Though the interview process may be similarly stressful for the interviewer (in a sense), the interviewee bears a much heavier burden. Interviewers treat the process as an inconvenience, while the interviewee sits and sweats as they wait for the already employed to pull themselves away from whatever frivolous email exchange has caught their attention that day. Those at the reception desk guide you to the typical two-by-four “interrogation” room so you may await your fate in solitary.

Back in November, before I was sure my internship would be extended, I began to explore other options. After sending out only a few applications, I got a response within mere days—a record on my end. They call me in for an interview two days later, and I arrived with an eager hopefulness. Unfortunately, the receptionist, I would later realize, would be the only friendly face to cross my path that day.

“…you can tell a lot about how a company treats their employees just by observing how they treat their interviewees.”

With an odd, industrialized atmosphere, the receptionist ushered me into a small room with three solid walls and a glass exposure that left me on display like a fish in a fish bowl. Employees walked by, sneaking quick glances at the girl who was left to wait over 10 minutes for the first of her marathon interviewers to emerge. I was scheduled to meet three key players, but inevitably only spoke with two potential colleagues and the HR manager (or whatever her precise title was). The first woman finally entered my glass castle with a look of irritation, used a seemingly condescending tone, and abandoned me 10 minutes later to go seek my next interviewer.

The second individual—a man—was much more conversational, but still condescending. While eager, I still got the impression that he had already rendered his judgment before ever hopping in the fish bowl. After he left, the HR manager came in to evaluate how I thought the process went. (Odd, but who am I to question protocol?) We blabbed about the traffic for a few minutes, and then I was on my way with the promise that I would hear from them in some regard the VERY NEXT DAY.

I bet you can’t guess where this is going…

The next day came sans phone call or email. I let a week pass so as not to look like an over-enthusiastic vulture. Nothing. Not even the slightest acknowledgement. To them, I’m sure I was simply a waste of time. But, as I’ve said dozens of times, I’m sure, you can tell a lot about how a company treats their employees just by observing how they treat their interviewees. With that in mind, I believe I dodged another bullet. Again.

Sometimes the brightest bulbs burn out. Sometimes the sharpest knives dull after use. And sometimes the highly educated, experienced businesspeople of our time forget they are not immune to  the rapidly spreading pestilence known as stupidity. Below are just mere glimmers of the nonsensical things I’ve witnessed over the last few months:

1. Reading for detail: We dedicate too much time to email. Once the morning messages start pouring in, they don’t seem to relent. But, thanks to my brilliant discovery, I may just have the solution—read them carefully the first time! When you’re setting up an appointment via email, and I respond with my date and time restrictions, do not suggest a time that falls outside those limits! You make more work for yourself, and for me. Not only will reading carefully cut down on volume, but it will also make you seem less stupid.

2. Intra-office communications: Everyone you could possibly need to talk to is within no more than a 20-foot radius give or take. Instead of emailing or calling from across the office, get up and walk over to their cubicle. You could probably use the exercise, anyway.

3. Punctuality: I understand that there may be hold-ups. Perhaps there may be road construction, or some idiotic driver blocking the street. But, if the bus is scheduled to arrive at a given time, it should probably arrive somewhere around that time. Not five minutes before, and certainly not 10 minutes after. I (and numerous others) depend on your service to get to the train station on time. So stop chatting with the street urchins and get a move on!

4. High heels: If you cannot walk in heels, don’t wear them. Especially do not wear them if they do not properly fit your foot! You see, today’s heels continue to grow taller. The higher the heel, the steeper the incline (duh). Thanks to gravity, your toes jam downward and your heel no longer fits flush to the back of the shoe. As if they weren’t hard enough to walk in already, now you are left with a gap that causes the shoe to flop off your foot. (See accompanying image for details.) I’m pretty sure they don’t make high heels that one would deem practical, but those that make you walk on your big toe all day long make you look like a newborn giraffe. (No, wait, even they emerge from the womb knowing how to walk better than you.)

