Overextending myself

I enjoyed all the extra-curricular activities that I participated in during high school. I expected to be able to do the same thing in college and fill my free time getting involved in campus activities. That didn't work out the way I thought.

Before I started college, Mom wanted me to look into getting involved in the Baptist Student Union. However, I was sort of hoping that I could explore my own spirituality during college without being tethered to a church atmosphere. Even though I am a Christian, I felt very uneasy being around other people of faith at that time. I only ever went there a couple of times during my sophomore year. It really wasn't my scene. I just felt like everybody was very self-righteous. The funny thing is that I knew many of the students, and they never acted like that when I ran into them on campus. This was just isolated to when they were in that building. I didn't feel like putting on fake airs just for their benefit.

One thing that we did not have at Artesia High School was Speech and Debate. At other schools, this fell under the Drama club. But no one there felt it was important enough to budget for yet another group of students to go to various competitions throughout the state.

When Eastern New Mexico University's Speech and Debate team announced their first meeting of the semester, I went to check it out. It looked very interesting at first and appeared to be something I really wanted to be a part of. However, the faculty member in charge of the team made it clear that he expected more out of the participants. It wasn't going to be like the high school version that I never got to be a part of. For instance, we could not just enter one aspect of the competition, like speech, interpretation or debate. We would be expected to get involved in at least five categories per competition.

This was not even the challenging part. We were required to come with whatever we would be speaking about or interpreting or debating on our own. This one girl and I went to the library and tried to find some material that would be suitable. She had done the Speech and Debate the year before, so she knew what was and was not acceptable material. Everything I suggested, she said we couldn't do it. It was very frustrating.

If I had been in Speech and Debate in high school, this probably wouldn't have seemed insurmountable. If I were permitted to just ease my way into with maybe two separate projects, I might have been able to work my way up to five or more. But the team advisor wouldn't allow that.

So I just quit. I had better things to do with my time at college. Besides, I was starting to feel some pompous attitude from the members of the team who knew what they were doing and didn't seem to like having to talk me through things that they had learned more than four years ago. And it wasn't like I left anyone hanging. I think they already felt like they would be better off without me.

During my sophomore year, I was approached to join Phi Mu Alpha, the music fraternity. It wasn't like one of the clubhouse fraternities, so I decided to pledge. I and five other candidates went through the initiation process and I was given a pledge pin. A week later, I was asked to pledge Alpha Psi Omega, the fraternity for the theatre department. With my class overload that semester and involvement in theatrical productions and the renaissance faire that had been planned that year, something had to give. I returned the pledge pin for Phi Mu Alpha. It was getting to be too much.

But I felt really bad quitting because that supposedly had an impact on some of the other pledges. Three of them also pulled out and they said it was because of my decision not to pursue it further. I had no idea I had that type of influence. I probably didn't, and they just used it as an excuse to get out because they were probably overloaded as well.

I also had to cut back my participation in the Renaissance Faire. I was still in it with one theatrical presentation and performing with the Madrigal Singers. Looking back, I still don't know how I got through that semester with my insanity intact. Maybe I didn't.

The Baptist Student Union, the Speech and Debate team, Phi Mu Alpha and the Renaissance Fair made me wish I had been able to avoid or quit other things when I was younger, like 4H or work. This was a good step toward becoming an adult. It's too bad I never quite mastered that ability, especially when it came to relationships, but that is fodder for future posts.