Summer is really a confusing time for us all, is  it not? Here we are, stuck in our respective hometowns rummaging around town for job scraps. Sure you could go back to the food service industry, I mean Arby’s is always hiring, but it just seems so anticlimactic to be 22 years old coming home from college to go back to fast food. Where’s the progression? Where’s the career experience? And where the heck is my internship?! Considering the scarcity of fresh-outta-college jobs these days I realize I can’t be too upset at the lack of internships, but that never stopped me from complaining. I also recognize how pretentious it seems to be this upset about part-time summer jobs and honestly I want to stab myself for even writing about it, but it is a very real, very irksome angst that I carry. Although, being the ever self-reflective person that I am, I think I’ve been able to identify the roots of my summer work bitterness.

1.  I got sunburnt, but only on one side, despite taking due care to position myself looking directly into the sun. Also, my parents have been gone for a week so I’ve eaten nothing but cereal and shapes Kraft Macaroni & Cheese (my body is a temple). So now I sound like an inappropriate middle school joke: What’s white, malnourished, and red all over…the left side of its body? (Need a hint? It’s definitely not a baby seal that’s been clubbed to death in Canada’s Annual Seal Hunt if that’s what you where thinking.) (Although that does exist.) (I am so sorry I even brought that up.)  (Sweet Jesus. Do not, I repeat DO NOT! search for “canadian seal hunt” on YouTube. It is graphic.) (Now excuse me while I go try and burn that image out of my eyes with a blowtorch.) Wow, at first I thought that was going to be a slightly off-color yet morbidly humorous joke, but that just got way too real way too fast.

2.  I applied to work at a Young Life summer camp this year which is excellent, except the dates are June 16 – July 16 approximately. Which means there is a month smack-dab in the middle of my summer where I’ll (potentially, God willing) be gone. This is problematic for a few reasons, a) I haven’t found out if I’ve been deemed worthy of said camp which is stressing me out and b) it’s hard to apply for a job when you are tentatively taking a month long hiatus from a three month job position. And I get it, who wants to put up the fuss of working with a kid who right after finally getting trained for the job is going to jump ship and then return 30-days later only to leave after a meager month and a half when you can simply hire the kid who’s able to work a solid stretch? I barely posses the energy to type that last sentence, let alone be a manager in that position.

Naturally, since this situation involves more than one element I get “overwhelmed” by my options and become decisionally paralyzed and take an excessively long time to sit and brood over my options. And still the only thing I’ve come up with is – I need more time. How bad do I really want to job hunt? Last year’s work schedule was exhausting and I can’t say I’m dying to get back into that scene. On the other hand, my sanity is being pushed to the limits with having nothing to do. I have, so. much. time. available to me now and it is terrifying. Do you know how hard it is to be productive when you sleep in till 1pm? It’s like when my 10:00am alarm goes off and my body goes, “Haha, right. ‘Cause that’s happening,” and then turns my phone off. Even my unconscious self knows that there’s nothing worth getting up for. I thought that since this summer might be a little more relaxed that I was definitely going to pick-up on my writing; I also thought that I was definitely going to graduate college in four years, and yet here we are. My summer has been reduced to simply puttering around my house in my pajamas muttering about how I should read more while trying not to lie down every five minutes because I’m “exhausted.” What happened to sun, sand and surf? Everyone gets all jacked up for summer because it means they get to party on the beach all day every day and it’s like, “Where do you live that that’s actually a viable option for you? Am I the only one with work ethic and no friends around here?  – Don’t answer that.” . . . And now you see that what I do all day is complain to myself, and I am insufferable. I want to crawl out of my own skin and club myself to death like I’m a little Canadian seal bab….nope, sorry – I’m not going there again. Lets end this before I relapse any further.

Welp, glad I could be a Debbie Downer for everyone…..

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