5. Windows: No, I don’t mean those clear plates of glass that allow you to admire the beautiful outside world from the confines of your rolly chair. I mean that horrific operating system Microsoft tries to pass off as functional and innovative. My computer takes 10 minutes to start up in the morning (if it starts up properly on the first try, that is), it takes forever to open programs, and if I dare use the Internet, my computer slows to a crawl and I must eventually restart. No wonder I converted to a Mac at home…

4. Seat hogs: Yes, I know. I’m small. Tell me something I haven’t heard every day since grade school. But no matter how tiny I may be, that does not give you the right to sit next to me on the train and take up half of my seat as well as your own. For instance, when the train is filled to the brim and the only open seat happens to be next to you, move over just a tad. And when someone (read: me) has no choice but to take that seat, move over! Don’t pretend you’re asleep. You’re not. And when I subtly jam my elbow into your side, take the hint! (Side note: When you insist on sitting half on top of someone, do not then “wake up” and start squirting stinky hand sanitizer all over yourself. I will not hesitate to show my disgust. You’re rude… and probably much too oblivious to notice my scowls.)

7. Failure to admit mistakes: It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been in the business—you can still be wrong. But no one knows how to accept blame or admit mistakes, so they try to rationalize their actions with half-truths, or they point the finger at someone else. Don’t worry, the powers that be can usually tell who is truly at fault. Good luck with that.

8. Respecting time: Everyone ends up being pulled in 20 different directions. So when you ask someone to bite off more than they can chew, don’t be surprised when your request is respectfully shot down. They will eventually complete your request out of the goodness of their heart, but your chance of a speedy turnaround diminishes when you act like they are your receptacle for unwanted tasks.

9. The clothing perception: Most of the time, I dress business casual. On nasty weather days, I throw style to the wind and don jeans and practical footwear. It’s amazing how total strangers treat me with more respect when I’m wearing a skirt and ballet flats, as opposed to jeans and boots. (Regardless, no one ever thinks I’m older than 18.)

10. “Conducting” business: On workdays, I take the train down to the city so I can then hop on a bus that drops me right at my building’s driveway. But, along the way, I’ve encountered some not-so-nice train conductors. Surely, they have to deal with a lot of crazy characters on a daily basis, but sometimes they can be pretty harsh. One afternoon, a woman handed the conductor on-duty an expired ticket. (They don’t have a very long shelf life nowadays.) She was obviously not very coherent, yet he berated her regardless. You could tell she was older and did not have all her wits about her, but he still harassed her for cash she wasn’t carrying, then demanded an ID so he could send a bill for the ticket price to her home address. Come now, jerk. Respect the elderly. Technically, you still made money from the purchase of her expired ticket. Hope you sleep soundly at night knowing you torment old ladies by day.

11. Assumptions: Preconceived notions are no reason to pass judgment and treat co-workers in an inferior fashion. That’s like parents who believe every word from their child’s lips is an automatic lie. Just…stop.

12. Jargon: Many talk in circles, using big words that nobody understands. If you have to start the term’s definition with “umm…” then you probably shouldn’t be using the term at all. Face it. You probably don’t know what you’re saying either.

Whether cross-country or cross-cubicle, email reigns supreme in this land of laziness. Instead of peering around the corner, or picking up the telephone, the working world relies on the written word to get the message across.

And I think I’ve developed a theory as to why…

In the social sphere, we LOL much too much. Many times, we toss in a good LOL because we actually find things funny. But more often than not, we tack on LOL to ease the tension. With LOL, we can text or tweet something serious or snotty, but then remove all negativity with three simple taps. Of course, what you said still sends a sting to its recipient(s), but the LOL makes it hard for them to evaluate your true position on whatever the subject may be.

But for the average 9-5er, LOL never factors in to such a professional setting. However, “thanks” knows no boundaries. While always a necessity for facilitating positive, polite correspondence, “thanks” can lighten the tone of even the harshest email. Point out someone’s horrible mistake, or send the instructions for a labor-intensive assignment. Then, tack on a “thanks” or “thank you” to the end, perhaps including an exclamation point for a double whammy of kindness, and there you have it. The bulk of the content may be written with a hint of passive aggression, but that “thank you!” serves as the cherry on a fairly bitter cake.

Sure, this negligible observation really has no bearing on how we interact with one another, but you will surely come to see its validity. Just pay attention…

Thanks for reading!

Last night I found on Yahoo! this article/blog posting: Amid unemployment and inequality, is the American Dream at risk? (I just want to point out it should be “Amid Unemployed and Inequality, Is the American Dream At Risk?” I realize that’s really neither here nor there, but this guy is getting paid to write and he’s still posting with errors. I would LOVE to get paid to write and would make sure something was proof-read or grammatically correct before posting online. Just saying.)

