Diary Of A Design Graduates Dreams

Its over. In just under 7 hours 2008 is over.

I would be lying if I said this didn't make me ecstatically happy.  I have hated the last 5 months of it, certainly not how I expected it to go.  There have been happy moments in there but on the whole, I have been dreaming of the new year, seeing it as a chance for a fresh year, a fresh start.  Hopeful that 2009 is my year.  

But looking back, 2008 hasn't been that bad.  The second half of it has certainly clouded my opinion of it, but on the whole I can't complain.  I spent the first half of it living the student dream.  Well maybe not dream, it was a lot of hard work but I lived with my best friends, had independance, and had optimism and hope for the future.  And I got a huge tick on my Lifelong 'To Do' list by graduating.

Having independance and hope ripped away from me was hard but success doesn't come easy.  If I wanted to work in Tesco I'm sure I could be happily employed and satisfied with my life.  But I have ambition... And while in the meantime I have been willing to lower myself, unfortunately these employers see my ambition and don't see me as a long term worthwhile prospect.

But you already know how my plight goes if you have been reading so I will simply form 2 quick and simple lists of my year... hopefully the highs will be longer than the lows.

Highs_

* Final week of university
* Results day
* Graduation
* My first (and unfortunately, so far, ONLY) degree related interview in London
* Singstar funtimes at Number 3
* Becoming best friends with the brother again
* Mac daddys wedding
* I <3 RSW first anniversary
* Christmas
* Getting my first tan in a decade
* Speed boating ad dolphins in Kavos
* Getting backwards compliments in the form of 'overqualified' rejections
* End of degree show
* Finally becoming pretty happy with my body
* Having my family back

Lows_

* Rejection
* The Job Centre
* The boyfriend going off on his travels
* My birthday
* No new Westlife album
* Getting a huge red swollen foot in Kavos
* Saying goodbye to university life
* Losing my independance
* Being underexperienced/overqualified... middle ground is where?
* My poorly grandma
* Unending unemployment
* Insane monthly hormones

So there we go... 2008 hasn't been all bad.  And now, with a few bottles of wine, girly films and my best friend of over a decade, I am hopeful for 2009!  So bring it on!!!

I suppose it is kind of a backwards compliment... sorry, you don't have the job, but only because you are too good for us and we feel you can do much better.  Doesn't make the rejection any easier but they are right... I can do better, and I want to do better.  When I apply to these jobs they are only temporary while I look for my dream, and unfortunately that also seems apparent to the employers.  
But I just can't win... overqualified for the lower roles, not enough experience for the roles I am qualified for.  So where is the middle ground.  I'm having some trouble finding it.

I had an interview today.  Not my dream job, far from it in fact but it was in a design company and it was just down the road so any money I would make could be saved up.  I got to the final 4 out of about 200 applicants apparently, but I would be offended if I didn't.  The vacancy description asked for 5 GCSEs, I have a bit more than that so why wouldn't they want me.  I don't know.  Because for the first time I felt I had actually convincingly lied my way through to convince him that I did want the job despite my 10 GCSEs, 3 A Levels and a degree.  I didn't deny my ambition, he encouraged it in fact stating that they promote from within so my design background wouldn't be wasted in this office job.  Who was I beat by?  I don't know but it was either someone used to working in shops, someone used to working in a call centre, or a criminology graduate.  I don't like to get too confident but I did think I had done well and might actually have a chance.  But 6 long hours later, no phone call of congratulations.  Right from the start he had expressed his concern at my qualifications, what does a girl with an interior design degree want to make coffee for is quite a logical and fair question to ask.  I'm disappointed but what did I honestly expect?  Them to be blinded by my lies and believe I truly worked so hard in my education to settle for this?  Companies don't want to employ someone they know is going to leave them soon after, its a waste of training... but it is so disheartening for me.

But anyway, my positivity is staying.  I refuse to let this set back get me down again.  It is still 2008, it is still not my year.  2009 is my year, I was far too optimistic to believe that luck would speed up.  So instead I have compiled a playlist of motivational, inspirational songs that I have been listening to on repeat to keep my spirits up and heed the wise words of Mariah and Whitney "They don't always happen when you ask them, and its easy to give in to your fears " but "There can be miracles when you believe".  I also built a set of drawers; screwing and nailing while listening to 'I'm every woman' can be very therapeutic.

