I lived in Seattle for a year or so after leaving graduate school. I was looking for somewhere to escape, to just sort of run away and not confront, among other things, the fact that I did leave grad school on the terms I did (and which I may blog about in the future).
So, fresh out of grad school, without a degree, well, it was sort of like Princeton walking onto Avenue Q. Only mine was the job equivalent.
After some very frustrating rejections, including my rejecting a job selling windows on no salary but only commission (read = $0), I went to a head hunter. We decided that between the fact that I could type 80+ wpm, knew my ass from a hole in the ground, and gave good phone, that I could be a great administrative assistant. I had a couple of interviews, and then she said the dangerous words. "Well, I could try you with W."
"W?"
"W." The headhunter replied. "She can be difficult. Some people find her very hard to deal with." Difficult was an understatement. She was a New Yorker, Jewish, and a lesbian, working in a conservative, mostly good-ole-boy Republican commercial real estate office in the Pacific Northwest. (Yes, there are LOTS of conservatives in Seattle.)
She goes through assistants like J-Lo goes through bad movies. One girl only lasted until lunch on her first day, when she left in tears.
I figured, "What do I have to lose?"
And I lasted a year. And I left because of a new opportunity and a lack of a future in real estate, not for any fault of W's (even though she was evil sometimes... well, a lot of the time. But you try telling your boss, "If I have to go pick up your dog, to whom I am allergic, from the vet one more time, I may throw him in Puget Sound.") I think a lot of it was a facade that she put on - a "tough character" she felt compelled to be to stay competitive on the fierce scene she was working on - and she was good at what she did, too. She may have been a bitch, but she was great. I learned so much about how the world of "work" works. And that's invaluable. At least I got something out of it... the salary was for shit!
Posted by Jon at August 6, 2003 01:13 AM | TrackBack