Anyway, if you read the article, you’ll find something familiar. Perhaps it’s what I’ve been saying for the past year since I posted “Wake Up American Dream!” This is old news, my friend. The American Dream has been down the crapper for the past two years; it’s not only at risk, it’s GONE. One of the main reasons people are Occupying Wall Street is because millions of middle and lower-class Americans are working their butts off for less money than ever. The economy is so bad that people are genuinely worried that they won’t be able to get by (Yours truly included). People are in fact, in dire economic straits and it is scary. It is no longer true that your success correlates directly with how are you work. It doesn’t matter. You could be the best, fastest, smartest, hardest worker at your  minimum wage job and it’s still never going to get you financial security.

I was flipping channels a few weeks ago and when it became clear there was nothing on tv, I settled on watching The Prince and Me with Julia Stiles. Really, there was NOTHING else on. At one point Stiles’ character Paige is blowing up at Eddie, the prince, for ditching their biochem lab and causing her to do poorly on the lab work. She righteously lectures him: “See, unlike people who are given everything, I have to earn what I get. But that is the beauty of a meritocracy. People rise and fall based on how hard they work. “

Sorry, Paige, but it seems we no longer live in a meritocracy.  The American Dream is gone because it is now no longer plausible to get you want just because you work very, very hard for it. Now, you have to know someone. You have to network. It’s not about what you know or even how hard or well you work, it’s about what connections you have. I’m sorry Mr. President, the American Dream just isn’t there to reclaim, as you suggest. As long as you are letting the economic inequality continue, there is no American Dream. I’m part of the 99% and I’d be on the streets of New York holding up signs with the rest of them…if I could afford to take off from my part-time min wage job and make the trip down there.

Bottom Line: I want to be paid fairly for all my hard work, and so do all the other Americans in this country who do work hard.  However, much like the American Dream, that notion is just a fantasy.

I’m a big True Blood fan.  Not since the 90s WB teen-soaps have I really needed to see every episode of a show, and those teen angst dramas are nothing compared to the awesome phenomenon that is True Blood.  I admit it. I’m hooked, and I’m not ashamed. Given that True Blood is on HBO (which I don’t currently get) and only runs 12 episodes a season (and then goes 9 months before premiering the next season,) I make a point to make sitting down and watching my weekly episode an event. A few weeks ago, season 4 came to a close and the HBO series, which I watch for my own guilty-viewing pleasure, loving it for its dark humor, campy horror and raw sexuality, I expect little more than naughty entertainment. However, the Season 4 final Episode “And When I Die” actually provided me with a mini-epiphany.

I’ll explain.

*SPOILER ALERT FOR ANYONE WHO WATCHES THE SHOW AND HASN’T SEEN SEASON 4 EP. 12*

In the penultimate moments before the episode reached its trademark cliffhanger, this season’s antagonist, Marnie, a wiccan gone rogue played by the very talented and versatile Fiona Shaw, has come back from the dead as a spirit and inhabited Lafayette’s body. For those of you who don’t watch the show I will keep it simple. The wicked witch Marnie takes over an innocent bystander and attempts to kill several of the main characters. Sookie, the show’s heroine and her friends join together and with the help of the spirits of their departed loved ones, and force Marnie’s energy out of Lafayette’s body. I apologize if all this sounds convoluted.  It’s just hard to explain in a single paragraph. Anyhow, the spirits confront Marnie whose only option is to accept her own death and confront the great unknown. Marnie, who has only recently gained the fear, respect ,and notice of others, in a fit of rage and frustration, shouts “But what about what I want?“- and my immediate, guttural response in my mind was “No one cares what you want.”

I had this thought and was immediately struck with two contrasting emotions. First, sadness because I knew that it was true, that no one really does care what one person wants. Second, I felt a little sense of pride that I had realized and accepted this truth. I felt mature; enlightened even, that while someone like Marnie, in her late 40s/early 50s was throwing a temper-tantrum because no one cared what she wanted, and I, a 23-year old ragamuffin, have accepted  one of life’s Painful Truths. Much like “Life Isn’t Fair” I have now acknowledged the ugly ”No one cares!” Truth. Let me be clear. In no way am I discussing the No One Cares Truth to feel sorry for myself or whine. In fact, having acknowledged the Painful Truth, I actually feel liberated.

