More knowledge dropped on me by my old man.

Just because she thinks she knows what she wants to do doesn't mean she knows. My father said when he got out of school he wanted to be a cost accountant. He's yet to hold his first cost accounting job in his life, including his first job out of college. He also never pressured us to figure out what we wanted to do, because as he states, "Hell, I was in my mid-30s before I realized what it was I wanted to do." (Hang in there, Dana!)



They may be afraid of it being different. They may also have a legitimate point about her maturity, or they may be finding ways to kick in a little more dough closer to home. I'm trying to steer away from these assumptions, because I have no idea. It's disingenous to assume they only want to hold her back for their own reasons.

Also, she does have a great opportunity here. That doesn't exclude a great opportunity somewhere else. There are tons and tons of priorities here that all need to be weighted and sorted and re-examined and evaluated. Dreams change. And that's the whole thing. At this pace, her dream is accomplished at 24 years old. That's barely a nap. I don't think dreams should be judged necessarily on the means but the end result. If she goes to another school and accomplishes exactly the same career goals as she would have at Pratt, is her life any less rich? Of course not. That's without even figuring in marriage, children and children's lives.

If you are making $100 every two weeks, then we cannot afford it.

because a high school education isn't going to get me a good job. i'm working what i can right now, alright? when i'm out of college i will be able to hold a better job.

Just a warning, ayah, I didn't see your "taking sides" post until after I had posted my last big long ramble. I'm not really trying to be all that argumentative. I do see your side of the coin, and I don't necessarily disagree, but from my vantage point there are many sides of this whole thing that I can't even begin to use in my reasoning.

I'm in no way calling the future Mrs. Waits a liar, but there is often a disconnect between what we hear and what was said. Especially between children and parents.

I understand that, and I'm not picking on you. I'm just saying that you didn't buy the Corvette, pool nor $3000 television. It's not your money. Saying "we" implies that you have some claim to it. Yes, your parents should give you a favorable line of credit, but that doesn't mean you are the best arbiter of the household finances.

no joke. This is the conversation that's been going on for the past few days.
"you're not mature enough because you feed homeless people. you are selfish because you want us to take your stuff to new york, and what are we going to do about holidays? i don't think you can pay it off after college. i can't believe how ungrateful you are that we'd pay full for vcu. why can't you just accept that?"

that's what's been said.
i'm trying to be as nice as possible about this. and god i'm grateful for what they're giving me and i have not asked for anything more than that.
i'vej ust said i'll do the rest myself.
that's not "flying" though.

P.S. I hate school.

i completely understand what you're saying.. but they say they can't afford it. maybe they're buying things they can't afford but i just thought it was weird.
i appreciate what they're doing for me regardless. i just wish they'd let me go. i don't want to be bound to richmond for the rest of my life. i'd love to buy a little house on main street and live around there but not right now. maybe not ever. i want to get out and explore my options. richmond has been "the option" my whole life, and i think i need to get out in order to really appreciate richmond or really appreciate what else is there, because i don't even know what else there is.

Sheeeeeit. I saw "what else" in north central Louisiana. Weren't all that great, neither. I did learn a lot, though.

Relax a bit. That's all just growing up stuff, you know that. Enjoy being young! It's a real pisser trying to appreciate all this stuff with a mailbox full of bills.

if i could have do it all over again, i would figue out some way to live in a dorm and then just spent all my money renting work space to paint and play music all day every day.

i get all of this. no problem.
i've lived on my own for along time and now have kids (and a daughter in her junior year of hs who's looking at colleges) and i want her to explore all of her options and will do anything i can to make college work for her--financially but emotionally as well. she's probably going to attend a small private school somewhere in the northeast. i don't have a lot of money--at all--but i'm going to explore all of our financial options to make this happen for her. i will probably be paying off loans until i die considering that right after her 4 years my son wiil be ready to go if he chooses. it's a nightmare but what the hell...i wasn't born wealthy and i ain't gonna die wealthy either. although i do wish i could afford this armani opera coat i saw in a magazine yesterday.