I am a religious girl, since I was 4 I went to church but it seems like right now God has abandoned me... probably doesn't help that my last sentence wasn't all true, I went to church since I was 4 but then I stopped when I was 18 and went off to uni.  So I probably brought it on myself, especially as I will admit I did go off the religious rails a bit in my first year.  But on the whole I like to think I'm a good Christian, I have my flaws like everyone but on the whole I'm good... especially compared to one girl I went to church with who was caught in bed with one of my friends boyfriends and is now pregnant with his child!!! And I now get to see her every fortnight at the job centre... the swotty girl who had the world at her feet is now seen as actually being no better than the rest of them anymore.  
But anyway, I digress... feeling abandoned by God, and having slightly mental parents I have turned to the side of magical cards to predict my future, probably evil in the eyes of the church but right now I need them!!!
So, it started on Thursday.  We aren't too good at expressing things in my family.  I had reached an all time low, I was crying every day and I just needed my daddy.  But when I'm emotional it takes a LONG time to get out what I want to say, quite often I don't manage it and at the end of it I'm still lost by myself.  So I wrote my dad a letter, explaining how I was feeling, to make sure I said everything I needed to, and basically just asking him for some wise parental words and a cuddle.  Another problem with my family, we don't really do that sort of affection.  So he bought me a teddy.  But a teddy bear wasn't going to make everything better.  Once again, communication failed.  He didn't know what to say, I understand because bring a crying person to me and words fail me, I never know what to say.  But then, after some awkwardness and he got up to leave, he kissed me on the head and gave me a big hug... and made me cry some more so he didn't get to leave for about half an hour.  I havn't cried since though, he may not have had the words but in his own way he made sure I know he is there for me.  And as for the wise parental words I needed... "Why is life so hard?" I asked him.  "Because it would be boring otherwise", the man has converted to Buddhism, read plenty of books on that and the Dalai Lama and the best explanation he had was because it would be boring otherwise?
He returned 10 minutes later with his faerie cards, always brings them out in times of need... to try to cheer me up with a reading from the faeries.  They were actually all positive, although I can't imagine the faeries were going to have horrible things to say to me so still not sure how useful they were.  But then the day after I went to see the other crazy parent with her tarot cards... once again a very positive reading.  Now as I said at the beginning I am a religious girl and I have never believed in any of these things before, I read my horoscope but its just a happy coincidence if it comes true, I never really believe in them.  But right now, I can't help but want to believe that the cards are true, that maybe fate is about to step in and turn my life around for the better, I can't really imagine how it could get much worse to be honest...  So right now' I'm taking the world as it comes to me, trying my best to stay positive and believe that the cards are right, and just hoping that after 2008 being such a sucky year, and the end of a huge chapter in my life, maybe 2009 will be the start of a new one and will be my year.  Fingers crossed!!!

Watching a documentary on America's prisons I was told that prisoners come out with no real world job experience, no contacts and little hope.  Sounds a bit like my own current situation.  Now I'm not saying that I feel quite as hopeless as a former criminal, I mean I do have the advantage of not having a criminal conviction to deal with.  But as a lifelong believer in the importance of education, I am now questioning just how much it has helped me.  I want a job, I really want a job, but it terrifies me because I have no real world job experience.  I know education, I love education but to now use my education, to apply it to a job terrifies me.  No contacts, proof of this necessity is clear when I look at my graduating class.  The only fellow interior design graduate of my class that has had success in finding employment got it because she had contacts, now I'm not saying she got it only because of this, she certainly deserved a job but did the fact that she had the contacts to help her find the job benefit her?  Little hope... graduate with no real world job experience and no contacts and then add in to that mix a worldwide economic recession and see how much hope you can muster.  Is education a prison?  An institution you enter in to feeling comfortable and pretty certain of your future only to be sent out of it with feelings and worries similar to those of a prisoner.  Knowing that you need the experience to have any hope but knowing that so few people will give you that chance to gain experience without already having the crucial experience.

Yes, today is one of them days where I'm running low on optimism... but on the bright side from months of this merry-go-round of emotions, feelings and hope, days like this generally are followed by days of hope so not all bad.