No One Cares. Not an Emo complaint that the world has left me by the wayside, just a simple understanding that I am only 1 in a world of almost 7 billion people. Sure, my dreams, ambitions, and interests are of great consequence to me, and perhaps affect and are known by those closest to me, but that is true of everyone on the planet. Everyone is concerned with their own wants, needs, ambitions, and so on. The reality of the situation is that only a very select few are cared about, remembered, and acknowledged in this world. Percentage-wise, I’d say extremely small. In order for a significant number of people to care what you want, do, like, dislike, or need, you have to be either a) famous or b) historically significant. Perhaps that is the reason that fame is something so many people crave. Perhaps people want to be famous, or settle for being notorious is because they know it means people will remember them, and details about them long after they are gone. Unfortunately, very few people actually achieve fame and/or notoriety, so the vast majority of people will fade into oblivion without much acknowledgement from the rest of the world. It’s sad, and it’s a part of life.  Again I must put on my philosophical thinking cap and point out that no one knows why one person achieves fame and goes down in history while others enter and leave this world without anyone else noticing.  It’s just the way it is.

So, what does this have to do with being a poor, unemployed wannabe-writer, you ask? I’ve spent over a year writing about how difficult it has been for me to want to be a writer so badly and be met with such frustration and failure. I admit that some of it has been self-pity, but most of it is pure discouragement and raw emotion. One of my high school teachers called it “ink-shedding”–a kind of emotional venting, but on paper (of in this case, on a blog). This is more for my own process of dealing with all these feelings of disappointment and frustration than it is about needing one someone to care what I want. This is just my way of expressing myself through writing. And, if I happen to make some valid arguments and observations about life, the world, the working world, employment, literature or whatever, well then that’s just a plus.

What I, and I think many other people need to work on is being okay with being unnoticed. When applying for jobs, I have to remember that as much as I really really want to write, so do thousands of others, and chances are, companies don’t really care about my specific situation. I need to work on making my life meaningful despite the fact that my career goals seem totally meaningless in this giant, money and consumer-driven world.  Now is the time to embrace obscurity. There’s nothing wrong with working to achieve some acknowledgement, but in the meantime, we should be okay with being unnoticed.

See, kiddies. We can learn things from HBO shows.

Last time I talked about how disappointed I was that the world of print and literature seemed to be going down the toilet because of Intellectual American Apathy and Tehnology.  Now I would like to talk about how little love truly talented writers get, especially compared to celebrities who get published just because they are famous.  I recently heard a story that just proves my point about literature not being about art’s sake, but just fodder for mindless consumers to sell a product.  Apparently, a few years ago, a friend of mine who has a degree in English/Journalism was asked by a lit agent with his own publishing company to submit a story targeted towards the Harry Potter/Twilight audience for approval. He spent several months writing a fantasy/sci-fi story that he thought would appeal to the target audience because of its fantasy elements and its human appeal.  However, the lit agent told him there “wasn’t enough teen romance” to make it an appealing to the Harry Potter/Twilight crowd.  Whether or not the story had real substance was irrelevant because it wouldn’t sell as well as a vapid teen melodrama mixed with a little fantasy.

Honestly, if we all have to cater to the Twilight Audience, I’m sorry, all creative writers are screwed. I have read the first Twilight book so that my opinion of Stephanie Meyer’s story would be an educated one. Let me just say that the fact that this woman has sold millions of copies of her books, and has a multi-million dollar Twilight Franchise including films that are the biggest sensation of teen generation, is a testament to how doomed creative fiction is.  I read the book. I saw the first two movies. I am not impressed. (In fact, I’m mostly offended and annoyed that someone with so little writing substance has been so wildly successful.) The writing is elementary at best, she has no character development, she constantly writes in passive voice and her idea isn’t even truly original.  Mind you, this is just my own opinion, but as someone who is really passionate about literature and good writing, I think it’s deeply sad that Stephanie Meyer is a measure of a successful fiction writer.

And seriously, SNOOKI, is a published writer. Snooki as in Jersey Shore fake-baked-hot-mess Nicole Polizzi has a published book. While her book, A Shore Thing (*CRINGE*) wasn’t a critical or commercial success,  she can still call herself a published author. Lauren Conrad, whose only contribution to world has been constant talking about how much “fun” she’s always having on MTV’s Laguna Beach and then later, The Hills, was on the New York Times bestseller list for her book L.A Candy which was based on her own reality tv experiences in Hollywood. I’d like to take this time to blow a huge, fat raspberry.

