Oh, the Places I’ll Go…
I’m sure you’re all familiar with at least some of the books of Theodore Seuss Geisel — though you probably know him by his pen name, Dr. Seuss. The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, The Lorax, How the Grinch Stole Christmas — these and other children’s books that Dr. Seuss authored and illustrated have entertained kids for decades. They’ve even spawned TV specials, stage productions, and several full-length movies.
Around high school and college graduation time each spring, you’ll often see a particular Dr. Seuss book displayed with graduation gifts in stores. That book is Oh, the Places You’ll Go!
First published in January 1990, Oh, the Places You’ll Go! was the last of Dr. Seuss’s books to be published in his lifetime. It offers whimsical advice and encouragement to readers as they embark on their new journey in life, hence its popularity as a gift for grads.
It begins:
Congratulations!
Today is your day.
You’re off to Great Places!
You’re off and away!
You have brains in your head.
You have feet in your shoes.
You can steer yourself
any direction you choose.
You’re on your own. And you know what you know.
And YOU are the guy who’ll decide where to go.
Though not a recent high school or college grad myself, I’ve nonetheless found this Dr. Seuss classic relevant to my life. I turned 48 back in January. As I stand on the threshold of middle age and look back on my life, I can relate all too well to the story’s description of how our life journey can take us from optimistic highs to discouraging lows.
Our narrator predicts:
You’ll be on your way up!
You’ll be seeing great sights!
You’ll join the high fliers
who soar to high heights.
You won’t lag behind, because you’ll have the speed.
You’ll pass the whole gang and you’ll soon take the lead.
Wherever you fly, you’ll be best of the best.
Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.
Except when you don’t.
Because, sometimes, you won’t.
I’m sorry to say so
but, sadly, it’s true
that Bang-ups
and Hang-ups
can happen to you.
I appreciate how Oh, the Places You’ll Go! doesn’t just feed youthful idealism. It reminds us that things often don’t turn out as we want them to:
You can get all hung up
in a prickle-ly perch.
And your gang will fly on.
You’ll be left in a Lurch.
You’ll come down from the Lurch
with an unpleasant bump.
And the chances are, then,
that you’ll be in a Slump.
And when you’re in a Slump,
you’re not in for much fun.
Un-slumping yourself
is not easily done.
And that’s the part of the story I can relate to the most. When I started college, I thought I had my whole life mapped out. I knew exactly which educational path I would take, which career I would enter, when I’d marry, and what kinds of things I’d accomplish. However, as the story’s narrator admonishes us, life can send our plans and ambitions crashing to the ground. And that’s a lesson I’ve learned all too well.
Throughout adulthood, I’ve hit plenty of slumps. I majored in political science in college with the goal of going to law school — only to find I didn’t like political science that well or have any interest in law. I was in ROTC for a time — only to find I wasn’t suited to be an army officer. I then went to divinity school with the goal of being an evangelist or missionary — only to crash and burn from an anxiety disorder that had been building in me for years. I later earned a graduate degree in English and tried teaching English overseas and in a couple of community colleges — only to find I didn’t enjoy it that well and couldn’t earn a decent living from it anyway. I then worked several temporary jobs at a university in the hopes that they would serve as stepping stones to a permanent staff position. To my disappointment, that didn’t happen either.
Oh, the Places You’ll Go! warns of the confusion such dead ends and frustrations can bring:
You can get so confused
that you’ll start in to race
down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace
and grind on for miles cross weirdish wild space,
headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.
The Waiting Place…
The story then describes a sort of limbo where lost and confused people just sit around waiting… and waiting… and waiting for something, for anything, to happen, rather than taking initiative and moving forward. I understand how easy it is to sink into such a state of indecision. But the story continues on an uplifting note:
NO!
That’s not for you!
Somehow you’ll escape
all that waiting and staying
You’ll find the bright places
where Boom Bands are playing.
With banner flip-flapping,
once more you’ll ride high!
Ready for anything under the sky.
Ready because you’re that kind of a guy!
And that’s what I decided to do: move forward and take whatever opportunities came my way rather than languish in self-pity. This led me to try my hand at insurance, which I did for several years. And it was an insurance job that brought me to the area I now live in and led to something wonderful: meeting the lady who would become my wife.
After marrying, I continued working at an insurance call center — an experience I did not relish. Realizing I needed a change, I decided to study something new: web development. I completed an online coding bootcamp and landed a coding job at a photography company. The job went well enough for over a year, but then my bosses decided they wanted younger, more experienced people and kicked me to the curb. Again, I found myself in a slump. And again, un-slumping myself has proven challenging.
Yet I’m soldiering on, as the story assures:
On and on you will hike,
And I know you’ll hike far
and face up to your problems
whatever they are.
In the meanwhile, I fill my days with job searching, coding practice, and other activities. Yes, some days I struggle to keep my chin up. That’s when I try to retain the optimism that Oh, the Places You’ll Go! concludes with:
And will you succeed?
Yes! You will, indeed!
(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)
KID, YOU’LL MOVE MOUNTAINS!
So…
be your name Buxbaum or Bixby or Bray
or Mordecai Ali Van Allen O’Shea,
You’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting.
So…get on your way!
