Rising to the challenge

I have had a lot on my mind lately. Like many high school seniors, college admissions have been a constant worry for me and my peers alike.

It seems like the subject comes up in every conversation I have had lately. These topics make me nervous. Like, heart-pounding, palm-sweating, stab-myself-with-a-pencil nervous. Seemingly everywhere you turn people are saying how college is the only option for a good future. But what if I don’t get into any of them? Then what do I do?

As I lay awake at night pondering my foggy future, my fevered brain began to formulate alternative options: plan B. I could get a job or an internship, maybe take a year off and travel. Or I could dwell in sorrow, live in my parents’ basement and buy many cats … then hurl them at passersby. I do not even like cats, but “Crazy Cat Lady” seemed like a fairly sound career option in those doubting nighttime ponderings.

This was the low to which I had sunk: contemplating self-inflicted social pariah-dom with lots of furry, scratchy little animals that make me sneeze.

I had to stop stressing. A distraction was needed. The answer to my problem came to me one day as I fixed myself another meal of cereal and milk, practically the only food I knew how to make; I had always wanted to learn how to cook. I resolved then and there that I would take on the hobby.

I learned through trial and error (and error and error and error) until I thought I had worked out a pretty good repertoire of easy, basic foods. Then I decided to make pizza. It couldn’t be that hard, right?

Four hours later the kitchen was drenched in doughy carnage. And I didn’t put the correct amount of yeast in it because, you know what? Yeast is just icky. I then assembled the other pizza accoutrements and voila! Time to bake.

But when the time came to take the pizza out of the oven, something was not right. The first bite was more of a brick-like cracker.

Already driven to a state of emotional imbalance by spending four hours on this abomination of a pizza, I snapped; I was pretty much sobbing. When I came upstairs to tell my dad the saga, he jumped up from his chair, genuinely frightened. “What happened? Are you all right?” He thought I was dying.

I took a deep breath in, gathered my strength and tried to form a coherent sentence through my tears. “M-my … m-m-my … MY PIZZA SUCKS.”

He had not been aware that I was even making pizza. Then he actually started to laugh at me. All at once I realized the ridiculousness of the situation. Soon we were both laughing and came downstairs to eat some cracker pizza. It actually wasn’t that bad.

My experience with pizza dough was a lot like applying to college, actually. In all fairness, I put more time and effort into my applications than I did on my pizza failure. But pizza dough is not the end of the world and neither is college. I delegated too much importance and undue mental anguish to both.

We put these almost life or death stakes on an envelope in the mail, but when it comes right down to it, I can do anything I want with my life – even if it isn’t perfect the first time I attempt something new. Sure, I may need to tweak the recipe, but I can always try again until I get it right. I will rise to the challenges life will serve me, even if my pizza doesn’t necessarily follow suit.

College, cooking, pizza, stress Issue 6, Print Archives, Views