This last thing might seem miniscule, but it is further evidence that people would rather deal with fast computers than have to use their cerebral cortex to do any sort of thinking/working.  I ran across an ebay commercial last week in which board members at a meeting are ridiculing “Pete” because he brought a pen and legal pad to the meeting so as to take notes. They imply that he’s a cave man for using such primitive methods of note-taking and insult him for not having a super awesome techno iPad to take notes with and put it in a word document and save it to an electronic device because writing is just so strenuous and who wants paper notes anyway? That’s right ladies and gentleman of America, HANDWRITING is now considered archaic.  This kills me.

Furthermore, I don’t understand why no one thinks that it’s important to know how to write nowadays. I used to proofread essays for my college friend who was Pre-Med because we all needed to take Englsh core classes, and his writing was horrendous. It was a mess; he mixed tenses, ended sentences with propositions and used plural pronouns for singular nouns.  But because he was a Bio student, his Lit teachers let him suck at writing and gave him As on papers that, if I, as an English student, had submitted in the same shape, would have received Cs. When people hear that I majored in English, they scoff and assume I picked an easy major so as to coast through college. False. I picked English because I love to read, write and I’m good at it. I understand syntax and grammar and sentence structure. It’s like mathematic properties to me. Unless you follow certain rules, it doesn’t work.  But apparently I’m one of the few who feels like a good writer is a sign of intelligence and a bad writer (one who is bad because he doesn’t care enough to be good, not one who is trying and just doesn’t get it) is a sign of laziness and disregard for intelligent communication.  Yes, we all have strengths and weaknesses. We can’t all be good at everything. I admit 150% that I am useless in math and non-earth science. And accounting. And business. And econ. But I feel I get no credit for dedicating myself to writing because no one seems to value good writing anymore.

I know. Wah, wah. Poor me.  But still, why does someone who is really good in Biology get to be labeled as “really smart” when being good at English is utterly unremarkable and will not get you a job. In reality, people are getting worse and worse and writing, so shouldn’t it be valued when someone actually cares about doing it the right way?

Good things may come to those who wait, but great things come to those who try. After months years of trying to prove I’m a worthwhile writer (and human being, for that matter), I finally landed an internship!

As the editorial intern for 1to1 Media, I have the opportunity to write articles focusing on the latest trends within the Customer Relationship Management (CRM) realm. For those who have no idea what that topic entails, read this blog post I wrote. (It just happens to be the sample I submitted during the interview process!) I write study summaries, examine case studies, and explore hot topics within the social sphere all in an effort to keep businesses current within the industry.

Unfortunately, I’ve been so busy with work that, by the time I finally get time to read or write for fun, I’m much to exhausted to continue looking at a page or computer screen for any longer. So if it seems I’ve been MIA for the past few months, it’s because I have been… but with good reason! And now that I’m getting back into the swing of things, I shall hopefully grace this blog with my presence a bit more often, offering up insight into the world that the placemats built.

Many may snub this small step forward, but I have finally gotten one tiny foot in the door, with the possibility of fully clearing that threshold in the months to come, so I’ll keep putting one foot in front of the other in hopes that it will take me somewhere wonderful. To read more items I’ve written so far, click here.

Stay tuned, there’s more to come!

Both Anna and I have made it no secret that we want writers (and preferably get paid to do so).  For both of us, it is our dream and we are very serious and uncompromising about doing it as a career. This may be a huge reason why neither of us has been able to find paid work doing what we love– the world of today is just not welcoming writers with arms wide open now that everything is about technology and internet media and things are only considered valuable if they can sell, sell, sell.  Unfortunately we have chosen the potential profession that is focused on the creative as opposed to the business end of things. This does not bode well in today’s society, especially in this economy, or perhaps even just because we live in a country populated by Ugly Americans who are content with being mindless consumers. I’m not saying there aren’t those who still appreciate literature, history and learning and knowledge, but then you also get the other end of the spectrum, the Academic Intellectuals who believe they are so above the common man that they are appalled at the idea of a Ph.D student working at a restaurant to keep out of debt. I doubt very much they care too much for creative writers either. But I digress.

