History of History.

 "Many think that getting a master's degree in History is a dead end." 


This is how the website, Mastersdegree.org begins their description of what to do with a History masters. It pretty much sums up the popular opinion of what it is to be a Historian. 


I know that my mother holds tightly to that assumption as she always changes the subject from my historical aspirations to medical school. Recently even suggesting I become an accountant to run my husband's business while, "doing volunteer work for history on the side." An accountant? Seriously, Mom! Historians may be nerdy, but accountants are downright zombies. Albeit the kind of zombies one would like to have chained up in the back yard during tax season...


The real history of history goes like this...History has been the staple of politics, law and culture since the beginning of time. In fact, we wouldn't even know about the beginning of time without concerned record keepers. Even the disgustingly nostalgic and sentimental scrap booking moms who buy polka dotted paper and and stickers that say, "Love" or "Imagination" employ the magic of history to maintain a record of family events. They too are archivists and historians. 


It is however somehow not acceptable to aspire to just be a Historian. One may take that undergraduate degree as long as they vow to continue on with their studies in law or business or even forsaking it altogether when a better paying career beckons.


Public and private middle and high schools across the country have deadened the experience of History for most individuals. At least in elementary school with the interminable study of Pilgrims and Christopher Columbus came picture books, school assemblies and those awesome turkey pictures where you get to use your spread out fingers as feathers. Past that light hearted approach to inspiring patriotism school strips away most truth, interest and value of the Historical genre. Hence, making it one of the most loathed subjects known to students. Me included.


Now I stand at the precipice of continuing my education into the post grad world. I've tried to force myself into med school, law school, matchmaking, motherhood, and housewifery just to avoid the truth that I am a Historian for life. 


That's right, I'm a Lifer. The tweed jacket, pipe smoking, long winded, short pant wearing, unkempt keeper of facts that resides somewhere between the obsolete card catalog and dusty historical tomes in a forgotten college library. That's what we look like to you, right?  


It's still better than the cadaver cutting, God-complex, white coat wearing, germ soaked doctor.... or ambulance sniffing, bad day-time commercial making, over worked and underpaid member of the public legal world. Historians have enough to deal with...paper cuts, eye strain, being dull in social situations and the extreme deficit of interaction with the opposite sex. It's not all heroes and high-jinxs in the world of History. It's serious business.