Texas Oral Exam for Psychology Licensure (Take One)

What did I do today, you ask? I’ll tell you. I drove ten or twelve hours and took an exam that was kind of stressful. It really was. Now I feel tired and happy to be done, and fairly worried that I may have to do this again in six months.

I studied like mad yesterday (and like, um, frustrated? the day before), went to bed late, and got up this morning at 5. By 6, I was on the road with a full tank of gas and my tires properly inflated. With the glaring omission of healthy food, I packed everything I could possibly have needed. That glaring omission led to waaaaay too much snacking on junky stuff from convenience stores. Way too much. But look at it this way: Michael Phelps, you know how many calories he ate during the Olympics, right? Well, he only traveled, what, a few hundred meters? Me, I ate less than he did (somewhat), and I traveled hundreds of miles.

The exam was on the UT campus, which is a lovely place. The building I was in is not as magical, though it did remind me of the 80s movie Labyrinth. My two examiners were very friendly. They gave me a one-page vignette about a child who came to therapy for some problems (my area is child  & adolescent clinical psychology, or else they would have given me a different vignette). I had a few minutes to read it, then they asked me almost exactly the kind of questions the study materials suggested they would, though it was still nerve-wracking to prepare, and to answer the questions. Without knowing more about the procedure, it was difficult to know how much depth to go into, or what level of detail was required. I don’t know if they were checking off specific items on a list while I answered, or just judging my thought processes. All very vague. And I can never find out. The whole judgment process is shrouded in the same black-box style of secrecy employed by the Spanish Inquisition and other reputable outfits. Oh, I understand the need to protect the security of the test materials, etc. It has to be a fair test for the applicants, and we have to protect the public. But just a little more guidance would be nice.

It really did not help my mental state that after some of my answers they said, “okay…” with smiles on their faces and asked a different question, but after others (WHY!?) one of them would say, “Hm. Anything else?” and sometimes even, “Anything… anything at all you want to add?” AAAAAAAA!!!!! Of course, I will never know what I was missing, though if I fail, I will receive a general description of the areas in which I failed. This is making my stomach hurt.

After the test, I waited in the “out” table in the waiting room with the other applicants (there’s an “in” table where we sat before our exams), making nervous chitchat and trying not to panic at hints they dropped about the things they said in their tests.  Why didn’t I say intelligent stuff like that?! Then the secretary told me I could go, and I went. Back to the car, parked in a museum parking lot (free on Saturdays) across the street, quick-change out of my suit (in the car… it’s kind of shocking how many times I’ve done this kind of thing in the past few years), and back on the road.

They didn’t make me take another exam on the spot, which means both examiners agreed on whether I should pass or fail. Yay. I will find out which it is within six to eight weeks, by mail.

On the way back from Austin, I stopped at a huge, monstrous Cabela’s sporting goods store. I was mostly curious. Well. Lemme tell ya. This is not some MEC or Galyan’s type place. Actually, it is, but kind of like if MEC were entirely focused on equipping and accessorizing only for trips whose primary purpose was to kill animals (including fish). I think, if my sensitive wife were to enter this store, she would be immediately rendered incapable of functioning for three days. Or maybe she would kill a random cashier or customer. First, it’s H.U.G.E. It’s larger than Toronto MEC, I think, and laid out for more grandeur or something. The central area is open up to what should be about a four-storey-high ceiling. Within this central area, stretching out across about a quarter-acre before the awed customer entering through the many double doors, is an artificial mountain-type rock landscape, complete with museum-quality diorama shrubs and bushes. It’s about 30 feet high. On this fake mountain are about a dozen dead animals. Seriously. Dead, stuffed, mounted things. To get to the camping section, you have to ride an escalator up beside these guys, to the second floor.

Down on the main floor, extending to the left and especially the right of this indoor mountain scene, are other naturalistic scenes, complete with ponds (live fish in them; catfish, I think) and less mountainous-type vegetation, with other taxidermified animals. These extend into the shoe section, the water sports section (meaning: boats for fishing and hunting), and other areas. There are at least a couple dozen large mammals mounted in that store. At least. I saw bighorn sheep, elk, deer, a full-size bull moose (probably stolen from Canada; sorry, guys), and I’m pretty sure I saw antelope. Each one had a little plaque labeling it and giving it some kind of three-digit standardized score. I guess I never knew sport hunting was considered really a sport.

The piece of resistance in this store — this unholy spawn of REI, Epcott, and the NRA — was a video game at the front door. Near-photorealistic animals in natural settings on the screen, and a little child-sized shotgun (complete with pump-loading action) for killing them. The kid I saw was about 7, with his dad giving him tense advice while he shot at some bighorn sheep.

Why am I now more disturbed at a game in which you shoot animals than at games in which you shoot people? Come to think of it, I guess the people-shooting games I like (or fail to fully disapprove of) tend to include at least a thin premise in which the people you shoot are an immediate threat to you and/or the human race, and peaceful means of resolving any differences are not feasible. The animal-shooting game is more like a first-person shooter in which you just hide in the artificial foliage at the mall, or in the medians of nice suburbs, and waste people as they go about their daily business, then mount them on your office wall.

Switching topics, driving across the many miles of still-relatively-undeveloped land between here and San Antonio is a joy to me. It’s beautiful. Just watching it go by makes me want to hug all of it (except I know that would not feel good; South Texas is a mistress who must be loved at arm’s length). It’s gorgeous. It’s soothing. I want to go wander around in the scrub forests, the live oak stands, or the hills and gullies of Hill Country, farther North. Sigh. The increasing pace of development around here makes me sad, sometimes. Okay, all the time. And everywhere, not just here. I am pretty sure I know most of the arguments to counteract my sentimental feelings on this subject, and I personally espouse a more pragmatic approach to resource management, but I can’t help feeling that we’re losing something fundamentally wonderful when we bulldoze and build a Best Buy. Especially if it’s a Best Buy.