By the time mid-February rolled around, I had already become pretty dismayed by the job search process. Every report that I read or caught on the news claimed that the class of 2002 faced the worst job market that any group of college graduates had faced in 12 years. No one was calling me back about jobs, when I called to follow up on my resume I was often informed that the position had already been filled.
In the midst of this all, my ever-supportive parents were completely renovating the first floor of my childhood home. They had converted the basement into a saw dust covered bunker where they cooked meals on a $9.99 hot plate, a George Foreman grill and in a microwave so old it guaranteed that all the food was contaminated with carcinogens. This was a pretty bleak environment to live in. Workmen occupied the house all day and I took refuge in the den where I more than made up for many years of not watching television and continually raised the high score (eventually to somewhere around 160,000 points) on our family Gameboy version of Tetris.
I needed a break from this all, and friends who attended relatively nearby colleges were more than happy to play weekend host. One weekend, I stormed through the Tundra-like flatland of Wisconsin to visit my friend, and former co-summer camp counselor, Meg, at St. Norbert’s College in DePere (pronounced Da Pier). Why I would opt to go further north in the dead of winter is a bit beyond me.
The following weekend I headed out to Iowa City, Iowa to visit a high school friend, Carrie. As I drove into town I was immediately struck by the number of blonde people that were around me. I felt like my dark brown hair made me stand out. However, I was pleased to find that Iowa City is a surprisingly cool little town with some chill record stores, some decent rock shows, and as any Big Ten town has ample booze and obsession with college sports.
In some ways, going to college in New York (or probably any big city) denies you the opportunity to experience the conventional concept of college. Although, in Iowa City I did witness a pretty large “dykes only” game of spin-the-bottle, which probably isn’t the standard, or at least not traditional, sense of a Big Ten college town. In addition to that viewing experience, I was introduced to the offensively compelling world of “Elimidate” and I learned how to play racquetball. I was so enthusiastic about the game (racquetball, not Elimidate) that I walked around for a week proclaiming that my new life’s ambition was to become a professional racquetball player.
Saturday afternoon,, Carrie and I had reserved a court in order to do battle once again and my new favorite sport. As I was getting ready in the bathroom, I heard my cell phone ring, but I missed the call. A bit later, I picked up the phone and checked to see if the caller had left a message.
To my surprise, and soon to be chagrin, I found that not only did the caller leave a message, but that there were about 7 other messages on my voicemail dating back as far as two weeks. The one that was two weeks old was a non-profit organization in Washington, D.C. saying that they would like to set up an interview with me.
For weeks I had been moping around that no one wanted to hire me and it turned out that someone did, but I had messed up, big time. I eventually figured out that I had somehow deactivated the function that notified me when I had messages on my phone. I was frantic. I called the organization back (on Saturday afternoon, of course, no one was there) and left a frazzled message saying that I was currently out of town, but I had just received the message and I was very interested in the job.
I obsessed over the whole thing the rest of my time in Iowa City. And I waited and hoped that the organization would call me back. I hadn’t heard anything by Thursday afternoon, so I called them. I apologized profusely and explained my technical inadequacies. The guy on the other end, Rhett, relayed that they hadn’t yet filled the position, but were in the second round of interviews. He said that I had been one of the strongest candidates on paper and they would still be willing to meet with me, the only problem he foresaw was that I was in Chicago and they were in D.C.
I inquired, “when would you like to interview me?” He responded “Monday afternoon.” I replied, “that shouldn’t be a problem. Can I call you back to confirm in about an hour?” He said yes. The first thing I did when I hung up the phone was instant message my friend Chad who lived just outside of D.C. in Maryland. I asked him if I could crash on his couch for two nights. He agreed, then I ran over to AAA and got maps of the drive from Chicago to D.C. Finally, I called my parents and told them that I planned to drive out to D.C. that weekend. On Saturday morning I climbed into my car and was off.
No comments:
Post a Comment