career/future/internship

So, it's done. I've submitted it. It's all up to whoever is in charge now, mainly I guess some Jon Davies guy. That's right folks, Nicole E. Owen has submitted her first resume and cover letter of her career today, not but one minute ago. (The wonders of e-mail making this whole business non-refundable, non-returnable, non-wait-I-didn't-really-want-to-send-that-able, on a click of a button.) I'm pretty sure it's terrible anyway. Honestly, writing both of those things was like pulling teeth, but now I have a presentable resume (presumably -- I've taken it to the Career Center twice for revision) and a cover letter that I can change and tweak for future use (presuming it isn't terrible). I thought for maybe a split second about posting those said things up here, but then I decided that I didn't want any more "constructive criticism", I just can't handle anyone telling "oh maybe you shouldn't have written that part", or "I saw a type in the second paragraph", not that anyone has told me these things, as no one reviewed my cover letter before I sent it out. Not that it would make much difference since the pool of practical skills that I have to draw from and expound upon comes only from my various part-time/full-time jobs that I've had, and while may be excellent sources for any management position, are probably not the best references for a publishing type position.

Then I have to remember to take a deep breath and figure that this is an unpaid internship, right in Athens, from UGA itself, and probably they have many, if not most, candidates who come to them without much prior experience, and probably none certainly with the work ethic that I have. And I have to remember that they are there to give us the experience so that we do have experience to write about for yet other internships that actually REQUIRE experience for the internship. Which seems like a vicious cycle of interning; must have experience interning to intern. So, such is life. As it is, my resume will already be fleshing out after the 29th of September because I signed up for a "Job Shadow Day" workshop. Yeah, one day, but every little bit helps I'd imagine. And if I get this one, then in the summer maybe I can get Peachtree Publishing (it publishes children's books in Atlanta). Then? Well by then, gosh darnit, that should be enough experience to get to the Random House Apprenticeship Program in New York! That'd be neat. Couldn't actually work there, apparently it's a terrible work environment with little room to advance, but the experience would be one of a kind.

Which brings me to probably the other question of the day. What about going into the Air Force. So, I talked to this Captain Kessler who is a public affairs officer at Eglin Air Force Base. We talked for about 40 minutes or so about public affairs and what it's all about. Unfortunately, she didn't tell me anything I didn't already basically know, or guess, and what she did tell me doesn't make feel really confident about wanting to pursue that avenue. It's not that I couldn't do that job, it's just that, if I wanted to be in public relations, I would be a public relations major, and frankly being a liaison and event planner just really isn't my thing. I could do the crisis management part, information dissemination part, base/personnel morale part. I could do it, but I just don't know if that's what I want to do. On the other hand, it is only four years, and I could get my master's and get some valuable leadership experience while getting paid better than my peers and having health insurance and a place to live. I guess my biggest problem with it is she said that there is very little structure, and frankly, I love structure, give me structure, I eat structure for breakfast. I'm a micro-manager and a planner, but if I have no structure, I don't know what to do and I flounder in my own details. So, maybe I could just scrap PAO and go into Intelligence.

Actually, there's this handy-dandy website that has every Air Force officer position available with a description of each one, and actually, Intelligence Officer seems to be more of a fit for my personality and mind than the description for PAO. Maybe I should talk to an Intelligence Officer now to get the scoop on that. I'd imagine there would be more structure in intelligence in any case. That job description was followed closely to a Planning and Programming Officer, which seemed a tad bit duller than the former.

At any rate, I guess I've still got time to figure it all out. After this externship, that should be enlightening, and hopefully I can get this internship, which will also be enlightening, and then maybe I'll know. It's really just about keeping all my options available to me right now.

Meanwhile, as long as I continue to be paid by the hour, I will continue to be a work-a-holic. I have decided that there is a fine line between work ethic and workaholism, and I'm hoping I haven't crossed that line. But sometimes I wonder.