Lost and Found

In my family, higher education was a requirement. The question was always where we would go to college, not if we would. So we did. My brother first, since he is six years older than I am. He chose to major in theater, specializing in lighting. That was his passion. He had known what he wanted to do since high school.

I considered my brother to be the lucky one. He had a passion, and he has been able to follow it. It carried him to a Master's degree and the life he's always wanted. In this case, I am not so lucky.

After high school I went to college like a good girl. But I didn't have direction. I didn't have a single passion that I wanted to pursue. In high school, I participated in a few activities. I was in band, on the swim team, and I was the Vice President and Editor of the literary magazine. I didn't see making a career out of any of those things (especially swimming - I was the only senior still on JV), but it seemed I had the best chance with the latter. So I chose to major in English. Poetry had been a passion in high school, so I thought I would become a great poet. Unfortunately, upon arrival at the University of Georgia, I discovered that the English Department was not what I expected. The degree I was going to pursue focused more on literature and reading and not enough on writing, I thought. So I sought a new path. I changed my major several times over the next two semester, finally settling on Psychology, but I never rekindled my passion. I had buried my love of writing.

My innate ability to string words together would occasionally surface. I frequently was able to boost a sagging course average with a grade-A paper, but I had stopped writing just for me. I always chalked it up to a lack of time. I was always studying and never had a chance to write anything.

I often felt jealous of my friends. Many of them knew exactly what they wanted to do with their lives. They were more of the lucky ones. I chose my major not out of love for the topic - though I do enjoy it to some extent - but out of obligation. I needed a major, and it seemed like one that could open a lot of doors. I thought I could enter many worlds with this as my background. Yet, as graduation approached, I became less sure of what I wanted to do.

Upon graduation, I decided that law school was a good idea. It was, again, a degree that could open a lot of doors and lead to a lot of different options. I made this decision too late to enter right into law school from college, so I took a full-time job and began my research into different law schools.

In this new job, I was asked to write again. The job was at an animal shelter, and I was assigned the task of creating biographies of adoptable animals for the shelter's website. I didn't click right away, at least not consciously, but eventually something changed. I started to realize that I was not cut out for a lifetime working in an office, and thus I became less interested in law school. I was scared to admit it at first, because I liked the idea of having a plan for my immediate future. But I had, with this one job, discovered two passions: writing and animals. Both had been there all along, but I had not noticed.

Writing had been there for years. I had buried it in college, only to allow it to emerge occasionally while writing papers for class. My passion for animals had been there as well, but it was manifesting itself in a different form. I had been a vegetarian for seven years, personally saving cows and chickens from slaughter. Now I was working to give domestic animals better lives. Though I am no longer at that job, I have to credit it with leading my to my passions.

I am writing again, just for me. I am pursuing a career as a freelance writer. I would eventually love to have a regular column in a newspaper or magazine. I don't write poetry anymore, but I recently found a computer disk with my past work on it, and I have decided that my talent for prose is much stronger. And the animals? I may not work daily at a shelter, but my passion for them is still alive. I have my own adopted dog that is living a great life. Also, much of my writing reflects this topic. I hope to educate the public about animal related issues in order to enact change. I will probably volunteer or even work at a shelter again in the future. I will not allow this passion to die; it took me too long to find.

The process of finding my passion was slow, and it took me longer than a lot of people. Maybe those who find it sooner are the lucky ones. They know what they want, and are able to follow their dreams. Or maybe I am the one who is truly lucky. It took me longer to discover what I am passionate about, and I went through a lot of doubt and confusion to figure it out. Maybe I am lucky because I truly appreciate my passion and I know, because it was so hard to find, that it is really here to stay.