how to not get a job

step one: discover that you have your phone number incorrect on your resume. 8047, not 0843.

what do you do with a BA in English?

Now that I am officially a college graduate, I am living at home (like any good post-collegiate person does in the 2000s) and am trying to get a job.

Though I might be a leading expert in my field, this is a slow-moving process. It turns out I have very few marketable skills beyond comparative literary studies, translating Beowulf from Old English to Modern English, and telling you the underlying structures of language. Unsurprisingly, our modern workforce does not really need to these abilities. (Do you need someone with these qualifications? I'M YOUR GIRL. give me a holler.)

Luckily, I live equidistant from two major cities, and I have been stalking jobs for both of them on craiglist.com in addition to driving around, submitting applications to places which would be entertaining to work at.

So far I'm not exceptionally worried. I have a tendency to have interesting summers entirely by accident; something will fall into place.

Congratulations, You Did It!

Graduating feels a lot like juggling joy and fear and anxiety and pride and excitement and terror and worry and giddiness and loneliness and regret and satisfaction and frustration and hope and need and want and confusion and love and bafflement and sadness and happiness. It's certainly very comforting to know that this isn't my last graduation, which definitely diffused the shock of I AM DONE WITH COLLEGE FOREVER. In 5-7 years I get to do this again... and it will be more surreal then, I'm sure.


HIGHLIGHTS:

• UNH running out of chairs for the graduating class, meaning a 58-minute version of Pomp & Circumstance and a lot of people just standing around while hilarity ensued
• Collopy and I deciding that we probably could have just gone to a store that sold curtains and bought a gold cord... screw you, Honors Convocation, we'll have your 3.2 GPA if you factor in this semester
• The man who was too short for the microphone stand and as a result looked like the microphones were his eyeballs
• The lady who was convinced that the world was going to end tomorrow and it is ALL OUR FAULTS so do something about it! Or be terrorists!!! or something to that effect
• Bert Jacobs, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Optimist, Life is Good Company, throwing frisbees and being awesome (read his commencement speech)
• Not being told that campus runs on a giant fart (see also: Commencement 2009 & the "CE-Yo" of Stonyfield Yogurt)
  
• When COLA was announced, the entire back row of professors in full doctoral robes threw beach balls at us
• UNH Graduation slowly becomes the UNH Folk Festival

I have a bachelor's degree from the University of New Hampshire in English and Linguistics.
That's strange to say. I have a bachelor's degree. Who let that happen?

we're half-awake in our fake empire

moving out for the last time. i loved this room.



(graduation updates coming soon)

Dear UNH (A graduating senior's letter to you)

I came to UNH because it was where I wanted to be.

Thousands of dollars and four years later, I am graduating on Saturday a leading expert in my field with two majors and a minor. I was pretty damn right.

If you had told me in Fall 2006 that I would study at Cambridge University, accidentally fall in love with linguistics, meet some of the greatest and most interesting people, get involved in social justice work, do groundbreaking research, and be accepted into and be going into a PhD program by spring 2010... well, I wouldn't have believed you.

I started out as an English major, though very torn between all sorts of academic interests. I had almost came in as a music major, though I knew that was not what I wanted to do. I toyed with philosophy (this was short-lived) and communication (one huge lecture class changed that). I secretly wanted to be a Women's Studies major, but they seemed crazy-intense and they scared me a lot. So I stuck to English, because I like reading and would be given booklists of stuff I actually wanted to read.

As I grew more and more jaded with writing papers on symbolism, I accidentally signed up for a class called The Secret Lives Of Words (yes, really); immediately after that I declared linguistics as a minor and started exploring the etymology of words within the context of literature - explaining the validity of my approach was an endlessly frustrating process. When I got back from England in the Fall of 2008 (a serendipitous mistake unto itself, I meant to go in 2009) and realized I had two more years to do something with myself, I added linguistics as a major. It was through a similar happy accident that I minored in Race/Culture/Power and found myself in Women's Studies classes, wondering if I missed the boat entirely on my passions.

And then I started my independent research. The more I worked on it, the more I knew this truly is what I want to do for a long time.

I will never forget first stepping onto this campus for Freshman orientation and hating every second of it...and coming back in the fall to live with a huge group of people I couldn't relate to and didn't want to live with. I remember sitting there, miserable in Williamson 519. But I will also never forget the feeling of being dropped into a great big new world of interesting people to meet... and meet them I did. Although SERC C in all of its shiny hotel-esque glory has permanently erased what truly was my first home on campus, I haven't quite left the mini dorms behind. To all my friends out in Mini Dorm Land, past and present: Thanks for the trials, the tribulations, the inside jokes, and the quirks nobody else will ever quite appreciate.