There seems to be a distinct lack of love towards writers and creative individuals today. No one wants to hire a writer unless they can write propaganda to boost a company’s publicity. No one cares about the artist unless it’s a graphic artist who can help someone design his webpage to better market  his product. No one seems to want literature and art for literature and art’s sake. The reason I want to be a writer is because I love to write, I have a very high regard for the arts and creativity, and I love to read great literature. I find it beautiful and engaging and you can learn so much from someone who can write.  I took a course in college called American Literature and Religion, and let me tell you, I learned more about life from reading Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne than I did in all four years of high school.  I can’t imagine a world without Charlotte Bronte, Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, or Shakespeare. All these writers brought so much to the cultural world throughout history, and their names carry so much weight and respect, you’d think that a writer would be considered a noble profession. Not in today’s society. Now if you say you want to be a writer, people scoff and tell you that you picked the wrong economy for that.  And when I say writer, I’m not talking about a reporter for the local paper, not someone who just wants to scoop a story to sell their publication. I don’t mean Carrie Bradshaw who has a weekly sex column (which in no way would pay her enough for her to be able to afford a rent-controlled apartment in Manhattan and $600 Manolo Blahnik shoes, by the way) but a real, honest-to-God creative writer who wants to contribute literature to the world, not just report current events feed the brains of consumers looking for mental junk-food.

And I’m sorry, but how is it that truly talented writers, like Anna, can’t find work writing when magazines are still mass-producing mindless, tired articles like “The REAL Reason He’s Won’t Call You His Girlfriend” and “101 New Tricks That will Drive Him Wild in Bed.” It’s insulting to one’s intelligence. They really do think we’re all dumb, ugly Americans.  Publishers today are more interested in selling magazines than producing solid, memorable, influential literature.  If William Butler Yeats was alive today trying to get a writing job he wouldn’t stand a chance, and that isn’t just sad, it’s truly disturbing.

Another problem is that the internet (oh how I love and hate you) is making the publishing world more and more obsolete as time goes by and technology continues to evolve at lightning speed. Half the writing and publishing jobs I apply to are for online writing, editing, publishing etc, and for someone who wants to be a novelist or have a column, it is very discouraging. I happen to be one of those rare people who don’t think being technologically dependent is a good thing. I like making eye-contact with people while we’re having dinner together instead watching them constantly clicking away at their blackberries. I like paying my bills through the U.S Postal Service because 1) It’s a good idea to leave a paper trail at 2) the online world is not truly a secure place. I believe people should keep their minds open to enrichment other than through the computer and I’d much rather sit in a classroom for an interesting lecture and discussion that take an online class. And finally, I don’t care what anyone says, if you own a device such as a kindle, I will not speak to you on principle. Real books don’t need charging.  In an age where everything is digital, I refuse to give up the “old world” charm of a book with a cover, binding, and PAPER PAGES.

I really have much more to say about how today’s society is destroying the value of writers. I am so disheartened to discover that my dream is to be part of a profession that people consider obsolete.  However I will need to address that at another time, in Part II…

In the meantime, show us writers a little love.

Ok, seriously, what do you want from me? I’m exhausted, I’m discouraged, I’m unbelievably frustrated, and what I want to know is, WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME? I have applied to over thirty jobs in less than 3 weeks and have heard back from only two of them. One stopped contacting me after the first email and the other one was an unpaid internship that unfortunately required me to go to an interview in the city that I couldn’t make in time. I have written cover letters, filled in references, completed dozens of questionnaires and none of it seems to be good enough for even the most basic of editorial or writing jobs. Even when I match the description of the candidate they are looking for perfectly, even when they don’t require prior experience, but only a bachelor’s degree, they are still not interested in hiring me.

I am a smart girl. I have a college degree. I am a very hard worker. I love to write and edit and I am passionate about doing it for a living. Still, none of that seems to matter to any of the companies I’ve applied to. I personally don’t think a person should be penalized because she decided late in her college years what she wanted to do for a living. Because I wasn’t exactly sure where my place in the world was at age 20, I did not apply for any internships through the university I attended. I am not interested in the journalism aspect of writing so I was not on the staff of the university’s newspaper.  These things seem to be working 100% against me when stacked up against other recent English Major candidates who did write for their newspapers or had internships as undergrads.

I personally find no fault  in focusing all my energy on my academics, thank you very much. I was more concerned with doing well in class than I was with getting my foot in the door with a company before I had graduated. I didn’t expect it to be this bad out in the real world, so I figured I’d cross the Bridge of Employment when I got to it. (My brother, by the way, who is about to enter his senior year in college, already has an internship and most likely a job offer for when he graduate  from one of the top financial companies in the country. If I had known then what I know now about internships, you better believed I would have seriously considered doing one.)  

