Opinion

JENNIFER CALFAS

EDITOR IN CHIEF

AARICA MARSH 

and DEREK WOLFE 

EDITORIAL PAGE EDITORS

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MANAGING EDITOR

420 Maynard St. 

Ann Arbor, MI 48109

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The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Thursday, September 10, 2015

I 

will never sit in a cubicle. I will 
never have to worry about the 
finances of running a small 

business, owning 
a company car or 
creating a presen-
tation for a board 
meeting. 
And 

I will never have to worry about 
these things and more if I continue 
on my path toward medical school. 
Those things make me happy. But 
does my major?

When we were in third grade, our 

teachers asked us the most important 
question of our lives, “What do you 
want to be when you grow up?” At the 
time, I’m sure most of us answered 
“astronaut” or something else that 
sounded acceptable in the mind of an 
eight-year-old. We didn’t realize just 
how important that question actually 
was or how long it might take to find 
an answer.

In middle school, our perceptive 

changed slightly to more realistic 
careers such as becoming musicians, 
authors and doctors, while high 
school finely tuned our answers 
even further to journalists, athletes 
and surgeons once things became 
more serious. Until senior year rolled 
around and it was time to start filling 
out college applications, I never once 
looked back on my decision to attend 
medical school.

And yet there I was, freezing on 

the “concentration/major” box fill-
ing out the Common Application, 
unable to move the mouse. Through 
all the confusion, a question formed 
at the forefront of my mind: Why 
was I hesitating? Two years later, 
I’d chalk it up to my subconscious 
trying to tell my heart something 
it didn’t want to accept: Maybe I 
didn’t want to do biology. In that 
moment, I felt like a child putting 
their hands over their ears, repeat-
ing a mantra of lalalala to keep the 
truth away. I was good at biology, 
right? You needed a biology degree 
to get into medical school, right? I 
didn’t just need to take biology; I 
needed to major in biology and love 
biology if I wanted a shot at becom-

ing the doctor that I always envi-
sioned in my future. At least that’s 
what I told myself when I hesitantly 
typed “biology” into that little box.

“Do What You Want” is a chapter 

in Amy Poehler’s novel “Yes Please.” 
She essentially argues that to be 
happy, we need to follow what we 
want to do in life. As she goes on to 
detail her early struggles as a rising 
comedian in an unforgiving industry, 
you can’t help but notice the great 
success that came with her hard 
work. Of course, all fans of “Satur-
day Night Live” and the ever-popular 
series “Parks and Recreation” know 
the name Amy Poehler, whether by 
her sparkling identity or constant 
enthusiasm as herself or her per-
sona, Leslie Knope. But only readers 
of her novel can truly see the depths 
of her love for work — not once in the 
novel did I remember reading that 
she was unhappy. Even as a comedy 
nobody in a small Chicago improv 
theatre, Poehler remarked that she 
was incredibly happy with her new 
“family.” Reading “Yes Please” was 
not only a small piece of happiness to 
feed the “Parks and Recreation” fan 
inside of me, but also an educational 
experience about life itself, especially 
college life.

Do what you want, whatever 

makes you happy, is an essential 
piece of advice all students enter-
ing college should carry with them. 
I had entered freshman year car-
rying the uncertainty of my con-
centration on my shoulders, and 
I didn’t even know it. Biology was 
something that I felt was neces-
sary to my success, not something 
that was bringing me happiness. 
Acceptance is the hardest part of 
any failed relationship, and this 
relationship was slowly but surely 
becoming a one-way street. To 
become happy in your work, some-
times you need to make the hard 
decision to let go of things that have 
become detrimental to your hap-
piness. Unfortunately, that might 
mean breaking up with your major 
if it just isn’t working for you.

When first-year requirements 

dictated that foreign language was 
required to graduate from LSA, 
I became excited to once again 
immerse myself in a topic I had 
adored in high school. This was 
especially so when Lorena, my 
fabulous instructor, added an equal 
mix of passion and fun to the lan-
guage that spurred me to partici-
pate actively in class once more. I 
found myself excited to do home-
work and to attend class each day 
again. I adored Spanish and came 
to the simple and quick decision 
that I would pursue a dual degree 
with the language as my other 
major, which ultimately led to the 
rethinking of my entire concentra-
tion choices thus far. Eventually, I 
gave myself an ultimatum: If biol-
ogy and Spanish were hanging off a 
cliff, which would I jump for?

The answer was too simple, too 

quick. I jumped for Spanish. And 
immediately after I jumped, I called 
my parents to let them know that, 
although I was still pursuing medi-
cal school, I was going to double 
major in BCN and Spanish and quit 
biology. They understood almost 
immediately, sensing my unhappi-
ness in biology in a way only parents 
can while giving me various reas-
surances. Directly after, I unasham-
edly cried for an hour straight. But 
they were happy tears, as I had final-
ly found an equal medium where I 
could still envision myself as a pedi-
atrician, yet be happy as an under-
graduate studying exactly what I 
wanted. I cannot wait to begin my 
journey as a sophomore in my new 
concentration, happy and interested 
for the first time in a long time.

