Might be a quarter-life crisis

As I have mentioned here before, I am a food scientist. Unfortunately, food science is a pretty location-specific career, and not many (exactly 3) Army posts are located near places where I could work. As much as I enjoy my field, I’ve been wondering if it makes sense for me to stay in a field where I can’t work everywhere we live. It all started last year. I got the job at Ann Taylor as a part-time, temporary gig. I honestly planned and tried to find a full-time position for the majority of the year I was in Virginia. Additionally, due to Mac deploying and our move, I decided to take the spring term off from grad school. Then the summer registration opened, and I didn’t enroll. Then the fall semester started, and I still hadn’t signed up for classes. I had a slight existential crisis about what I was doing with my life and decided to not continue in the Masters of Agriculture program. As the post-deployment job list came out, it became obvious that my job potential in my field would be low, even with a Masters degree.

I started looking at jobs here in town, and I focused on the several colleges. After sorting through and applying for jobs at five universities, I realized that I was genuinely interested in pursuing a career in higher education. Somehow, I came across a Masters program in higher education at one of the schools here. I took a big leap of faith and applied for it. Obviously, I haven’t heard back yet, but it’s better to try and fail than to wonder what might have been. I’m still looking for a job, and I’m more hopeful than I’ve been over the past year.