Everything In Its Right Place

For me, there’s no better feeling in the world than knowing that your life is exactly where you want it to be. Finally, at the age of nineteen, I have reached that point in my life. Maybe that means than I’m an actual adult now? Probably not. For the past six years, I’ve known that I want to be an advertising major, but until now, that goal had never been a tangible reality within my reach. Now, everything that I’ve worked towards has paid off, and the haze of my future is beginning to sharpen.

I guess I’m pretty lucky in the sense that I’ve always known what I want to do. I have friends who still wander aimlessly from one potential major to another, and as someone who is an avid planner and lover of organization, that just wouldn’t fly. I’ve always loved to create, but I never really knew where a love of fonts and aesthetics would take me in life. Then, in eighth grade, I was watching Desperate Housewives, and my future all made sense. No, I wasn’t considering a career in neighborhood scandals and love affairs. In the fateful episode that I happened to catch, the blonde one (Lynette?) was trying to get back into the advertising business. While my mom sat next to me watching Lynette try to prove her relevance during a job interview, she had no idea that in my mind, my entire future was taking shape. It’s funny- for my entire life I had seen commercials on TV, billboards on the side of the road, and advertisements inside magazines, yet I had never actually considered who made these advertisements and how they got in front of me. It finally all made sense, and I can’t imagine a career better tailored to my personality. Last year in my intro to advertising class, with every guest speaker who came to visit, I found myself getting more and more excited about the industry I would one day (hopefully) be a part of.

At the beginning of this year, I applied to get into the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communications at UGA. Before applying, I attended an information session. The lady who was conducting the session rambled on about the requirements, the application process, the various majors within Grady, etc. Then, she talked about how competitive it was to become an advertising major, and she encouraged us to have at least two backups in the event that we weren’t accepted into the program. Backups? For the past six years I had thought of nothing but advertising. Upon hearing these words, my friend, Lindsay, drew a hangman and his noose, and while it may seem a bit dramatic, at that point in time, it seemed like the only viable option. And if we’re being honest, the noose sounds like a more appealing option than being an interpretive dance major-my backup plan, naturally.

After I sent in my application and wrote my statement of interest, the waiting began. I wasn’t too worried about getting in, but then again, UGA hasn’t always been a fan of accepting me and making my life easy (AKA The Great Waitlisted Debacle of 2010). It didn’t help the situation that when people asked me which Grady majors I had listed as my alternatives to advertising, I honestly couldn’t remember which majors I had chosen. Oh, no big deal, it’s only my whole entire future that I can’t even remember. Fortunately, after two months of waiting, I received an email with the subject line: “ACCEPTED TO ADVERTISING.” There was the initial moment of, “Thank you, Jesus!” Then came the tweeting and the happy dancing and the forwarding of the email to the people who care and then some more happy dancing. In all of the ensuing excitement, I almost forgot to accept my acceptance…

Now that I finally have a significant part of my life in order, I find that other parts of my life are falling into place. I’m surrounded by the best friends a girl could ask for. I’ve finally accepted the fact that no matter how many years (six) I study the French language, I’m NEVER going to be fluent, and that’s okay. My longtime dream to study abroad is finally becoming a reality. All in all, it's shaping up to be a beautiful life.

And to my random readers in Latvia, Russia, and other countries around the world (four out of seven continents!), I'm not really sure how you found my blog, but thanks for reading!