My point is, follow Amy Poehler’s 

advice and do whatever you want 
and what makes you ultimately 
happy in life. Whether you’re a ris-
ing undergraduate or a new fresh-
man, never be afraid to pursue the 
important things in life. Enjoy your 
work, and you’ll create your own 
happy future.

— Megan Mitchell can be 

reached at umeg@umich.edu.

A long, winding journey

Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Ben Keller, 

Payton Luokkala, Aarica Marsh, Adam Morton, 
Victoria Noble, Michael Paul, Anna Polumbo-
Levy, Allison Raeck, Melissa Scholke, Michael 
Schramm, Stephanie Trierweiler, Mary Kate 

Winn, Jenny Wang, Derek Wolfe

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

Do whatever you want

MEGAN 
MITCHELL

S

ymbols of privilege: Canada 
Goose, Sperrys, J. Crew and 
Grey Goose. As a white male 

from an upper-
middle-class sub-
urb attending an 
elite 
academic 

institution, I am 
living proof. Though we often asso-
ciate privilege with a specific race, 
gender and socioeconomic status, 
there are some forms of privilege 
that aren’t as obvious as a silk shirt 
or, quite frankly, a penis.

Superficially, I represent the 

advantaged, but I also represent 
the disadvantaged 1.6 percent of 
the population that is openly gay 
or lesbian. Yes, I, a member of the 
“elite,” encounter abuse due to my 
homosexuality even in Ann Arbor. 
The University is ranked as one of 
the nation’s most liberal college 
institutions, yet I would argue that 
the student culture subconsciously 
remains homophobic, causing the 
persecution of gays on campus to 
appear somewhat invisible to the 
naked eye.

My first encounter with homo-

sexual persecution at the Univer-
sity occurred before I was even a 
student here, during the winter 
of my senior year of high school 
when I was admitted to Michigan. 
To celebrate the acceptance into 
my dream school, I asked a long-
time family friend, Adam — then 
a sophomore at the University — if 
I could come for the weekend and 
(sorry, Mom) party. Friday night 
I was ushered into an (unchaper-
oned!) apartment, given access to 
all the alcohol I wanted and thrown 
into a social scene unlike any lame 
high school party I had been to. 
Adam’s girlfriend and her friends 
came over, and after pre-gaming 
and getting acquainted with every-
body, we left for a house party. At 
the house, I was again ushered into 
a sweaty basement with a DJ, beer 

pong and party lights. I partied as 
any hot-shot senior in high school 
would, standing quietly by the beer 
pong table, pretending to be super 
focused on the game to avoid talk-
ing to people.

The guy I was standing next 

to at the table turned out to be an 
exchange student from China. I 
was interested in his experience as 
an exchange student, so we talked 
for a while. Not once did thoughts 
regarding his sexuality cross my 
mind; I was simply focused on 
the conversation we were having. 
I gave him my number for a rea-
son I can’t remember, maybe due 
to my innocence, maybe due to 
the impairment from the alcohol. 
Again, I didn’t think anything of it.

After the conversation ended, 

Adam replaced the exchange stu-
dent at the beer pong table. “Thank 
God, I was getting worried there,” 
he said in my ear. Confused, I 
questioned what he meant. “You 
guys were talking for a while,” he 
accused. I immediately understood.

Adam had caught me completely 

off guard. I’d had conversations 
with guys before, but had never 
experienced this kind of judg-
ment. After explaining to him that 
the guy was an exchange student, 
Adam then uttered, “You gave him 
your number,” in an attempt to 
prove my guilt.

We did not speak about the inci-

dent for the rest of the night, but as a 
result, I became nervous and avoid-
ed other conversations with guys, 
feeling my every move dissected by 
Adam’s gaze. The next time I vis-
ited Adam, I didn’t dare speak to 
other guys — only to groups with at 
least one female present.

That night I was introduced to a 

type of discrimination I had never 
experienced before. I was expect-
ing some kind of eventual abuse 
for my homosexuality at college, 
but not this soon and not by such 

a close friend. An action that I had 
found so innocent — a conversation 
about Asia and its culture with a 
sophomore student from China — 
was taboo just because that conver-
sation was with another man.

Throughout my freshman year 

at the University, I have been sub-
jected to other subtle forms of hate 
and discrimination due to my sexu-
ality. At my first frat party, I was 
told the more girls I hooked up with 
that night, the better chance I would 
have in being admitted to that fra-
ternity. My roommate continually 
questioned why I never brought a 
girl back to spend the night and pres-
sured me to do so. A night out was 
never complete unless you heard the 
casual insult “homo” or “faggot” at 
some party. Many of these offenders 
fail to realize that they are oppress-
ing an entire community when they 
make these “meaningless” comments 
they forget to have said less than five 
minutes later.

Homophobia has been internal-

ized by a large part of the University’s 
culture, and students subconsciously 
reveal it in ways that are still hurt-
ful. The conversation between Adam 
and me was so quick, so discreet, but 
it was one of the most meaningful 
to me. Acts of discrimination, such 
as Adam’s, are acts of microaggres-
sion, and they are less visible (and 
even perceived as nonexistent) to 
the student body. The oppression of 
the homosexual community often 
seems like an invisible one; preva-
lent, but conducted so accidentally or 
thoughtlessly that it becomes naked 
to the human eye. I am an upper 
middle-class white male, and there-
fore I am part of the advantaged. But 
I am also gay. Just because oppres-
sion is not visible to the majority of 
the population does not mean it is 
 

less significant.

