Tuesday, March 24, 2009

Job (no) Fair

Print business cards. Network. Write Shit Down. Visualize. Read "The Secret". Pray. Do the rain dance. Eat my vegetables. Rinse. Repeat (if necessary). This has been my routine for the past year. Guess what? Still haven't gotten that dream job. I'm less than pleased. Have you noticed already? Yes? 

I had the pleasure of graduating into the worst job market in the past decade. I also made sure to graduate with a degree that was sure to pigeon-hole me (Design & Merchandising). I couldn't help it, I'm a glutton for punishment. It will take a boatload of elbow grease to get me out of this butt-fuck. 

Design and Merchandising is a hybrid of fashion, marketing, buying/retail management and "soft" graphic design. Soft, not meaning flacid; however, I am proficient in adobe suite/after effects but real graphic designers would throw fecal matter at me for implying we had the same coursework. 

I have suffered more rejection now than ever before in my life. Always a great student. Never in trouble. Im attractive, so I haven't had problems with the fellas (hollaaaaaa). But how are you supposed to react when you never hear back from jobs, or when you do, they simply say "We hired another candidate, but we would like you to continue to apply for positions with our company". Well, fuck you sir/madame. 

I wasn't prepared for this. I thought graduation=job. Dear economy, you're ruining my sense of self-entitlement. When my parents graduated, they awoke in the land of milk and honey. If I were to follow the theory of transitive property that says if A=B and B=C, then A=C. Meaning my parents went to college and got great jobs. I am like my parents and too attended college; then I should have a great job. I took out that Stafford Loan with the assumption i would be a big baller/shotcaller in a year or less. You son of a bitch. 

The fashion industry is in dire straights and entry level positions are non-existent. This means I can continue to wallow in self-pity and blame the economy (which I do regularly in twenty minute intervals) or I can get off my arse! Now here is the hard part. How do you continue to keep pushing on without that "pat on the back". In school when you studied hard for a test or wrote an exceptional paper, you had the grades to reflect that. How do you drum up the fortitude to keep going when you can't see the fruits of your labor. When emails are never returned or you network until your blue in the face, how do you keep from playing in traffic? I must be solving this great mystery of the universe, because I have yet to give up. 

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