Am I old?  Because when I was young I remember that adults/old people never seemed to get excited about Christmas... just stressed out by Christmas shopping.  I have all my Christmas presents sorted so why am I still not able to get in to the Christmas spirit.  I love Christmas... or at least I love the idea of Christmas, that typical Christmas scene that you see on cards, and in all the films.  The Christmas with plenty of fluffy snow, not the one where you are constantly in fear of falling over on the icy pavements.  I'm over this fear now... I have had my fall, and after the initial embarrassment and speedy bounce back up hoping nobody saw (I was in the middle of town, everyone saw!!!) I even managed to laugh to myself that it happened.  I'm not one of them miserable types that hates the world after a fall, I can see the funny side... I would laugh if I saw someone else fall so why not laugh at myself.  The Christmas with perfectly wrapped presents under the tree that all look immaculate and identical, not the one with Winnie the Pooh wrapping paper sat next to all the other standard quick wrapped presents in cheap paper.  I am quite an anal person so this Christmas dream is certainly one I aspire to live someday... even if it means hiding real presents in a cupboard and having fake wrapped up boxes around the tree.  The Christmas with all the family going round to someones house for a big dinner and charades... yes I'm one of those weirdos that actually wants charades on Christmas day, maybe only because I have never had it though but instead I get a disfunctional meal with my father, step-mother and fat step sister, while the other step sister sits in front of the tv eating chicken balls and smileys.   Despite all these disappointing Christmas facts, I do dream of that perfect Christmas happening someday, when I have more control over my Christmas celebrations people with me will be suffering charades.

So why do I not feel Christmassy?  Is it because both my mothers house and my fathers house is still plain, no sign of any trees or tinsel?  Or maybe its because it is my first year without an advent calendar!!!  I want to feel Christmassy, I have Miracle on 34th Street on as I type this, and for 2 weekends in a row I have had my festive boyfriend playing Christmas songs.  But it just does not feel like Christmas, and the advert that keeps telling m 'Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas' is telling me blatant lies!  Are my expectations of Christmas too high?  I think it is fair to say that yes they are, but despite this it is my first year when I just cannot get Christmassy at all.  So am I old?  Have I become my father? The man who despite spoiling his children at Christmas, is in all other respects a bit of a Scrooge with a Bah Humbug attitude.  Or perhaps it is just my current state of mind, where none of my clouds have silver linings.  I didn't enjoy my birthday, maybe Christmas this year is just doomed to the same fate, I certainly hope not but things aren't looking good.  

Christmas cheer welcome from anyone and everyone.

Well, last night was a bit junk.  I was happy during the day with my wonderful boyfriend there to keep me happy but then the floods came.  Thoughts of the future came flooding in to my mind, or should I say thoughts of 'what future?' 'when I am going to actually get my future?' came flooding in to my mind.  I was totally overwhelmed by negative thoughts.  Ridiculous every time I look back on my 'manic depressive' episodes because the tears just take over, I cry so much for so long that after a while I'm not crying about anything, I'm just crying because I'm sick of crying and feeling so hopeless.  Even my poor mother got a midnight text from an overly emotional daughter, luckily she was in bed and doesn't take her phone with her so I didn't wake the poor woman.

Today though, its back to positive thinking... or at least as positive as I can manage.  So time to give up on design, not forever and I will keep looking but it just isn't happening right now, people can barely afford to buy places, nevermind employ an interior designer to make them look amazing.  So time to embrace the present, I have lived my life in the future.  Choosing my GCSEs while I dream of A Levels, choosing A Levels I didn't particularly want to do but knew I needed to do if I wanted to pursue my degree dreams.  Working my arse off in my uni years, sacrificing much of my social life in my final year to get the good degree while I dream of my future career.  Time to live in the present.  Time to just enjoy my life for a bit.  So time to just apply for jobs that I can work in while I just enjoy my life instead of killing myself in a job working constantly to progress in my career.  If I don't live now, I'll be in my 60s or 70s before I start to enjoy life.  So while applying for every admin job under the sun I stumbled across an advert for charity work.  So I looked in to it... much better pay than I ever would have expected for charity work, especially as I spent my youth doing it for free.  And if I'm going to put my dream on hold, why not spend my time doing something worthwhile, something for the people who are in even worse places in life than me.  To make a difference in a job that gives me the satisfaction of knowing I can help people while not selling my soul to it.  So time for happy thinking, and printing off hundreds more cvs and covering letters while I continue to hope for the best, I may not be focussing on it for now but I'm not giving up after all my hard work!