Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you so much for asking me what I am doing with my life next year. I completely forgot that the future is rapidly approaching. Without the constant questioning of people like you, I would be totally amiss, naively enjoying my senior year and worrying not one bit about health benefits, salaries and the safety hazards of cities.

Admittedly, your question is valid. My future is impending. So is death. I try not to let either thought consume me.

But sure, let’s talk about the inescapable future, since talking about the past year is too broad of a topic and my current interests and commitments are too dull for you.

When I share that I have “a few options,” but not a definite lifelong career choice, I can see dissatisfaction in your eyes. “What’s your major again?” you ask, as if you’ll know the perfect position for me once you hear what will appear on my degree. When I respond that I have majors in the colleges of Communication and Arts & Sciences, I see the lingering pity in your eyes. You try to hide your low expectations for my employment possibilities with your next question, usually something about where I want to live.

When I say — again — that I’m unsure, you don’t exactly click your tongue at me. But I can read your mind well enough. You’re thinking about my poor parents, and what a disappointment it will be when I have to move back home. Trust me when I say if I do move back in with my parents, it will be very, very brief.

Your doubt frustrates me. So to get off of the topic of my future, I turn the conversation to you. Within the first 15 seconds, you share with me the news of your lucrative contract at a trendy firm in a hip city.

Excuse me while my eyes glaze over and I begin to reconsider my entire existence.

Up until this very moment, I was feeling pretty proud of myself. Sure, my future is not certain. But I am a good person. I have learned so much — including how to be a better learner — in my liberal arts education. I have taken an opportunity to read — really read — and digest the opinions and approaches of different economists, philosophers, journalists and political scientists. I have attended talks by inspirational speakers who are thinking outside the realms you have established as reality. I have even changed my major a handful of times after taking a random elective and instantly thirsting for more.

My GPA is fine; my resume is solid. My heart is good; my brain is hungry. My body is young; my soul is passionate. I can change the world if I want to! And better than that, I know that I have such potential within me.

But you still look down your nose at me. Because Fortune 500 companies are not fighting over me. Because graduate school is not in my immediate future. Because a few years of service work might be. Because traveling and being independent without a contract tying me down sounds exotic and doable to me right now. So I might as well do it.

Having my next move set in stone is a luxury I can only dream of. It means an entire semester of being able to say with absolute certainty what you will be doing next year.

I am, truly, happy for you. You worked hard. You did good things. And you have something to show for it — a promise of a salary or grad school. Way to go!

I’m still figuring that part out. Give me a few months without your additional judgment and skepticism, and then I promise you will be the first to know what my future holds.

Until then,

Any liberal arts senior from any four-year university