look up and on

We are finally going on holiday on Thursday. And! I have a job to return to in September! And I am listening to Kurran and the Wolfnotes (as recommended by superfiona, hurrah for good music) and it is sunny (probably only for two minutes but oh, well).

Sunday night I drank too much on an empty stomach. This summer has been quite wine fuelled. I'm cutting back. I want to shift the five pounds I've gained, le sigh, from the increased partying and decreased gym time. This kind of happens automatically when term time rolls around again (does it ever stop feeling like "back to school"?) but I'm not often patient with weight loss.

Lots of admin to do for my new job. Glad all the necessary paperwork arrived before I go away.

worry

I am one of life's worriers. EA once told me there is a worry gene; she was celebrating the fact that she doesn't appear to have it.

I am worried I will not get the job I have an interview for this week. I am worried about what I will do if I do not. I want it, badly. I should stop telling people I have interviews, as the way I feel when I fail and have to pass the bad news on is becoming too much.

I am worried about the fact that I still don't feel right, even though the "bad" couple of months are now ostensibly in the past. I know this is chiefly down to my unemployment, but when all I need is a hug and it's out of reach I can't help but fret over how shit this is, sometimes.

Going home today. My sister is graduating tomorrow. I can't believe it's two years since I did.

preparation

We're on the telephone talking about the plans we have for the week. I have an interview the next day; he has a position to run for in the sailing team elections. I am tired but positive about the impending trip to another firm for another hour's tentative chat.

"I hope you get it." I say, after we've discussed what answers he'll give some silly questions they're going to ask.
"So do I. But I'd happily not take it if it meant you got the job."
And then my heart exploded.

still

Another rejection from another job today.

Most times I'm fine with this I really am just not, today.

It's exam time and I've got a cold and I'm unhappy and FUCK.

Each rejection makes you stronger, blah.

hope

Listening to two girls chat beside me in the awful dungeon of a cafe in college, talking about how they don't have time to do any job applications. Yet, bizarrely, neither of them have actually done the preparation for today's classes; what keeps them so busy, I wonder?

This course is not hard work. Watch a few hours of online lectures a week, read up on anything you're hazy about and make a stab at a basic prep task. Turn up to all your classes and you're in college for about ten hours a week.

If you can't cope with this, how on earth will you be a lawyer? Will you sulk when you're not allowed to go at half past five on the dot? Will you ignore the tasks your supervisor sets you in favour of the pub and then moan about what a bitch she is, how busy you are, doesn't she understand?

I know, I know, I'm arrogant. I'm struck equally by reassurance and fear; these girls aren't really competition in the job market, but then again I've met people just like them who are qualified lawyers.

Spanish class soon.

grr

So, for reasons unknown, I've been behaving like a total bitch recently. I thought it was exam stress, but, no, exams are done now. Overtired? Certainly, but that doesn't account for being a twat last night. Or on Friday, over a sodding dress. What the hell.

Just resolving to get on with it and stop being ridiculous. I think it's the change thing, sad all over again at a departure that isn't my own. (But it is, in a way, losing all connection to the city I love better than any other).

...

Working a law firm in Bristol for the week. Loved the first day, and I hadn't expected to. I was awake until gone five am worrying about it. See, ridiculous.

possibly submitted it in a drunken stupor

Just got an e-mail from a law firm thanking me for my application, and letting me know they'd be contacting me soon with a decision.

I do not remember submitting this application.

I wonder what was on it.

jibe-oh

Got a non-pfo (why not just say acceptance? who knows; I'm tired) the day after. Happiness ensued.

This weekend was the warmest so far this year. I squeeze my child-bearing hips (cheers, ma) through the window and we sit on the stone balcony. Bickering about schooling and commenting on the girls walking past the afternoon slips away and it seems seconds since I arrived.

I return to London with renewed enthusiasm and a shadowed shape of a plan.

pfo

...
I don't even want to be a lawyer.

Not surprised, but rather fed up.

what it comes down to

Much to my surprise, I have a second interview with the Law Firm. I am mostly surprised by this because I appear to be losing it; I typed up that anecdote about my Oxford disasters in two successive posts. It's not even that interesting.

I must revisit the tired Oxford story once more, I'm afraid. I performed poorly, that is true, but I'm also pretty certain they knew I just didn't want that place. I am sure people go in there to fight, and to win, and I didn't care by then. Oh my, how much that sounds like postoperative bitterness.

I know that my major stumbling block is convincing the Law Firm that I want this job. My clearest memories of my first interview are trying to explain why I want to be a lawyer. But there was no burst of brilliant inspiration, no desperate conviction from a young age. I went with something about long-standing undercurrent of ambition and a ramble about my transferable skills in the end. To me, jargon of that sort always translates to there is something I'd rather be doing.

I realise it is then paradoxical to claim that I want this. I do, though. This job would justify the path I am about to take. It is the goal that will push me through the tedium (and the preparatory course is Very Tedious).

And right there, in those few sentences, is why this is soulless, and why I am sad.

I Don't Think I'm Ready Yet

I had an interview last Thursday.

When people ask how it went, I answer: It wasn't as bad as my Oxford interview.
It wasn't. In the second Oxford interview they showed me a picture of a large structure and asked me what it was. Clearly, it was a tomb, but I said watch tower. Oh yes. I also told Robin Lane Fox that there were multiple versions of Homer's Odyssey. My explanation of this sort-of truth was not sufficient, clearly.

There were the required amount of fatuous questions. I gave equally pretentious answers. I felt hardly myself, playing this game of pretty platitudes, jumping through hoops.

Good Things: (to distract me from silly interview) moved into new house (beautiful), listened many times to my new purchase- Patrick Wolf - The Magic Position, tiptoed around family, begun watching the first season of House (watch it watch it watch it) and revisited my Eels collection for comfort. (Check the title).

I don't think I got the job. But - watch this space.