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Wifebeaters

After a restless night's sleep, I definitely needed an espresso this morning. While waiting for said espresso at the (duh) espresso bar at work, I overheard snippets of a conversation that made my blood boil.

Of course, first off, I'll be the first to admit that I was naughty to eavesdrop. At a table near the espresso stand, five young researchers sat... loudly praising their undergraduate alma maters... all five went to prominent, highly selective, incredibly difficult universities and small colleges on the east coast. Excellent schools. I'll be the first to admit it. My undergraduate institution must seem like kindergarten in comparison. I believe four of the five were graduate students (Ph.D. or M.D./Ph.D.); the fifth is a research assistant.

Each was scooping heaping spoonfuls of academic and intellectual glory on his or her respective college... on the high quality of their undergraduate education. This sort of boasting, I've heard, is "common" for Hutch newcomers (the graduate students, I believe, were all in their first year - and the R.A. has been at the Hutch just as long as I have)... at least the newcomers that came from... well... "prominent, highly selective, incredibly difficult universities and small colleges." The two graduate students in my lab did not go through this (but then again, they did not go to schools like Yale, Columbia, Middlebury, Duke, or Amherst), but they say 99% of their classmates did... and finally quit boasting once they were "humbled." Once they saw that they were "no better than anyone else... no smarter than anyone else." I've heard banter like this from graduates and undergraduates alike... before The Humbling.

But then they moved beyond academic praise... and into "work" during college.

1. "I know... I do so much research in Dr. [So-and-so's] lab at Yale... and I had that National Science Foundation grant (no one else had any grant that large)... so I didn't have to work some loser job on the side..."
2. "Oh, I totally agree! Thank God I was smart and successful enough that Professor [Some-famous-geneticist] at Columbia saw my talent and paid me more money than my stepfather was giving me to go to school. And with no loans for tuition, I was more popular than my old roommate... who worked some sh*t job at Banana Republic."
3."My parents said I was above working through college..."
4."I felt so bad for those people who had 'nasty jobs' because they couldn't get research positions."
5."Yeah... at least I didn't work in a fast food joint... or a retail store... God, do they ever get anywhere?"

Yes, witch. They do. They may not get (or even try for) a prestigious position as a Molecular and Cellular Biology graduate student, or an M.D./Ph.D. fellow, but they get "anywhere." Somewhere. Breathe air. Live lives.

I'm willing to bet the five of them did not even fathom that someone standing three feet from their exclusive, impromptu club worked three "nasty jobs" simultaneously in college - simply because his school was too small and little-known for famous geneticists or Nobel-Prize-winning neurobiologists to set up hardcore research labs. Microbiology technician, T.J. Maxx, tutoring. My blood burned as I heard those five egos praising their own intelligence... and pitying the "little people" like me - who did not go to Yale or Columbia or Middlebury or Amherst or Princeton or wherever else - and who did not do prize-winning research on breast cancer genes or cell differentiation in nematode worms. I guess it's the Pity Part that really frosted my cookies. I had not even realized that I "needed" their pity for my "situation." Believe me, I know the Hutch is crawling with geniuses. [The walls swell with excess brainpower; ceilings sag under the grunting weight of new ideas; fuses burst and lights dim with each volley of spunky neurotransmitters sprinting across synapses.] But I never labelled myself as Worth Pity... or In Dire Need of Pity. After all - I shall muddle through, right? I saw little dishonor in working a sales register, tutoring a student with diagnosed memory problems, washing lab dishes, autoclaving old petri plates, or maintaining bacterial stocks. I fathom, however, to the five I stood three feet from this morning, that there was plenty of dishonor in not having the money or resources to go to one of their superschools... there was plenty of dishonor in working-where-I-could. We all can't be made of money, after all.

Zach and I ventured to Seattle's T.J. Maxx this past weekend after I "just had" to stop at a craft store in the same shopping center for some "special glue" for a dreaded James Craft. I saw a student there in the same situation I was: not-very-refined, just-working, unsophisticated, content. I bought a wifebeater. My first ever. ("Eh, what the hell... it costs mere pennies at a store like this; and I need cooler pajamas..." And for the record, I don't like the name 'wifebeater,' but few seem to understand what I'm saying when I speak of my "knit tanktop.") I was wearing said wifebeater underneath my shirt this morning when four wealthy, intelligent, overachieving-but-not-Humbled graduate students and one wealthy, intelligent, overachieving-but-not-Humbled research assistant (all proudly uniformed in sweatshirts from their wealthy, respected, selective universities or small colleges) agreed that the "poor people" who had to work "nasty jobs" in "sh*t colleges" Deserved Pity - because they'd never make it "anywhere" - and just aren't that sophisticated.

And I stood three feet away, with an unsophisticated wifebeater, purchased from the parent company of a former employer, clinging to my chest as the sweat beaded to the surface of my skin (Boiling blood, remember?). Curtis gave me my mocha. I muddled a "thank you" to him and swallowed bitter tears. And I, having defied their odds and gotten "anywhere," mentally refused the five's Deserved Pity. Heading back upstairs to my not-so-sh*t job, I prayed that I'd never be like those five, and hoped their Humbling would come soon.

Maybe I should buy them wifebeaters.

[Disclaimer: I've nothing against Princeton, Yale, Columbia, Amherst, Duke, Middlebury, or any other college or university mentioned in the above banter. All are (and shall continue to be) fine, wonderous institutions of learning. It was just Sad Coincidence that some of the individuals mentioned above went to some of these schools.]

Posted by James at January 28, 2004 11:55 PM