You want to go, go. But pay. Then mom and dad's opinion doesn't matter. I owe 400 on student loans every moth and it's no big deal, after living on less than 20k a year for five years of grad school. Stop trying to talk them into it and decide it's worth it to you - if it's not worth it to you, why should it be worth it to them?

she's smart, that bjw.
and concise.

it's worth it but how can i do it if they're telling me they refuse to allow me to?

They don't have to 'allow' you to. My folks never paid a nickel of my college education. The forms are in your name. It means borrowing, is all, and working throughout. You can eat on $15 a week in a pinch (but restaurant work means it's never required, they always feed you if you're really hungry).

It's your life, sister.

Note that 600 a month will really cramp your style, but if Pratt's worth it - and I'm no artist but you seem pretty sure - then go for it. If it's a fuck-up, well, you never learn til you make your own lousy choices.

Oh CM, I'm sorry to hear you're having to go through all of this.

I'm so happy for you that you're getting such stellar responses from the schools.

I can't and don't want to try to give you answers to these things but maybe I can add some more points to the discussion from my own experiences. Be warned, they might seem to contradict eachother, but it's a complex situation.

Here goes:

1) Having a huge loan is a pretty big burden.

2) School is rarely 100% good or bad---there is lots of bullshit involved in all schools, but there is also a lot to be learned.

3) When you try to leave your hometown it often happens that people say things to you that sound like warnings, but really stem from either jealousy or fear. When I left Montreal (at the age of 28, not 18!) people said all kinds of crap to me to either try to hold me back, or make themselves feel okay about never having left their home town. (Luckily my family was behind me.)

4) Some parents send out "warning signals" when their children talk about really pursueing the arts because they secretly wish they had gone into the arts and are jealous. (Or maybe they held back from dreams in the arts or another field and are passing that along.)

5) An undergrad degree is often a starting place. I finished mine and was shocked to find out I wasn't really prepared to go straight into a job in that field. As someone said, the grad school you go to is more important than were you did your BA.

6) And...if you do go to Grad school---make sure you're not paying---they should pay you. (btw, a lot of universities milk their undergrads to pay for their grads.)

7) Follow your gut.

8) As someone else said, don't go into a program that feels like a major comprimise for you. Even if you do go to a "cheaper" school, doing a degree is still a major investment financially, time-wise, energetically, psychologically, etc...


In short I'd say---parents stuff aside---if you think Pratt is waaaay out of your range financially then you really need to think about the burden of a massive loan. This is especially the case if you want to try to get somewhere as an artist; to "get somewhere" often requires living leanly to begin with. (Then again if you're sure you want to go to grad school & become a teacher maybe you will eventually have a salary that can pay it off.)

But... that said... please don't don't don't let yourself get stuck in a pattern of living out of fear of what the future will be like. (Similarly, in the long run holding yourself back for the sake of others isn't helpful to you or them.) The future is the result of the present. Living in that way of constantly "saving up" for one day having a great life is bullshit. Especially for an artist. You need to trust your gut feeling & instinct about what feels right for you, that same spark and intuition you use to make art (I've seen your stuff and can tell you have it).

So... there's my rant. Good luck and....

....

...here are various rockbananas to cheer you on.

thanks for all of your advice polly.. and the rock bananas.

i'm not sure of what to do right now, of course i want to go to pratt. it's new york, a big exciting city.
vcu is comforting just because i know i wouldn't be in debt.. but i don't want to be in a program alongside some of the artists i've seen accepted in to the program. i heard some people are as "good" as i was in freshman year of high school, if not earlier. not me in particular but everyone in cfa. (center for the arts).
i've seen some of the art and while some is amazing some if it is just really childish and terrible and i want to go in to a competitive program, not a program alongside the likes of some of the students there. i do know some great artists that came out of vcu.. well one.
diego sanchez. he went to grad school at vcu and was a visiting artist at cfa a month ago. he is incredible.
i don't know. we'll see how it goes. maybe my biological mother will die and i'll inherit her money.
maybe one of my coworkers will beat me up and physically and emotionally damage me and i can sue the company i work for.
who knows?
i'm very tired.
i wish i could wake up in the future, tomorrow. tomorrow is the future, but i mean the far future. when i'm 18 and know where i'm headed.
if i have to go to vcu i will leave richmond after. not forever, but i have to get out at some point. and if i never get out i'll definitely join the peace corps like i've been thinking of doing.

