18th century studies

'You're living the dream,' Dad said over tuna sandwiches in Pt. Pleasant, New Jersey, at his recent birthday-cum-Father's Day bash. I explained it wasn't really a dream, but thank you; he pointed out that I had a goal, a dream, and I had made it happen; I thanked him. I am here in London reading for my M.A. in Eighteenth-Century Studies . Yet, this dream hasn't come without a price. Besides my huge tuition cost (a number that pains me to write here), I started my programme late at King's College London. I'd been on a job in Arlington, Va., and couldn't get out of my lease. I began approximately two weeks late, bringing as much of my stuff with me as I could, along with a cat. I was also bringing some mysterious health disorder(s), some difficulty swallowing and a thyroid nodule deemed 'indeterminate'. Mom accused me of caring more for my education than my health. She wasn't wrong. However, I knew that I'd be on the NHS and in good...

It's hard to figure out what to say at a time like this. A guy named "Zach" from another uni in the UK said in a BBC interview that it was somewhat "wrenching" to realize he'd taking out a $65,000 annual loan in light of the strike, which began yesterday across the nation. The teachers are striking because their pensions are threatened to be cut by 10,000 pounds a year. That's the gist of it - don't make me get into the financial particulars. I don't have a pension. And I have about 25 pounds in my savings account. From the standpoint of principle, the professors from King's College London (my uni), Oxford, Cambridge, etc. not only have a right but almost an imperative to stand up for themselves. Yet, as a cabbie put it to me last night, "That they are fighting because of a 10,000-pound loss shows they have pretty good pensions to begin with. Some of us don't even have pensions." Right. Reminds me a bit of the argument in Hollyw...