Though I am saddened by the fact I will not be in New Hampshire this summer and beyond, it's for the best. I don't think I could bear knowing that I'm so close, but not entirely here. Merely being here is part of the experience: HoCo Radio, walking through the MUB, the way Ham Smith smells like old books, Ham Smith Room 128, the T-Hall bells, my summer-research-desk-cubicle on the 5th floor in the Dimond Library, the way the sun hits all the trees on campus every day - even on rainy days, lying in the grass wasting time, the way that the other parts of campus feel like a different universe unto themselves, all the people I didn't get a chance to meet, and even the biddies and bros (okay, maybe not so much) - I will miss every aspect of my four years here.

To everyone that matters: I love you all a lot. It's been so incredible to meet the people we are today. Thanks for making my undergrad experience amazing.

i can't bring myself to publish this on facebook yet

which sounds so stupid, but it's true. i have been trying for a little over a week now.

at the end of days

I haven't been doing much as of late. It's nice, actually; now that (nearly) everything is done, I can take a weeklong vacation from doing things. I am mostly spending this time attending assorted Recognitions. Next week I am attending a Senior Celebration for my minor and a reception for people who did undergraduate research. I was also invited to an Affirmative Action reception before graduation to get a stole from the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs. Please note that my actual majors - my actual academic concentrations - are not doing anything.

I essentially was awarded for being gay the other day through OMSA's graduation reception- really though. I understand what the motivation behind this was, and I appreciate it, but in reality I was awarded for being gay. I don't do anything, so this is overwhelmingly unnecessary. (Really. Mostly I just sit around and write papers.)

But, at the same time I can't resist anything free... which might make me an immoral person, but to be honest we are inching dangerously close to All-Chicken-Meals at the dining hall, and that is not cool, UNH dining. And many of these receptions are catered.

how did it get so late so soon?

Dear UNH,

I feel like I just arrived on your campus maybe two years ago. I'm about to go to my last day of classes in my undergraduate career. When did this happen?! Thanks for four years of academic excitement.

With love,
Heather

Q: Heather, what have you been up to, now that you have finished your thesis?

A: My post-thesis life has been rather uneventful.

1. From Tuesday at 12:45 PM until approximately 11 AM on Thursday I put a pause on my life to merely exist without any responsibilities or paper-writing (or, arguably, any thinking).

2. I started applying for jobs. I didn't have a resume until Thursday because there wasn't really a need for one, but now I do! Because I will have a BA, I have decided I was going to avoid working at Wal-mart or whatever, and instead try to get a job that will make me feel like a real person for a while... so I'm applying to be a receptionist/administrative assistant. This process mostly involves re-addressing my cover letter and occasionally mixing up what website I got their job posting from, only to realize AFTER having made a pdf and sending it. That's not especially professional!

3. I saw Girl Talk again. Gregg Gillis puts on one hell of a dance party!


Today is mother's day ... but Mom is currently in London with Dad at a stamp convention. Since I can't really say happy mother's day (my family, as a whole, is very bad at communication sometimes) to her at the moment, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY MOM. you rock.

As we inch closer to graduation, groups are coming out of the woodwork to Celebrate! The other day I got an invitation to a Commencement reception from the Affirmative Action and Equity Office, celebrating me... how do you know about me, Affirmative Action and Equity Office? Apparently tomorrow I am being honored by the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs, too; I would like to point out that I don't do anything worthy of merit.

i am turning in my thesis today.

this is my thesis. it is 15 pages long. i wrote it in 6 weeks.

i guess I should start de-post-it-noting these library books then.

inspiration information

The final draft of my thesis is due on Tuesday. There's a few stylistic things to work on, but they won't take a very long time to fix. So I have been slowly re-introducing myself to Normal Human Society outside of thesis-writing. It's a little bit stressful. Where did all these people come from? and why are they so loud?

But, this is especially exciting because as of yesterday I am officially a grad student! (So, not really part of Normal Human Society.) I received my postgraduate handbook from Strathclyde yesterday. The highlight of this packet is the following:
"Research seminars: Invited speakers and members of the department present papers routinely. We expect you to attend on a regular basis. Even if the topic under discussion does not seem immediately relevant to your on topic, attendance is important. The ability to take part in debate and discussion on topics that may be unfamiliar is an important academic skill. If you wish to pursue an academic career, you will often find yourself teaching outside your area of research expertise."
Translated: You will attend other people's research seminars. It will make you look smart.

Someone told me I have six more days of classes left in my undergrad career. What? How?