I Need A Job

im struggling with regards to finding things to blog about. this is either good because it means i'm not doing any extra curriculars to distract me from my school work or its bad because my life is depressingly depressing. despite what this struggle means, i can squeeze out another entry until something interesting happens.

i've never really had a legit job. living in connecticut our family could afford a bunch of stuff and i got to spend my summers bullshitting, loitering and doing everything not productive i could think of. then i'd go to my home away from home, YMCA camp belknap on lake winnipesaukee in wolfeboro, nh. its a boys sleepaway camp that i've gone to for 6 years and, to summarize a long and memory filled description, its tops. to be a counselor (or as its called at belknap, a leader) you must be chosen from about the 60 or so 15-16 year old guys by the existing leaders. it is a HUGE honor to be selected as a leader. in fact, there are two years of training before becoming an actual leader with your own cabin. i can proudly say that i was chosen 3 years ago and the past two summers i have been training to become a leader.

here's the problem: belknap is seperated into four 2 weeks sessions. belknap is unofficially ranked the best summer camp in america and the waiting list is several hundred kids long. the result is that most kids, if they get in, go for one session so other kids can go. also one session costs over $1000 so most parents usually wont go over 2 weeks. however, there are some kids whose parents are awesome and let them go for a month. luckily my parents are definitely awesome. most of the time. i was a camper for 4 years, after the first year i was a monther, so i went for 2 months. then i got senior recognition (i was chosen) and went back the next year as a part of the leader corps. leader corps doesnt get paid and you start running activities, taking over different cabins in different divisions (divisions are decided by age) for one night intervals, and you serve the food. you are a substitute, a baby sitter, and a waiter. and the best part is, LC's dont get paid. there are two sets of LC's per summer, one for the first half of the summer and the other for the second (cuz god knows no one could be an LC for the whole summer).but even though you do all that bitch work, theres still another selection process that decides if you come back the next year as a Leader In Training, LIT. not all LC's come back as LIT's just the ones who are "good enough".

so then you're an LIT. you share a cabin with a leader for the whole summer, half the summer is in one division and with two different leaders and cabins and the other is in another division with two other leaders and cabins. the LCs go home when the LITs switch divisions. as an LIT i was paid very little, relative to the amount of work i did and the amount of time i worked. however, no one ever gets mad about their pay because theyre happy just to be back at camp, myself included. and even after these two years, the leadership is so esteemed andregarded with so much respect that there is a third selection process that, if selected, FINALLY leads to becoming a full fledged leader. i find myself in the unique position that my fellow LITs would absolutely kill for where i have received a letter from the leadership director saying that they would love to have me come back and be a leader.

however, recently, my family's financial situation is not as stable as it has been and with me being a capable almost 20 year old, i have a responsibility to make things easier for my family back in ct. sadly, i have no choice but to go through one of the final steps of the "boy to man" transformation and get a job. jobS really. one for now and one for the summer. normally id just say "well that summer one's taken care of, cant wait to go back to camp". but now with my situation i really need to be making some serious bank, so unless i can't find another job aside from belknap...i need to find another job besides belknap. which sort of screws up my closure to belknap. ive gone to this amazing place every summer for going on seven years now, made some amazing friends, learned how to play ultimate frisbee there, along with many of my other cherished memories. and now i have the opportunity to go back, as a LEADER, a chance that every kid who goes there dreams about, and im looking for another summer job.

ill be honest, there are some other factors playing into this decision. one being that i really really REALLY miss my friends from home and theyre always pissed when i say "k bye guys time for belknap" and then i get back and its time for school. and that was when it was a month. last year was the first summer i went for the full 8 weeks and as much fun as i had, sometimes i was way too stressed to enjoy camp. the second factor would be that me saying good bye to belknap is another part of the "boy to man" transformation. there are a handful of men that i know personally that have stayed with belknap since they were campers and are now running the show, but at some point every guy there has to stop living in the "never never land" belknap world where youre a boy forever and start thinking how this summer is going to help me in the future with getting a job, having more money when the fall semester begins, etc.

so thats the summer.

on thursday, i finally did what i kept telling myself i was going to do but with every bit of me did not want to do: i went to college mall and applied to every store. after my last class ended at 2:15 (college life is a dream, honestly, when will my days ever end at 2:15 again?) i got on the 9 bus and headed over. at about 7, 7:30 i made my way home. i lost the sheet of paper that had the list of every job i applied to but after trying to recall them in my head, i know that i applied to at least 20 stores. some were sears, zumiez, a pet store called "pets", inside scoop, journeys, foot locker, aeropastle, abercrombie, hollister, american eagle, old navy, electronic boutique, dicks, rue 21...it was a job marathon.

i just realized that i had a follow up interview with abercrombie today at 9am. but i really didnt want to work there. really really.

target was the worst. its on a computer, which deceives you into thinking its gunna be easy and fast. there were 6 parts. the first 3 were the basic stuff, that took about 20 minutes. the next 2 parts were, like, multiple choice questions, that took about 10 minutes. and then i got to the 6th part and i was like "thank the lord im almost done". the 6th part it a 50 question survey asking questions such as "are you happy with your life thus far?" "when someone insults you do you accept it or do you call them out on it?" "are you a good listener?" that took another 20. afterwards i was furious. luckily i saved the big stores like sears, dicks, and target for last so i ended my job hunt after target wasted an hour of my time.

so hopefully ill have a job soon! i now know the layout of the college mall like the back of my hand so thats an added bonus. i need me sum $$$$$$$$$!!!