Mission Accomplished: 502 Days Later

After being a near straight A student in undergrad it still took me 6 months to find a job that had nothing to do with my psychology degree. After being a mediocre student (grade wise) in law school it took 16 months to find a job that makes use of my law degree.

I'm not going into detail, but I'll be an assistant director of a small non-profit public interest organization. In the professional development offices this would be referred to as a non-traditional job. A.K.A. a non-practicing attorney for those readers who are not legal beagles. I'll be a lawyer that doesn't write briefs and doesn't argue cases in front of judges.

The job appeals to my jack-of-all-trades/Swiss army knife nature. I get to travel a bit to discuss issues in front of community panels (what do you know that substitute teaching experience paid off). I can recruit potential members to join the organization. I help with fundraising. I'll keep tabs on legislators to get a heads up on potential bills that affect the organization (a.k.a. lobbying). A juris doctorate isn't required for such an administrative position, but many J.D.s end up working in them. We have the right skillset.

I assume there are health benefits, 401K plan, vacation/sick time with this job. I'll ask tomorrow. Today's second interview was a 30 minute session with my boss and a board member. They compared notes at the end and said I stood out. Great! Now I want to know about such details as the insurance, 401K, and vacation/sick time. A whirlwind of a day for sure.

I've heard many '05 graduates out there are still looking. I wish you the best of luck. I wouldn't blame you if you simply gave up. I was about ready to. Tomorrow the bar results for this summer come out and I wasn't looking forward to the additional competition.

The best thing is now I no longer have to lie. I was exhausted by putting up the stiff upper lip and saying I would prevail whenever asked how the job hunt was going. If one more person asked how the job hunt was going I was going to rip out a random major organ of their's. The truth was the job hunt tasted like ash in my mouth. I reached the point where I had no idea what I was going to do. I went through so many backup plans that I no longer had any ideas. I felt like the biggest failure. I was the biggest failure. Perhaps I finally won by simply enduring. I don't know.

Yet a win is a win, no matter how ugly the process. Here's to finally winning.