Saturday, October 17, 2015

What do I want to be when I grow up?

Rewind 3 years and I was graduating from UVM with a degree in Elementary Education, totally psyched to find a job and start teaching.  Well, totally psyched until I realized that I didn't have a chance in hell getting hired. Like anywhere.  So I picked up a restaurant job so I could afford to live and I kinda became at peace.  I briefly lost sight of my teaching goals and decided to invest in travel instead.  Totally still love that decision.  Seeing the world made me more, well, worldly.  And led me to a bilingual school in Madrid where I made my first tracks in teaching.  After over a year of European travel under my belt, and with endless destinations on my wish list, I moved home to regroup, and to try the applying game now that I had some interesting stuff on my resume.  20+ cover letters, resumes, and crossed fingers later, still nada.  Was I not trying hard enough, did I not want it bad enough? Yeah right, when I want something I go and get it, and I don't stop until I do because I'm a perfectionist and I have to have things my way.  Dammit.

So maybe, just maybe, it's time to spread my search to more than the college major I picked out SEVEN years ago, and devote some time to figuring out who am I TODAY.

So, who the fuck do I want to be when I grow up?

First narrowing points... who DON'T I want to be when I grow up:
  1. The person who sits in their cubicle all day and leaves notes like, "please stop cracking your gum" and "whoever keeps stealing my hot pockets will be reported to HR" all over the office.
  2. The person who is constantly focused on climbing the power ladder, wanting to become the top person; the one who is in charge of everyone ('s happiness). Yuck, get a hobby. Take up boxing or something. Works for me..
  3. The person who has a job that is so intense and overwhelming that everything else is on the back burner (family, friends, travel... FUN, that stuff is seriously important too).
  4. The person who wakes up in 30 years and say, "wait, shit, what did I do with my life?"
So, what are my choices now? I'm 25, I've got a lot of energy, and nothing technically permanently tying me to this specific dot on the map. Choices choices...
  1. Sub until someone likes me enough to hire me, and then, at long last, have my own classroom.
  2. Apply to a bunch of grad schools around the country (better yet, all around the world) in order to specialize my degree.
    1. ESL? And then work in a city?
    2. Special education?
    3. Counseling?
    4. Something totally different that strikes me as interesting?
  3. Coach skating lessons full-time (and probably work at a bar to supplement whatever money I need to float my life)
  4. Take a job in something entirely unrelated to my degree, just to see how it feels.
  5. Travel until I'm broke, and then refer back to numbers 1-4 on this list.
  6. Bartend until I wither away from lack of mental stimulation and a surplus of customers who say things like, "Did you even PUT any alcohol in this?" "Why is my steak pink inside?! I ordered it medium-rare!" "Any luck finding a real job?" "You must have a boyfriend by now, right?"
  7. Move into my parents basement and fully embrace the arrested development "adult" life I've been living since moving home from Spain. Fast forward 30 years and I've replaced all real people in my life with four-legged friends (this plan should be a lot more terrifying than it actually is, sorry I'm not sorry). 
Hence, my current plan is to try each of these on for size, and chronicle how each one fits one-by-one. And hopefully, by the new year, I'll no longer be on the fast track to being a washed up Euro-tripper. Buena suerte (to me).