The thing is, apart from the internship, I wouldn’t have done anything differently about college. I still would have majored in English. I still wouldn’t have picked a major in something that bored me or that I hated just because there’s a good market for it (i.e Finance, Accounting, Business). I would never have been happy working in those fields even if it offered me guaranteed financial security. Hell, I have a friend who majored in Accounting, interned, secured a job before graduation and is paid exceptionally well. He hates his job.  At least I feel confident that if and when (emphasis on the IF) I find a job in the writing industry, I will enjoy it and it will be what I want to do.

Which brings me back to my original question. What do they want from me? I honestly for the depths of my soul do not know what else I can do that will make me a more desirable applicant to these companies. I currently have two unpaid online internships, one writing, one content editing, but apart from that, I really don’t know what else they want. I can’t get experience if no one is willing to take a chance and offer it to me.  So I’m going to lay it all out there for anyone who reads this to see:

I want to work in the writing field and I am willing to work very hard. Please give me a chance.

“…I’ll hit the ceiling, or else I’ll tear up this town.”

In 1984 Kenny Loggins released the single Footloose from the iconic film of the same name.  Minus the chorus lyrics about how cutting loose and dancing is an alleviation from a pointless dead-end job, every lyric to Kenny Loggins’ song Footloose is prophetically true about the current economy and employment situation in this country. On a more personal note, it describes my life to the letter, again excepting the bit about the dancing.  I will elaborate. The beat and melody of this song sounds really peppy and upbeat, but all the verses are about working an 8-hour exhausting job while you’re youth passes before your eyes. This is where the song hits home for me.

I realize the country’s current financial crisis affects everyone. People have lost jobs, homes, are struggling to make ends meet. By all accounts, I could be much worse off than I am now. The only thing I can do is reflect upon how the crisis has impacted my own life, which is why Anna and I started this blog…to see personal experiences with unemployment after graduation.  My current frustration with not having a decent paying job in a field of my choosing is more than a financial issue, it’s emotional. I am currently very terrified.

Yes, I am currently working a service job to pay my bills waiting for a) the economy to turn around or b) someone to realize HEY! We really want to hire this girl and pay her to write! … I’m not holding my breath anytime soon. However, while all of us who are in the transition period, time’s a wastin’ as they say. My clear and present danger is the fact that while I am waiting it out living in my hometown, time is passing much faster than I expected.  Quite apart from desperately wanting to start my own independent life, I have realized that while I sit in my hometown working to pay my bills and applying like a mad lady to jobs online, I am getting older and passing time that I am never going to get back.

Once again I apologize that in times like this I tend to wax philosophical, but isn’t it interesting (and kind of a bitch) that the decade in which you are born and are living in so drastically affects how you live your life? If I was born ten years earlier I would have a much better shot at being employed with a decent writing job by now. Because my country’s economy is falling down, falling down, falling down,  years of my life that I planned to spend how I envision, are being taken from me. I’m not saying wah wah, Poor Me, I’m just lamenting the fact that a time I thought was going to be a transitional period in my life is turning out to be the bulk of my twenties and I am not able to do what I truly want to do as an occupation.

Like Kenny says in Footloose,

You’re burnin’, yearnin’

for somebody to tell you that life ain’t  passing you by.

I’m trying to tell you

It will if you don’t even try.

That’s my problem right now, I’m terrified my life is passing me by while I’m waiting for my big break to come along.

What’s even more frustrating is that many of my fellow 2010 graduates have pretty decent well-paying jobs and I am just one of those who had a less-applicable degree who got cast away by the wayside.  Last week the mother of a high school classmate of mine ran into my mom and condescendingly asked her what my future plans were since she deigned it so embarrassing and even pathetic that I hadn’t gotten a real job yet.  As if times weren’t hard enough, now I’ve got to deal with people looking down on me because I’m having such a hard time finding a job in a very tough field given the economy. It is not for lack of trying. I’ve applied to hundreds of jobs, and have mostly not heard back from them.

Basically, my goal now is not just to find a job, become 100% financially independent, begin my career in the industry of my choice, but to actually get to start my life as an adult. I’m not getting any younger.

Take a look at this video, and really listen to Kenny’s lyrics. It’s not as happy and perky as you thought.