OMFG.
What am I going to do with the rest of my life? Seriously. What?
At the end of job hunt week six, panic is starting to set in, all sharp talons and acidic drool. I've sent resumes everywhere but the North Pole (Assuming, of course, that if Santa is interested, he knows where to find me.), and heard back about only one of them. It was for a local technical writing job, which sounded interesting. I like to write. I even take some sort of perverse pleasure in making complicated things simple and easy to understand, which seems to be the point of technical writing: Translating the goofy engineer-speak into human tongues. I could do that.
But something went horribly, unimaginably wrong during the interview. Sentences I'd rather forget were uttered, like: "We're an established company, but we run like a startup." (Engineer/human translation: "Kiss your weekends and evenings goodbye, because if you work here, your job is your life. We might let you have sponge baths at the water fountain, but that's it as far as personal time goes.") and "So how were your algebra II grades?" (Engineer/human translation: "No, we don't have the technology to monitor your nightmares. What would ever make you think that we did?")
Honestly. I'm a relatively smart girl. I've been known to eat the last of the communal office popcorn without replacing it, and to loose thousands of dollars of original art, but by and large I'm a competent individual. Why is it that no one wants to hire me? I've got a sunshiny personality and enjoy making people laugh, damnit. I am the perfect employee.
I've been trying to send out a resume every day to somewhere that I can really imagine working. Downtown Boston? Absolutely. Lynn, Mass.? Sure thing. Hanover, New Hampshire? Why the heck not? (In a moment of weakness, I did send out a resume for a production job in Avon, Mass., a place where I suspect living might be only slightly preferable to death. But it's not like they got back to me, so no harm no foul.)
It's becoming increasingly obvious that staying around here is out of the question. My local newspaper's help wanted ads are riddled with positions involving livestock and cheap "historic" hotels that smell of cat pee. They're all jobs, and I'm not a job girl. I'm a career girl, because--to misquote a brilliantly underappreciated movie--I missed interpersonal relationship day in high school. I'm not going to be one of those people who plans her life around a boy, or a family, or anything but a whim.
For the past six years, I have had the privilege of working on smart, important books that I truly believe will help change people's lives for the better. They may not sell like The Da Vinci Code, but being involved with them has been an honor. So many of the jobs out there wouldn't ever give me the feelings that I get working at Jewish Lights--the random pride of having 16-year-old girls walk up to me at trade shows and say "I grew up on your books," or the tingle of learning some jeopardy-worthy fact about history or religion or faith that nobody else in the world could be reasonably expected to know.
A few weeks ago, a livejournal entry about the job search process was circulating in my head. It was going to involve the fact that every day for the previous month and a half, I had lived some portion of a different life. I had a tiny apartment in the North End and worked on YA novels. I lived on New Hampshire's seacoast and spent my days proofreading educational materials. I stayed right here in this pink-wallpapered bedroom where I grew up, and I sold books at the Borders in West Leb. The entry never happened, though, because even then I was too concerned to really take pleasure in the experience. I am a timid girl, really. A shy one. How can I do all these things? And who am I to convince an employer to hire me, when serious powers of persuasion are obviously going to be necessary?
Ah. Someday I'll have a job. Even if it involves a goat herd.
The Components of My Dream Job:
--Every day would be a long stream of things to review--book cover designs, developmental editing, illustrations, and submissions. And my feedback on them would be important. Key, even.
--Celebrity gossip would be involved, one way or another.
--I could design if I felt like it, and proofread manuscripts without a supervisor standing over me with a stopwatch.
--The products of my work would be geared toward YA girls, the books all sparkles and fairy dust and "buscuit"-style prince charmings.
--Contact with the outside world would be minimal, as I really do hate most people very much.
--My coworkers would be funny and cool but not so cool as to be frightening.
--The health insurance deductible at my place of employ would not be so high as to make doctor's office receptionists laugh out loud. (Unlike now.) Maybe there would even be one of these rare and skittish beasts I believe some call "401K."
