THE Forum

We returned from our honeymoon, got through the holidays, and prepared to wait. My husband, Cameron, in the months leading up to the decision to apply and ever after, was addicted to the Business Week Business School forum. I mean, addicted. In our small Boston apartment, there was no hiding what you were doing on the computer. I would casually walk over to the couch to watch TV and see him quickly minimize the screen to hide his stalking. Of course, I knew he was either on “the forum” or on Bogleheads.com – another of his horrifying internet obsessions. I would roll my eyes and ask what was new in the world of hopeful business school applicants.

“Well, the people applying Round 3 are starting to find out if they got interviews. I don’t know why people bother applying to Round 3, but I guess some people got lucky. The Round 1 people are telling everyone where they did and did not get in. It looks like it’s been a tough year and a bad day. Most people are saying that if you get into Harvard, you should just go, even though the case method way of learning isn’t best for everyone….”

This is how it went. For months. Most of the time, he wouldn’t tell me what was happening on “the forum,” but I have to confess, I started getting addicted to it myself. It was strangely elating to find out the “perfect” candidate didn’t get in anywhere (a free spot for my husband!) and often frustrating to read people’s excuses for not applying to the best schools (just get over it, Mr., you’re not qualified and we all know it). It was also terrifying to read of the candidates who could have been my husband’s paper twins not get into the very schools Cam was applying to. However, the craziest and most stressful times of all on “the forum” were the days people got “the calls.” The schools let you know a week or so in advance which days they would be releasing their offers, but a day has 24 hours in it. Starting at 8am, people in India or China or Mississippi would start posting that they had just received “the call.” This was an alert to all applicants: the calls were happening, and if you don’t get one, be prepared for “the email.”

I thought to myself, “THREE rounds of this?? THREE schools? How will we ever make it?”

School #1: The email. Boston = out.

School #2: The email. Close-ish to Boston = out.

School #3: Ah, school #3. How you tried to slowly and painfully kill us both.