As a prospective English major, I'm not sure what I want to do after graduation. Sometimes I think about becoming a journalist, traveling around the globe following leads and interviewing interesting people. Other times I consider just staying in school until I am physically forced to leave.
But in general, all dreams of career paths are void of things like cubicles, computers and anything that could possibly be called IT. Though I enjoy surfing the Web and can send an e-mail as well as the next person, I leave computer science to my engineering friends.
This summer, however, what I planned to avoid at all costs was exactly what I ended up doing. I, the reader, writer and computer-illiterate, was an IT intern.
Being a bit lazy during the spring semester, I didn't put much effort into searching for summer jobs. After applying for only two internships, I got a call back from one, which didn't work out. Needing money and something to occupy my time, I took up my summer job from last year as an IT intern at my dad's office.
Every day I got up at 6 a.m., put on slacks and a blouse and headed into the office. After downing a few mouthfuls of coffee and some dry Special K, I went to my cubicle, typed in my password and was thrust into a completely unfamiliar culture.
I was immersed in a foreign language. I "managed assets" by sending "port replicators," "nic cards" and other equipment to "IR" or "deployed" them to new "users." Sometimes I organized invoices, master agreements and other documents whose purposes I didn't understand but whose places in the file cabinets I knew by heart.
And although trying to learn new acronyms and keeping different forms straight might have been frustrating, it was a step up from the hours of boredom when all the work was done and no more was coming in.
During times like these, I planned how I would avoid this job next summer by scanning the Internet for English-related internships. I practically memorized the advertisements on craigslist and Bookjobs.com.
When even searching for internships became monotonous, I would read online blogs and remind myself that the company block on Facebook was still up and running.
When every interesting Web site was read, and every idea I had was Googled, it was just me and my cubicle.
The cubicle is an interesting invention. Although door-less with short walls that can easily be looked over, it somehow is very isolating. If I had no need to print, fax or copy and no one happened to walk by, I could go without seeing another human being for hours at a time.
Not only can the cubicle cut people off from the world inside the office, it also completely separated me from the outside world. Sometimes I'd stand up and look out the windows lining the walls of the building and be surprised to see rain. Other times, the shades were drawn and it could have been snowing in July for all I knew.
A friend of mine told me about how she decorated her cubicle during her internship. I never saw the point in decorating mine. One of my coworkers would always tell me how clean my cubicle was, but the truth was it was just empty.
Somehow, I had found myself in the world that "Office Space" and "The Office" had long before taught me to avoid: a world of copy machines, diversity training, computer glitches and office safety meetings. You would have thought watching three men beat a fax machine with a baseball bat would have been a good enough warning.
But then again, as the wise and handsome Jim Halpert said, "Right now this is just a job. If I advance any higher in this company, then this would be my career. And uh ... well, if this were my career, I'd have to throw myself in front of a train."
My coworker one day related the same idea to me, just in a different way. She told me that the job might be boring sometimes, but at least I was making good money doing it. And that was true.
All the copying, scanning and changing of database information, although mind-numbingly repetitive, sent me home happy with a decent check every couple weeks.
As someone planning to major in English with little to no idea of what to do upon graduation, making some money over the summer -- even if the job isn't something I want to do -- is probably a good idea. I still have two more summers to investigate the inner workings of newsrooms, publishing houses or wherever else I might want to eventually work.
I can use the money I earned this summer if I have an unpaid internship another summer or when I travel to interviews during my fourth year. It's also money that allows me to eat gelato downtown rather than ramen in my room.
Not only did the internship provide me with a little cash, but it also reaffirmed my own interests. I know I won't be happy working as a secretary or computer programmer or any similar position. I'll keep reminding myself of that when I'm swamped with student loans or working for barely any pay.
I know it's important to intern in my field of interest to improve the chances of getting hired down the line.But it's not always a bad idea to do something you might not like to learn and appreciate what you do enjoy. And the bit of extra cash along the way isn't such a bad thing either.
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