today, the first time my mother and i have spoken in two days, besides hello and good morning or goodnight, this is how our conversation went:

mother:"elizabeth i'm trying to be happy with you.. but after our discussion the other night.. i just. i don't understand so i'm trying to forget about it"
myself: "i kind of understand, but i'm really afraid i'll regret it if i don't go to pratt"
mother: "that's not how you should see it. you should be thinking about your family and parents, not yourself"


uh. last time i checked this is my !!!!!!!!!!!!!!future.
think about myself? i think so. this isn't proposing a big hardship on them, they just don't want me going away. it'd put a huge amount of financial pressure on me for 10 years but whatever.

this is so frustrating.

oh yeah, thank you all so much for the advice. i really appreciate it. it's tough to figure this out right now. i know i am dreaming big right now and there is a huge chance that things won't ever work out at all for me.
maybe i should keep my dreams small to avoid disappointment.
anyways, i appreciate the advice from everyone, as i said.

You know, I think at your age you mom shouldn't be laying that on you. It doesn't sound like you want much more than their blessing and a ride to the station, suck it up and at least pretend you're happy, you know?


But I'm not a parent, so what do I know?

As to the "be thinking about your family / parents, not yourself" argument...

Take my mom. She has two brothers, both older. They went off to colleges and then moved out of state. She decided to live in-state to be close to her folks. That decision turned into the rest of her life, and I don't think she really knew it would at the time. As her parents got older, she took care of them. When grandmother died, she's been the only one there for her father.

My point is that it didn't kill her, but a little piece of her has always, always always wanted to move away. Part of her has regretted not knowing what it means to live outside those two counties for more than a few months. She made her choice, and it has been wonderful for me to have grown up so close to my grandparents, but when I faced the same issue (wife wanted to move 800 miles away) I went. It's been hard on my mom, but she has absolutely understood my decision, as a direct result of her own internal debate all these years.

You should not be thinking about your parents before yourself. You are not a depression-era cotton bowl farming family who needs the free labor or else The Bank will reposses the farm. You're an artist. Or at least you're trying to be.

get your mom to post. i suspect that we're missing something.

you aren't missing anything, seriously.

she's mad that i went to my biological mother to ask her to sign for loans, (EVEN THOUGH SHE ENCOURAGED ME TO DO SO) and the only reason she is mad is because my biological mother said she would.
she's mad because she thinks i am selfish for wanting to move to new york, because they would have to move my stuff there.
she's mad because she doesn't know how i'll get home on holidays (uh i'll hold a job and buy bus tickets... it's not that difficult)
she says i'm not mature enough because i like to feed homeless people.
i'm not mature enough because i cried when she told me i couldn't go.
she thinks i won't be able to pay off the loans when i get out of college.

i think that's all.
i'm not trying to make myself look better than her, if that's what you're thinking. this is the internet, and if i'm going to get advice from people who have been there i'll give you the facts.

this is what's happening. i don't want it to happen.
i don't get how i'm selfish or too immature.
oh well.

It's true though.

It made me really sad to read this.
I understand where you're coming from, I have often felt this way myself.
But I think you know in your heart that you're wrong to say you should keep your dreams small. That would be the saddest thing ever.

I had a friend come and visit me from Montreal this weekend. She is an architect, and is signing up for more architecture school, but she is also a painter. We often spend a lot of time talking about the trials & tribulations of trying to be an artist. Somehow in our conversation yesterday she said something about following your intuition in making life decisions & we got talking about how it's the same intuition that leads you in art.

Anyway... I mentioned you & your situation to her. She has a bunch of friends in art schools in New York. She looked stunned when I told her you got into Pratt and pretty much told me that you really should go. That it will be an amazing experience for you and that you will be very enriched by the people around you there.

It's weird. It's not like your parents said you couldn't go to art school, or that they aren't willing to help pay for school at all.... it's that they don't want to let you go to New York. It's pretty clear. I understand that 16 is pretty young to move away from home... but still.... if you lived in rez I'm sure you'd be around lots of others in the same situation as you.

I don't think you should comprimise. I'm with ayah on this 100%.