ShareThisI want a "gap year."
That's my conclusion after reading "New High-School Elective: Put Off College" by the Wall Street's Journal's Toddi Gutner this week.
Gutner reports that many highly motivated high school students who are accepted into top colleges are delaying the start of their higher education years in exchange for a year to "gain life experience" and "focus" their goals. These kids aren't slackers, but are using that year for concentrated and varied experience. Gutner chronicles one young woman who is taking a year off after high school to work an internship in Boston before going to China to live and study the language. She'll start at Harvard in the fall.
Heck, there are now even "gap consultants."
This is different from what I remember. A group of my good friends took their "gap year" in college, by remaining for an extra semester or two after the traditional four years were up. I really wanted to follow suit, but it didn't sound like such a good idea once my parents told me I'd have to pay for it. I graduated instead.
Heck, I didn't even get a "gap summer." I barely got a "gap 10 days." My mom and dad pushed me to start work right away. I had moved to Washington, D.C., and started a job there a little over a week after I graduated from the University of Illinois. That was a shocker!
So now -- more than ever -- I want to collect on that gap year. I might have just goofed around with it back in my younger days, but now a year "off"" from kids, career and responsibilities? Just 12 months to "gain life experience" and "focus my goals"?
I could change the world. Or at least my world.
For starters, I'd have a really organized house. And, without four other short, often cranky people constantly rearranging things like a puzzle around here, stuff would stay where I'd put it. I could read all the great books sitting on my bedside table.
I'm not sure if I would learn to cook really good "grown-up" food, which would be a pleasure to eat, or if I would finally fulfill my fantasy of ending food presentation and production almost entirely around here. I could live on just a little bit of cheese, crackers, salad, coffee and red wine. That menu, annoyingly, doesn't work for kids. (Actually, I've often thought it would be great if I could just fill their bowls twice a day with the exact same thing from a bag, like I do the very satisfied dog and cats. But I digress.)
Oh, and I would go skiing and actually get to ski as I like to.
Hmmm, I wonder if during a "gap year" I could meet a guy, get married, and then tell him, "Oh yeah, I have four kids, and they are getting back tomorrow." (Okay, I suppose that might be rather unethical.)
I've actually dreamt about what might be called a "gap year" or at least a "gap semester." Seriously -- in the dream I'm back in college having a great time while my kids are being well cared for somewhere, but it's not clear where. Sigh.
But back to reality. Far from having a "gap" year, I think I'm living the "constrained" years.
But I also know that someday the kids are going to be grown and I'm going to finally get that "gap year." Many of them. And my guess is, I won't want it so much then. My house won't be as organized as I think it will be, I won't get around to all that reading anyway, and I'll wish I had some little people on their little skis with me out on the hill, calling, "Mom, wait!"
So, I wonder, after all, if it may well be the "constrained" years that are causing me to "gain life experience" and "focus my goals" in a pretty wonderful way that would be impossible to achieve, even in a lifetime of "gap years."
(Betsy Hart hosts the "It Takes a Parent" radio show on WYLL-AM 1160 in Chicago. Reach her through betsysblog.com. For more stories, visit scrippsnews.com.)
FROM THE HART
