Three years ago today I graduated from Baylor and my entire life changed. I had no idea how difficult it would be to adjust to a postgrad existence right after I came back home, and my first year after college was extremely rough (read my long summary of my one year postgrad experience here). And while last year was a much better time for me, I feel like I’m back to square one, not knowing what I should be doing with my life or where I’ll end up. I like to say that three years ago I was a completely different person without a clue about my future, but I don’t feel all that grown up anymore. I’m still not in the career or place I’d like to be (like with everyone else’s plans, COVID derailed and basically eliminated my timeline of moving to NYC in March 2021!), but I’m learning and growing here at home surrounded by my loved ones. I loved writing the one and two year recaps of my life since college and wanted to continue with this summary of this past year—three years after graduation (although at some point I should probably stop talking about how many years ago I left college)!
While technically my first “real” job when I graduated from Baylor three years ago was an Outreach Specialist at Legal Aid, I’ve had lots of different jobs in my little adult life. My prep editor Billy gave me my actual first job as a freelance “stringer” for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser and Hawaii Prep World despite me having no experience, and I’m lucky he still asks me back every fall! Covering high school football is difficult and stressful and fun and it feels like my comfort zone where I know exactly what I’m supposed to do. I wouldn’t have nearly the same amount of writing experience without that position. Since I left LASH at the start of 2020, I’ve been at the Office of the Public Defender in different capacities. I started off as a Felony Legal Clerk where I remained for three months before I was moved to the same position in Appeals til June of last year. At that time, I was promoted to the Community Outreach Court Intake/Case Coordinator as my current job of almost one year. I like my job and I love working directly with clients, but I do not love earning the least of anyone in my team while not actually changing the material conditions of the clientele. In between my many office moves, I began and quit working as the Administrative and Communications Liaison for Hawaiʻi Peace and Justice from 2020-this month and I became a paid contributor covering Baylor men’s and women’s tennis for Our Daily Bears.
With the many job changes and experiences I’ve had over the past three years, I’ve realized that I still have no idea what I want to do with my life. HA! One would think I’d be over this bullshit confusing phase by now. AND YET. I’ve been rejected and/or failed more times than my parents should probably understand and at this point I feel like I either need to hunker down and tolerate my mediocrity or welcome even more repudiation (which secretly hurts my soul) from outside sources! Thankfully one of my best BFFs is in the same life state I am so at least we can mourn/cry/apply for jobs/cry together 🙂 In my ideal career (though I do not dream of working and would rather do nothing all day forever) I would watch and write about football OR work with clients at a tech company (this is a new idea for me) OR tell big companies to whom and where they should donate their money OR travel and eat and write about foods OR host a show talking about football. Do you see my problem?
Some mini highlights of my past three years are that I visited my Waco BFFs twice; purchased my signature giant white glasses; got into many Twitter fights :-); moved in with my partner; adopted a couple of SUPER CUTE rats; bought lots of beautiful clothes; paid off a chunk of my student loans; lived on Indeed.com; disappeared my depression and made it come back again; and cooked many a tasty meal! Here’s to the next three years of living!!!
