This is the place you end up when you lose the chase. . .

Another set-back, another disappointment. I've had a lifetime's share in the last few months.


I try so hard to be ambitious, to think you have any future at all when all you get is a million setbacks.


I thought that by now things would be if not tolerable, then at least going somewhere. I applied for that World Affairs Council internship, and I got the e-mail today that "no thanks", but my talents were not good enough for them. Not good enough to provide 10-18 hours a week of free work, the work that they apparently so desperately rely on. Yes, this position, I thought, would help me when I applied to graduate school to show that I had some knowledge and potential in the world of International Relations and nonprofits. It would've been hard to work that much, but I suppose it would've been worth it. There's nothing else much in Seattle that would be similar that would have a real internship position. Believe me, I've tried.


And now they've told me "no thanks". Apparently a 3.91 GPA in the field isn't good enough. I'm not sure what I would need to have been good enough. Though I DID see that some extremely wealthy girl who was in my study abroad program and who was from the Seattle area had done it, as her picture was on the internship website. She was always going on about how her family knew the Nordstroms, and how Bill Gates lived next door to her. I suppose that's really what it takes: Claremont college education, rich well-connected parents, the same old same old, spoiled rich people, nepotism, that Old Boy's Club that I'm not invited to.



I guess it's funny that I always assumed I would be. Being the smartest kid all through High School and college wasn't enough, I guess. Because intelligence and competence isn't really what matters at the end of the day. Money talks; money is really the only thing with a voice anymore. I'm sure if I had parents who helped me apply to a bunch of Ivy League schools, including paying the $300 a pop application fees and who knew people who went there or if they had gone there themselves, things might be different. If my parents had known some well-to-do city folks who would give me an internship, well, even better. If I didn't have to worry about working and could take classes and do unpaid internships and still afford to eat, well, that would be awesome. But I don't have any of those things. I'm just a plebe working for the man, and the education I'm going to be indebted for for the next twenty years doesn't mean shit in the real world.


Now I'm thinking about graduate school. None of the prestigious ones will want me if my only work background is Macy's. And if I go to some shitty small school, well, where will I get a job then? Centralia College? If I'm lucky, maybe. Or even worse, I'll just be unemployed with another fifty grand of debt accumulated.


I guess I should just face it- I'm not qualified for greatness. I don't have the tools necessary to make something happen. I was operating under delusions of grandeur- the major, the studying French, the implication that I would somehow be a desirable addition to any organization. Truth be told, I probably should've gone to trade school, or learned about agriculture or something. Cream rises. It turns out, I'm whey. And there's no savior in sight, no likelihood of someone dropping some opportunity in my lap. Should I even try anymore? Or should I just accept my lot in life, to take what's given me and stop complaining? I've probably been trying to fit a square peg into a round hole my whole life. I mean, failing now and again is bound to happen, but at what point do you stop banging your head against a wall? It's not going to help, it's only going to be frustrating and painful. Maybe me moving back home is for the best after all. It's probably where I belong; clearly I couldn't hack it in the big city. Macy's barely even wants me, why should some impressive non-profit? The world just chewed me up and spat me out. I'm not a heroine, I'm a character from a Hardy novel. There is no happy ending. Just disappointment, economic impotence, and settling for something distasteful. But it's probably still better than begging and pleading for one chance to be someone in this world, and having the door to happiness slammed in your face, over and over.