Failing to Appreciate the American Dream

Huh. I never heard of this story of the self-exile of Chheng Guan (David) Lim, who spent four years in hiding in Ann Arbor after going on academic probation in the engineering program he discovered he did not like at the University of Michigan.

Do read it all. You can skip the rest of this post since it will be self-referencing reflection based on my own life in Ann Arbor and familiarity with academic probation. The story is fascinating enough without my additions!

I've mentioned before that I started out higher education as a computer science major. I had taken every math course in high school and loved my programming classes. Yet after two semesters of being a math major, I found myself on academic probation with a GPA of 1.993 (if I remember the thousandth place correctly). On such thin margins, life paths are determined. Remember that when it comes to deflecting asteroids on a collision course with Earth.

In my own defense, I did have a great time.

I assume now that a student would whine to a professor to get a small bump to avoid that plight. It didn't occur to me even though I thought I'd calculated my programming course (ALGOL-W, I think) as being better than my final grade.

But rather than focus on getting that 0.007 GPA to get off academic probation, I doubled down and took even more math in the fall after summer break. My GPA went into free fall and I was out. In the nick of too late, I accepted that since I did well in my political science and history courses, that was probably the route I should have taken. I had taken every history class available in high school, too, after all. I registered for classes, somehow hoping that I'd escape the consequences of a GPA as low as I'd gotten it. The paperwork caught up with me, but not before I had attended courses for some weeks and figured that was the life for me. So I had that going for me.

My first course of action was to get a job. Which I'm sure was a relief to three apartment mates who kind of needed me to pay rent--aside from the value of my friendship and company, of course. So in a very bad economy, I finally found a job washing dishes at a seafood restaurant. Stray cats followed me home at night when I walked across the Diag.

I owed it to my friends, of course, not to let them down. And I worried my parents would despair. But I never had any doubt that I'd work the problem. I briefly considered the Army option (I would not go that route for 7 more years). I had failed. I was not a failure. That distinction was never unclear. I never considered going home in failure to live in my old room at my parents. And I never forgot my ultimate goal was to graduate from the University of Michigan.

I applied for readmission, citing my flash of insight about my proper path. The University would have none of that. Heck, I even remember spending a good half hour (as in amount of time--not the experience) with the head of academic affairs at the university on the way out. I even remember his name to this day (or think I remember it, anyway). But he had his own theories about why I flunked out that didn't involve alcohol and a disinterest in math that was crippling.

(Indeed, a good friend in college and a room mate who loved math--yet scored less than me on math SATs--could not bear to start the weekend if he was in the middle of a math problem he had not solved. That was the difference. I was already heading for happy hour and 25 cent hot dogs.)

A friend, who I will always be grateful for, drove me down to register when I told him what I needed to do. He didn't even ask. He just said, "Well, let's go," and he got up and headed for the door. I fully intended to register, but without my own car you can never tell if I would have carried out my intention in time for that term. Luckily, I grabbed my check book and never had to find out.

In a fortuitous event, we even had a guest lecture by a state representative in my political science class. Perhaps that turned on my radar for that career path when I got an opportunity to work for the state legislature a decade later--working in part for him, funny enough.

So I went to the local community college and took a full load of history and political science. With that under my belt, I reapplied and was accepted back in to Michigan.

I returned to the University of Michigan. Without my state scholarship, of course, due to the aforementioned GPA difficulties. So I continued to work. I worked the dorm cafeteria to provide access to food as much as for the pay. And I eventually got a job at an arcade (several arcades, actually), where I eventually became an assistant manager and then manager. Work the problem, as I always say. Whining says you gave up.

In perhaps what was a foolish gesture, rather than take easy classes to get off of academic probation, I took introductory physics my first term back. It was a course I flunked in my last term in, so it seemed like a statement about my resolve to do well this time. I got a B- in that. And hey, in seven years of helping my children in their grade school science fair projects, Mister earned two first places (only one trophy since the first year there was only a ribbon) and Lamb has earned 3 trophies. So my physics education was not totally wasted.

After that first term back, I lifted my GPA above 2.0 and never looked back. Working 20-30 hours a week, it did take me longer to graduate. At one point I had to stop taking classes until I paid off my tuition debt. But I made it. I may have every mark it is possible to get on a college transcript, but I graduated. Double majored, even. As I like to joke, "I loved being a college sophomore--the best three years of my life!"

Then I went on to graduate school, the Army National Guard, and then a good job and family (and divorce, in time) and all that. It's been a good life so far, and I look forward to much more.

The Lim story hits home because it is just beyond my comprehension that he would have fled the world in shame after faltering in college. Perhaps where he came from, that was a stumble that you could not recover from. But not here. If you stumble, you get up. I had only limited financial help from my family--those were rough times in Michigan. I was grateful for what I did get, and didn't use that as an excuse to stop piling up credits even if it seemed like it was painfully slow at times.

I hope the Life of Julia that our government is trying to impose on us doesn't take that attitude away from us. If you eff things up, face it, learn from it, and try again. A safety net too comfortable and certain is really just a burial shroud.

Anyway. Lim eventually graduated with a bachelor's degree in history, and returned to Singapore to live a normal life, dying too young at 55 in 1986--the year I graduated with my own BA in history and political science, coincidentally.

This is a great country. I hope Mr. Lim's hope, failure, and recovery gave him an insight into why America is great. We certainly reward success. But we forgive mistakes as long as you forgive yourself, learn, and keep moving. For every person, you are the biggest obstacle to your own success.

This is America, damn it. That's what we do.