There were 12 years of grade school, not including the first year of preparatory-brain-washing in kindergarten. In high school, soon it was time to think about an adult profession. Certainly no one wants to become an "associate" at a big box store, work in a hotel or restaurant or a clerk at a gas station. In the old days, factory work was another option but most of those jobs have gone overseas.

Maybe become a scientist, a doctor or a lawyer? Like everyone else, you want to make as much money as you can when you're an adult, so one of those professions would be best for you. That is, until the cost of college sinks in and how it will be paid for. Your parents spent much of their working life putting money aside for your education. But after doing the numbers, it becomes apparent that those funds will only pay for the first year or two in college.

So it's off to talk to the school counselor. It was hard work getting through 12 years of school to get good grades and the counselor should have all the answers. There are Pell Grants for living expenses and alternative ways to fund education. Loans might be an option if your parents are willing to bare their personal lives for college applications, too.

Nagging away in the back of your mind there is the shrinking, shriveling economy. Chances of finding a high-paying job that will pay off the loans are getting worse everyday. Parents will have to take out a second mortgage, but that's their problem right? But something must be done about a future profession.

So it's off to college with a new and growing debt. It's really a gamble that you'll do well in college and hopefully after graduating, there will be a high paying job waiting to pay off the debts. Some students that do well in high school do terrible in college, so who can know what will happen?

The first day at the dorm is a culture shock. It's a culture unlike what was expected from watching movies but soon you get used to it. After all, this will be life for the next 10 years or so. But that's too far off in the future to think about right now. After becoming orientated it's on with the coursework!

Fortunately things go well and funding is found to continue college, but others are not so fortunate. Some of your best friends had to leave school when their parents just couldn't handle more debt or one of them lost their job. These former students went back home to live in their old bedrooms and are now working in a big box stores, restaurants and a gas station but they still have college loans to pay, for a career they will never have.

In emails they state it's impossible to make those loan payments when they can't even live independently on the money they earn. Their parents often fight and argue over what they will do in this depression-economy, because now they have to make the loan payments in their senior years which your friends have defaulted on. And all of them dread Christmas time without any money to buy presents. Deep inside is a dread this could happen to you.

Now a girlfriend has entered the scene. The two of you have become quite close and she wants to make love. What will happen to your career if somehow she becomes pregnant? Wisely you decide not to even consider taking that chance. Upon refusal to have intercourse with her now she thinks you're a closet gay, but so be it. Education is the top priority, not fatherhood and a shaky minimum wage job.

Hard work propels you onward toward a career as a scientist. There are years of work in a faculty member's lab while continuing difficult courses and work on a thesis. The faculty advisor and mentor can only provide guidance. It's more than a full-time job, but you get used to it and know it will pay off in the end.

The faculty member and scientist who owns the lab never spends any time there. He's always in his office or away at a meeting or conference. When he is in the lab, he's usually there checking lab work progress, performing for a video crew or posing for still cameras. The scientist is taking credit for all your hard work! But that's how the game is played, and the reality sets in that he is not like the scientists on television documentaries.

Finally the day comes to defend the thesis which took about one year to write and edit. In a room with closed doors packed and numerous faculty members, you stand there and are grilled for about an hour. Everyone was given copies of the thesis long before this day. They read it and know everything it says. They have questions that must be answered right on the spot.

Then you are asked to wait outside in the hall for their decision. After what seems like forever, the conference room door opens. At this moment you will learn if the past ten years were worth it all or not. After being asked to step inside they shake your hand, congratulate you and address you for the first time in your life as doctor! You did it!

Now it's time to find a job. After emails and resumes are sent out, an offer comes from a west coast college. Arrangements are made to fly out there for an interview.

A staff member you've known for years warns that the cost of living in California is sky-high, but why should that matter? What does that matter to someone with a PhD, right?

At the interview a salary is offered as a newly minted PhD. Excited about the prospect of such a high-paying job, it's time to find a place to live. Then reality sets in ­ even that high salary offer won't be enough to pay for a family, the cost of living out and education loans at the same time.  Now your head is spinning ­ how can this be possible? Depressed from another reality check, you refuse the offer and fly back home.

That same staff member, and engineer, bumps into you in the hall and asks the trip went. There is no choice but to admit that he was right ­ the cost of living in California IS sky-high.

Fortunately, the very school you graduated from now has an associate faculty position open which they offer and you accept. You'll get to live near your friends and family.

Now a new chapter in life has opened. The college provides start-up money for a personal laboratory, too. Kind faculty members donate their unused equipment to help since the start-up money isn't enough for all the basic equipment needed.

Another cold reality is ever present. Produce several science papers each year and win enough grants or corporate funding to fund all the science work, or they will show you the door. The college gets more than half of all grant money for administrative and overhead costs, leaving what's left for research to pay for materials, lab assistants, etc...

But now you're a scientist. And the answer as to why that faculty member you used to work for that was never in their lab is finally apparent. Now you too, sit writing science papers and grants.

And yet another sobering reality check as a scientist sets in ­ that of becoming a professional beggar for every-dwindling grant money just like all your colleagues! Some of them are competing for the same funds along with thousands of other scientists around the country.

Someone on staff naively suggests a new invention that will help people with a certain type of illness. There is no choice but to tell them that without grant money to fund and a corporation behind it, that it can't be done. It reinforces the golden rule concept that even in the academic world still applies the same one as the golden rule for venture capital ­ "Those who have the gold, rule."

In the medical world, rare diseases almost never receive corporate research money or grants simply because not enough drugs will be sold or medical procedures will be performed to pay for the research AND earn billions of dollars for drug company shareholders. As a scientist you quickly learn that government grants, pharmaceutical and corporate profits are what really control all research funding behind the scenes. Essentially, they decide who will live and who will die. Forget about curious scientists wearing lab coats holding test tubes finding cures for rare diseases. That's Hollywood stuff.

If you had any idea ten years ago this was what being a scientist is all about, maybe you would have chosen another profession like engineering. Engineers don't usually write grant proposals, science papers or work over weekends and holidays to get their work done.

Down the hall from your office, a hopeful PhD student is now toiling away in your lab workingjust like you did for someone else. You are passing on the legacy, like it or not.

So much for being a scientist

Anonymous