Higher Education

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You know how you hear people get excited about being the first person in their family to graduate college? Well, I am the opposite. I am the only one in my immediate family to NOT graduate college. First, some of the most intelligent people I know are not college graduates. My BIL is a few credits short of his Bachelor's, and he is borderline rich. He has no degree. My late great grandfather had an 8th grade education, and was a real estate wiz. It's a good thing because all his money ended up going to care for my very sick great grandmother. Anyway, I started college at sixteen, but after a car accident at 18, I was in and out of college because of my poor health. My older sister got her Bachelor's at 18 (she too started college at 16), and her Master's degree at twenty-one. I remember how excited she was when she paid off her student loans! My dad got his Bachelor's degree in his twenties while working full time, while my mother finished her Bachelors degree in her early thirties. What was cool to me was that they both got their Master's degree at the same time, in their early forties, at the same school (they even had a class together). I really admired them for working, and going to school. They had to take out student loans, of course. My late mother would happily have kept going to school, I think. Her last years before dementia gripped her (she started getting symptoms at 46) she taught at the college I had previously attended. I even had the privilege of taking one of her classes! She loved teaching, and she loved learning. To me, school was about getting a degree to get a good job. My professors tried to get me to go into psychology, but I tend to take on people's problems as my own. I just can't separate myself. Did you like school? Would you go back if you could? I know money is often a huge obstacle. Do you remember decades ago all they said you needed was a high school degree, then later just a Bachelor's. Now, for a great job you almost need a Master's degree!