Adulthood

The end of semesters always want to make me cling violently to my youth.

I had an internship interview a couple of days ago, and the sight of my resume printed out and stuck in the front of an official-looking binder freaked me out.  It looked so adult, so important.  I typed out that resume kicked back in my dorm room desk chair surrounded by my ubiquitous clutter, including two not-yet-washed shot glasses, a family of stuffed chickens, and a half-eaten Christmas candy cane container of Reeses Pieces.  These things shouldn't coincide in a world with my resume in the front of an official binder, and questions like "where do you want to be in five years?"

I went to the newly admitted student reception at the journalism school.  Three huge television screens scrolled pictures of accomplished alumni on an endless loop of intimidation: New York Times reporters, MSNBC employees, the guy who invented Hulu.  This was the back drop for the dean's inspiring speech about how the answer to people's endless questions about the gloomy future of journalism is us.  The fresh-faced college undergraduates eating catered dining hall cookies and hot lemonade will decide the future of an entire industry because we are going to become the best of the best.  Us. Me.

Me with my socks that never match, my clothes that never fit quite right, my hair that never lays down properly.  Me with unevenly applied make-up and papers that are always crinkled up from being squished in my unorganized bookbag.  Me that frequently eats waffle fries, pickles, and corn bread for dinner. Me that has gone to class an hour early on accident so much that my friends call messing up the time of something a "Samantha." 

How am I supposed to "network"?  I'm going to have to squish my over-sized right foot into an acceptable high heel (damn it, society/patriarchy/shoe companies), pay a million dollars to get a suit tailored to my stumpy legs, find a product to smooth my hair even on rainy days, and buy a brief case that doesn't have a cat on it.  I'm going to have to learn how to small talk and how to swallow my feminist rage rants and Republican rage rants; I'm going to have to learn to talk about the weather and Current Events From Major Media Perspectives with patronizing old guys.  I'm going to have to learn how to sip wine without gagging or commenting about how it tastes like stale Wonderbread or spilling it on my $300, tailored suit skirt. All so I can spend five minutes impressing some random person with my facade of put-togetherness, so they'll give me a chance to have to prove myself all over again.

I can't help but wonder if adulthood is worth it, as if it's optional.  All these visits to University Career Services are giving me the hives.  And they aren't really helpful. They tell me how to google job opportunities. If there's one thing is this world I feel perfectly competent at, it's googling.  What they don't tell me is how not to throw up my unhealthy breakfast in the workplace because I'm so afraid of failing at being an adult.  They don't teach how to time when  you stand up as an important person enters the room to shake his or her hand so that you don't awkwardly stand too long while they walk toward you or too soon so it looks like an afterthought.  They don't teach you how to stop interjecting "like" into your everyday speech or how to keep your mascara from bleeding onto the piles of concealer you put under your eyes to cover up the bags, making you look like you have black eyes instead. They don't teach you what kinds of questions are appropriate when the interviewer asks if you have any questions.

Basically, I'm not very good at selling myself and that's all adulthood is.  All I want to do is pay my rent. Why do I have to invent a persona to do it?