— Daniel Dixon can be 

reached at djdix@umich.edu.

You gave him your number

T

his past summer, while most Michi-
gan students interned, worked, trav-
eled or took classes, I climbed out of 

a deep pit of emotional tur-
moil.

My 
inner 
equilibrium 

initially faltered at the 
end of last fall. As I 
struggled through my pre-med classes and 
extracurricular obligations, the anticipation 
of returning home for Winter Break stood as 
my only beacon of hope. Home life, though, 
came with its own stressors: a strained 
relationship with my brother, a lack of upkeep 
with my high school friendships and the 
dread of returning to Ann Arbor for another 
soul-crushing semester. While at home, my 
heart and soul began to spiral downward. 
I kept asking myself, if I didn’t like being at 
school and I didn’t like being at home, where 
did I like to be?

As winter semester began, I noticed a heavy 

feeling in my chest. I woke up each morning 
dreading going through my day. I spent hours 
lying in bed and staring at the ceiling, my 
mind blank and my heart heavy. I lost interest 
in the few enjoyable activities for which 
I had made time in my otherwise-tedious 
schedule. In the midst of feebly attempting 
to pull myself together, my support system 
disintegrated, due to an irreparable rift in my 
group of close friends. Whatever small hope I 
had held for a speedy recovery vanished.

As 
humans, 
we 
are 
evolutionarily 

programmed to adapt. I do not believe feeling 
permanently sad is possible; instead we 
eventually become numb to our pain so that 
we can go about our daily lives. By February, I 
had fallen into a routine that kept my feelings 
in check. Each day I would wake up, go to 
class, nap, go to meetings, finish homework, 
go to bed and repeat. The less thought 
required in completing my day, the better.

Knowing that I needed help, I signed up 

for a Counseling and Psychological Services 
appointment, but felt wary of attending 
weekly meetings devoted to discussing my 
sadness. As my appointments continued and 
the ground beneath me thawed, my heart and 
mind followed suit. By the time my parents 
came to pick me up in April, my full range of 
emotions had returned and my mother and 
father witnessed me collapse into a puddle 
of tears. Unlike Riley’s situation in “Inside 
Out,” though, my breakdown did not lead to 
an immediate, happy Pixar ending. Instead, 
that moment was the initial step down a long, 
winding road of eventual recovery.

The first half of my summer seemed to 

worsen my mental state. Rather than properly 
studying for the MCAT as I had intended, I 
would go to the library and my mind would 
start to race. Each day I became increasingly 
aware of my disinterest in pre-med life, 
my disengagement from the University 

community and my disconnection from the 
social circles all around me. Unable to ignore 
these thoughts, I postponed my MCAT to a 
later date and opted to work the rest of the 
summer as a camp counselor. For the first 
time in months I rediscovered something 
that I loved, and from that moment forward 
the true recovery process began.

Being a camp counselor did what months of 

therapy could not — it shifted my perspective 
through firsthand experience. Instead of 
waking up each day focusing on my own 
problems, I woke up thinking about how to 
best serve the needs of my campers. Instead 
of celebrating my own moments of success, I 
celebrated all the times my campers learned 
something new or made a new friend. The 
best part about camp was that all the usual 
pressures from life did not exist. I was free to 
be myself without worrying about doing well. 
Instead of trying to outshine one another, 
the entire camp community worked to shine 
brightly together. The moment everything 
clicked was when my campers and I went 
on an evening motorboat ride together on 
the lake. I’ll never forget our shrieks and 
squeals as the driver accelerated full speed 
across the water. We clung to each other over 
every sharp turn while wind whipped our 
hair and faces. I drank in the perfect evening 
air and a thought popped into my head: this 
was what it meant to be alive. Life was not 
about comparing myself to others or aiming 
for success purely for the sake of appearing 
successful. Life was about doing what I loved 
with people I loved.

For the rest of the summer, I turned this 

epiphany over in my mind. Were the concepts 
of enjoying life and achieving greatness 
mutually exclusive? Did the road to happiness 
necessitate giving up my dreams of becoming 
a doctor? After much thought, I became 
convinced that happiness and achievement 
are both possible, as long as I push myself 
for the right reasons. Medical school will be 
difficult, but I just need to remember that I’m 
going on this journey to help others, not to 
boost my own image.

As I begin my senior year, I worry that I will 

relapse into my previous stage of emptiness 
and depression. However, I strongly believe 
that if I surround myself with the right 
people and do things that make me truly 
happy, I will be able to push through the 
tough times and achieve my dreams without 
sacrificing my mental health. The University 
is a challenging environment that puts many 
students through tough mental roadblocks. 
This place has knocked me down numerous 
times, but I am determined to stand up once 
more and walk across the finish line with a 
smile on my face.

— Annie Humphrey can be reached 

at annieah@umich.edu.

A NNIE 
HUMPHREY

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