For a good portion of you fine readers, summertime is full of sunburns, seedless watermelon, air conditioning, adjusting to life with the parentals again and internships. Surviving sunburns is possible thanks to the ingenious invention of waterproof sunscreen; watermelon does not require survival skills -- well, at least seedless watermelon doesn't; the parentals will always be dorks, and the sooner you face that the better; and air conditioning can be survived with a light sweater. A summer internship, though, is much trickier to emerge from unscathed. So listen to a gal with experience before you enter the world of filing papers, fetching coffee and (maybe) doing work.
Last summer, the first person I encountered when I entered the strongly air-conditioned, fluorescent-lit, sterile-looking office building was a woman who looked like she could use some fresh air, less honest lighting and sterilization. Her name will not be disclosed, but rest assured it is a typical name for a frumpy woman (some examples would be Brenda or Bertha).
She wore her skirt so that it almost covered her chest, which would have been quite impossible, to tell the truth. She was the office snack lady, and I think she spent more time rearranging the snacks in the break room than actually doing her job. She had a hard time doing her job because, as she often reminded us, using the Internet is not "how it was always done." This woman is easy to classify and to deal with. Just show enjoyment in her snacks -- but be sure to leave her some -- and don't bring up topics like YouTube or Facebook.
Be prepared to meet with some office snoops as well. I say this because last summer, when I returned from the printer one fine day in July, the man in the cubicle next to mine was actually in my cubicle and looking at my computer screen. Creeper. Good thing I exited that "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" movie review. (On a side note, that movie was lovely, but it could have followed the book a bit more.) Moral of the story? Don't leave movie reviews in plain sight on your screen. Instead, read them covertly in the lower left-hand corner of the screen so your body mostly hides them and so they can be easily exited or hidden behind a fine piece of internship-applicable writing.
Another person you may encounter during your internship is the petty complaining co-worker. With hair styled too high and lots of makeup, her main concern is that she does not do more work than she has to. (I want to believe that mine had a New York accent as well, but I think that would be too much of a cliché.) She also may dislike you saying, "see ya later alligator" at the end of the day. I received many a stern "do not use that casual rhetoric with me" glares from my petty complainer. And never casually take a handful of the jellybeans she has in the bowl on her desk -- although she wants people to think they are for public pleasure, she can only part with one at a time. More would be a personal offense.
If you actually get the chance to do real work, do it right. This will (a) make it less likely that you will go back to making copies, and (b) prevent you from embarrassment if you are prone to weeping at harsh words from a boss figure. Also, do not mess with the printer settings. If you do, you might encounter a run-in with Ms. Petty-Complainer, or an investigation by The Snoop. The Snack Lady wouldn't really care because she still uses a typewriter.
What will you most certainly learn from a summer internship? Well, hopefully some skills in the field you are about to enter. If that unfortunately is not the case, maybe you will learn that your co-workers are a bit too old for you to date (oops) and will acquire lightning-fast browser minimizing skills for those times you peruse Web sites that are less than appropriate for the workplace. If your internship ends up being a flop, I hope you will at least enjoy the sunburns and seedless watermelons coming your way.
Maggie's column ran biweekly Fridays. She can be reached at jones@cavalierdaily.com.
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