At the end of job hunt week six, panic is starting to set in, all sharp talons and acidic drool. I've sent resumes everywhere but the North Pole (Assuming, of course, that if Santa is interested, he knows where to find me.), and heard back about only one of them. It was for a local technical writing job, which sounded interesting. I like to write. I even take some sort of perverse pleasure in making complicated things simple and easy to understand, which seems to be the point of technical writing: Translating the goofy engineer-speak into human tongues. I could do that.
But something went horribly, unimaginably wrong during the interview. Sentences I'd rather forget were uttered, like: "We're an established company, but we run like a startup." (Engineer/human translation: "Kiss your weekends and evenings goodbye, because if you work here, your job is your life. We might let you have sponge baths at the water fountain, but that's it as far as personal time goes.") and "So how were your algebra II grades?" (Engineer/human translation: "No, we don't have the technology to monitor your nightmares. What would ever make you think that we did?")
Honestly. I'm a relatively smart girl. I've been known to eat the last of the communal office popcorn without replacing it, and to loose thousands of dollars of original art, but by and large I'm a competent individual. Why is it that no one wants to hire me? I've got a sunshiny personality and enjoy making people laugh, damnit. I am the perfect employee.
I've been trying to send out a resume every day to somewhere that I can really imagine working. Downtown Boston? Absolutely. Lynn, Mass.? Sure thing. Hanover, New Hampshire? Why the heck not? (In a moment of weakness, I did send out a resume for a production job in Avon, Mass., a place where I suspect living might be only slightly preferable to death. But it's not like they got back to me, so no harm no foul.)
It's becoming increasingly obvious that staying around here is out of the question. My local newspaper's help wanted ads are riddled with positions involving livestock and cheap "historic" hotels that smell of cat pee. They're all jobs, and I'm not a job girl. I'm a career girl, because--to misquote a brilliantly underappreciated movie--I missed interpersonal relationship day in high school. I'm not going to be one of those people who plans her life around a boy, or a family, or anything but a whim.
For the past six years, I have had the privilege of working on smart, important books that I truly believe will help change people's lives for the better. They may not sell like The Da Vinci Code, but being involved with them has been an honor. So many of the jobs out there wouldn't ever give me the feelings that I get working at Jewish Lights--the random pride of having 16-year-old girls walk up to me at trade shows and say "I grew up on your books," or the tingle of learning some jeopardy-worthy fact about history or religion or faith that nobody else in the world could be reasonably expected to know.
A few weeks ago, a livejournal entry about the job search process was circulating in my head. It was going to involve the fact that every day for the previous month and a half, I had lived some portion of a different life. I had a tiny apartment in the North End and worked on YA novels. I lived on New Hampshire's seacoast and spent my days proofreading educational materials. I stayed right here in this pink-wallpapered bedroom where I grew up, and I sold books at the Borders in West Leb. The entry never happened, though, because even then I was too concerned to really take pleasure in the experience. I am a timid girl, really. A shy one. How can I do all these things? And who am I to convince an employer to hire me, when serious powers of persuasion are obviously going to be necessary?
Ah. Someday I'll have a job. Even if it involves a goat herd.
The Components of My Dream Job:
--Every day would be a long stream of things to review--book cover designs, developmental editing, illustrations, and submissions. And my feedback on them would be important. Key, even.
--Celebrity gossip would be involved, one way or another.
--I could design if I felt like it, and proofread manuscripts without a supervisor standing over me with a stopwatch.
--The products of my work would be geared toward YA girls, the books all sparkles and fairy dust and "buscuit"-style prince charmings.
--Contact with the outside world would be minimal, as I really do hate most people very much.
--My coworkers would be funny and cool but not so cool as to be frightening.
--The health insurance deductible at my place of employ would not be so high as to make doctor's office receptionists laugh out loud. (Unlike now.) Maybe there would even be one of these rare and skittish beasts I believe some call "401K."