The more you observe the world around you...

...the more obvious some things become. Yeah, that's a deep thought, well at least the kind of deep thought that I'm having at this time of year. It's something different to be out of school for a while and focusing on the real world when you still have a year remaining. Our supervisor has been on vacation for the last two weeks (with one week remaining). We've been doing our job and getting things done, but today it seemed our office was concerned with more important things: jobs. That meant for two of the three interns printing up resumes and cover letters to submit for OCI. All of us go to different schools and so we have different deadlines, but they seem to have a lot of the same ones while Cardozo is on a completely different path. For instance, my OCI stuff was do on Monday while theirs is due on Friday. They registered for fall classes about a month ago and I register next Monday. It's frustrating at times to be forced to compare myself and Cardozo to other schools and ways of doing things. Of course, my way of doing things is probably different from the rest of the world, but still... So, they spent today printing their resumes on 100% cotton resume paper. Gimme a break. Apparently, this is normal behavior, but I've never been introduced to this practice. Is the paper the resume is printed on going to make that much of a difference? One comforting thing is that everyone gets shafted by their Office of Career Services, in some ways we were lucky because our OCI process was almost entirely online. This is the first time I got involved with applying since I was in the middle of nowhere last summer. It's an interesting process and I can already see that the chances of these efforts being fruitful are slim to none, but alas, we do what me must to be able to say we made the effort.

I've been a bit lost lately. Worried about the mounting student loan debt that will more than likely never be dischargeable in bankruptcy (see, I've learned at least one thing this summer--though, just this week I was working on a case that happens to be an exception to this rule--lucky her!) and stressing about keeping up with everyone else, I am easily swayed into seeing things from the wrong angle. I forget to hold on to the attitude that got me this far and has proven more than worthy in the past. I know that I will find a job. I know that things will work out and I will be able to pay off my loans. I know that I can do this without spending extra money on special resume paper (though I might give it a try down the road if things still aren't working out). This internship has been a good thing. I have learned a lot and have helped some people. It's funny, I didn't really come to law school to help other people. Well, in a way I did, I wanted to make money so I could finance my friends projects and make money off of them, but here I am actually helping some people help themselves and give them a fresh start. I think this is even considered public interest work. And yes, I did mock public interest work in my past. It might not be such a bad thing. What is even funnier is that while considering my classes for next semester, I'm considering fulfilling the requirements for a certificate in Alternative Dispute Resolution. Totally the opposite of what I would have predicted 2 years ago, but life has a funny way of shifting things on us like that, doesn't it.