Going back to school at 27
Summer Hathaway From “School of Rock” in iconic Beret, leaned against tree, and looking unimpressed.
It’s about to be my first, first day of school in nearly a decade—and it’s kind of a big deal.
As a kid I’d spend the waning weeks of summer holiday planning my ultimate lineup of first week outfits (pro tip: everyone goes hard on day one, day two is where you really hit ‘em). Dancing around the change room of a thrift store adjacent to the university campus I’ll be spending the majority of my time at for the next 9 months, suddenly those days didn’t seem so far away.
School had always been a part of my plan. From 6 years old, when all I wanted to do in the world was paint, I’d started saving every penny of birthday, Christmas, and Hanukkah money towards one day attending Ontario College of Art and Design. When my dramatic tendencies, and intrinsic love of performance, had every adult in my life encouraging me towards acting, my path rerouted towards Julliard. When a knack for storytelling and words was unexpectedly dropped on my doorstep, Oxford was added to my list of potentials. There had never been any doubt that I could get in wherever I pleased, why would there be? School was where I thrived. I was always top of my class, teachers favourite, receiving so many awards that they began feeling superfluous! How to be invited to sit with the cool girls at lunch, or get Jason to notice me—these I was still figuring out...and sure like most renowned big names, there were those who doubted me. Madame Stevens from the second grade will rue the day she gave Chloe Gross a C+ in art class! Nevertheless, I naturally excelled in tandem with the structure and routine that school provided, was told by enough people how brilliant I was from a young age, and thankfully had ample untarnished delusion to believe this to be true.
*Record scratch* Unfortunately when your life falls apart, being on the honour roll doesn’t mean shit.
In my last years of high school, the institution I’d flourished under for so many years became much more of a crutch than anything. Starring in the school play, or becoming student council president, didn’t feel like fulfilling achievements, but draining responsibilities I internally struggled to keep up with. When I graduated, and all of my peers headed off to post-secondary, I took my savings jar and decided to travel instead.
My intentions of working in the arts never wavered, and to be successful in that world, degrees were not a requirement. So many of the artists I admired had never gone to school, had no fancy letters following their names, and so post secondary became less and less of an inevitability for me. Still, as I explored the most amazing city in the world, making friends with worldly creatives twice my age, seeing photos of past classmates on their more typical paths had a small part of me fearing that I might be missing out.
What was meant as a brief stopover in Canada to regroup, became extended with the arrival of an unexpected epilepsy diagnosis, and learning to live and be medicated for a condition while independently supporting yourself doesn’t exactly scream “Let’s throw full-time studies in there too!” So I worked, created on the side, and adapted once again to what life was throwing at me, while waiting for my body to heal itself so I could go back to the plan—if somewhat mangled now. Though I had passion coming out my wazoo, interests galore, and a unique perspective to deliver them both; a cumulonimbus of shame started forming above me whenever someone asked what I was studying.
Putting my life on pause was doing just that, I wasn’t living. I knew I’d always wanted to move, and after speaking with a mutual friend also living with a chronic condition who had moved herself a few years previous, my untarnished delusion began creeping back in knowing that I could too. She had moved for school, which I’d decided was now entirely out of the question for me between managing fainting spells, and a need to prove that I could succeed without taking a traditional route.
One night I found myself googling “best art schools in the world”, and the top result happened to be in one of the cities I’d been considering relocating to. The school was very impressive, competitive, and my overachiever ears were pricked up. It offered entire degrees in subjects like welding, storytelling, and shoe making—I’d never even known I’d wanted to be a cobbler until that very moment! I found a course that operated on a timeline that suited me, covering a plethora of subjects that interested me, and decided to apply—with the deadline being only 48 hours away. I immediately got to work on a portfolio, had a seizure 6 hours in, and got straight back to work the next morning. I submitted the application expecting nothing, but less than a week later received an email confirming my acceptance.
My feelings on school has changed over the years; I knew many people who had dropped out, warned that you could learn the same curriculum without the hefty price tag, and I also knew many brilliant creatives who had no formal education but were producing some of the most impactful works. I have multiple friends who had recently chosen to go back to school around a similar age, learn a new skill, finish a degree, take on a dramatic career pivot. I made friends with a woman who, while previously a doctor, at 30 was moving to the same city I was to earn a degree in songwriting. Though circumstances and various choices didn’t lead me to continue school at the age when most are being funnelled into it, at 27 this choice feels entirely my own. I wasn’t moving my life for school, I would be moving either way. School however would hopefully serve as a launchpad in an unknown city, offering connections and resources, keeping my personal creation regimented, and maybe even teaching me something fun along the way. It’s gonna be weird? Exhilarating? Horrifying? It’s my first day of semester tomorrow, and maybe it’s a positive that the thing I’m most stressed about is which outfit to wear.
The final step in accepting my application had been providing my high school diploma, and having graduated a decade ago during the height of my parents divorce, I had absolutely no clue where that bugger had gotten to. After a rigamarole of phone calls with the district school board, late this past July I’d had to head down in person to the place that had once felt so familiar but was now so foreign. The office staff at my alma mater were unrecognizable to me, as was I to them. I had to squint at a plaque of my graduating class, high up on the entrance wall, to find my face amongst many, completed with a choker necklace that I would now tenderly regret for years to come.
I’m still involuntarily holding on to the same baby cheeks, which I’ve recently learned has people guessing I’m far younger than I look. Maybe I’ll blend in with my classmates tomorrow, the youngest of whom will have been born the same year Obama was originally elected. Maybe I’ll start a secret yet legal affair with my puppetry professor, because we’re the only ones who truly get each other. Maybe I’ll feel so behind, or ahead, or out of place, and drop out! Maybe I’ll return right back to thriving like a day never passed, and continue my education further. Maybe the launchpad will give me just enough steam to take off solo by the end of the year. I don’t know, but I’m excited to find out.
Anyways gotta run, it’s a school night. Fill you in on all the latest gossip at lunch tomorrow?
