously positive results.
People have you seen how birds handle launching their young? Horses? Foals are expected to be on their feet and running with the herd the day after they’re born. Baby birds are literally pushed from the nest because that’s how they learn to fly.
Doesn’t work right away? Tough nugs. You’ll figure it out.
A few weeks ago we went to New York and we let Coco lead us around the NYU area. Coco is a city girl through and through, she very much wants to go to NYU but she’s convinced she can’t get in. I keep telling her to let the admissions people decide. We had lots of fun looking at the buildings, feeling the vibe, and, of course, checking out the merch at the bookstore.
Me: You realize their color is purple, right?
Coco: I know. I think I can make it work.
Looking at colleges should be fun. It should be interesting. I know schools are expensive and I also know that college isn’t for everyone and that we’ve all been sold a bill of goods that doesn’t add up. That there are many roads into the future and college is one of them. One.
The one piece of advice I have tried to impart on Coco, when she graces me with her time and possibly even thinks I have some life experience worthy of her attention, is that what matters most about your next stages in life, college in particular, is that you find a place that has your tribe.
My son Sam worked for two years (these were not ‘gap years’ as every nervous parent likes to call them, they were just years. When Sam was working hard and earning a good living and finding out how to hang a shower curtain and other necessary evils of life on this planet). After being a working stiff long enough to tire himself out, he picked the one school with the one program he was interested in, made a beeline for Lake Tahoe and has been there ever since. When Nate was up to bat, two years later, I asked him if he felt he needed a break from academia. “Nope. I know exactly what I want to do and I can’t wait to get started,” he told me with his signature good cheer and quiet confidence. He headed straight for Montana … and has been there ever since.
Both boys followed their own instincts. Both went far from home, found their people, their interests, and have been exploring and loving those places and ever since. Both have great jobs and amazing partners. A moment of great pride happened for this Mamma Bear when I arrived at the Bozeman airport and Nate McChesney picked me up in his car and took me to his favorite diner and toured me around his town.
✅ Mission accomplished.
Sure, you want to study something interesting, you want to prepare yourself to hold a job or to build a business, but you want to find your people because loneliness is deeply defeating and robs one of the will to do much of anything. I tell Coco this … find a place where there are people who make sense to you.
Everyone has an intrinsic compass that, when honored and monitored, will send them where they are meant to go. I love the desert and am terrified of the ocean. Coco is all about the beach, the ocean. Sam freestyle skis the big mountains out west, Nate is happy alone in a cabin in the backcountry.
We are connected by history, blood, DNA and maple syrup (Vermonters, for sure), but we’re different, too. And it’s our differences that make life so interesting.
I have no idea what I studied in high school or college, but I remember the people, because a lot of them are still my friends. Heck, my high school tennis coach called me yesterday to see how I’m doing. That guy was my coach forty years ago and we still care about each other and each others’ families. My daughter plays tennis on her high school team and Coach Rich Johns told me he was going to look online to see her schedule. “I’d love to see your daughter hit a tennis ball,” he told me before we ended the call.
It’s about the people, not the name of the school or the percentage of grads who go to law school. It’s about the tribe you build and the love you share. This is true of every stage of life.
Mammas, if your son really wants to grow up to be a cowboy, let him. If your daughter want to boss people around on Wall Street, even though you spend your days knitting sweaters in solitude in your solar-powered house with composting toilets, let her go.
This kid came into this world with business to transact. Yours did, too. Get the heck out of their way and let them tell you the story of who they are and why they’re here. It’s a good one, I promise.
Stellar! I am sharing with all folks I know with college bound kids; this is required reading before they embark on the journey. Thanks, Melissa and Happy Mother's Day to one wise woman!
Amen sister!! Best thing about college was you. ❤️