Riding the Metro

My commute everyday is almost 40 minutes which means that I have almost an hour and a half to sit next to strangers and think about what else I could be doing with my life instead of commuting to work. Did you know that according to Texas A&M’s annual mobility study commuters in DC spend an average of 67 hours a year in traffic commuting to work?! I mean I could learn another language with that amount of time!! Don’t get me wrong that is not what I want to do with that time but I could you see. I could.

Coulda, woulda, shoulda. (For my Sex and The City fans you will appreciate my shout out.)

What would do you with that time if you could have it back? If you think about it, please don’t cause it’s kind of morbid, but if you were to think about it you would see that we are dying from the moment we are born. See, I told you morbid…stop thinking about it! While no one wants to die there is a type of calm knowing that there is an end. And an end means that you had to cram as much life as you can into whatever time you have. I have decided to work during a significant portion of my life because that way I can live with a roof and food and running water but some have other goals. While I wouldn’t mid sleeping outside on a beach I wouldn’t want to do it all the time so I gotta work. Hence the commute.

Since this is what I have decided to do with a huge chunk of my life I have decided that I should make it useful. Learn that language. I tried to do that, remembered that I suck at languages, and promptly tried something else. As a political science major in college I was constant reading and it wasn’t for fun. Not to say that I didn’t sometimes enjoy what I was reading but when it’s required that human rebellion in me wants to read my Cosmo instead of the CNN.com front page. My commute had turned into daily me time. I now have 1.5 hours to do whatever I want, within reason of course. So reading for pleasure has become a thing. (Read about how I rediscovered my love of reading here). I like to think I am using my time wisely.

Now don’t get me wrong. Sometimes you just want to sit on the train and take a moment and be silent or write a blog post or admire beautiful people you see. People watching is always a great way to spend your time. People are the most fascinating things. From the big, small, male, female, young, old. When you people watch you notice things like how everyone has their head buried in their smart phone. I say this as I write this blog post on the WordPress App. Wait wait. before you yell hypocrite you should know something, I am the writer and therefore rules and generalizations do not apply. Now that we have that cleared up we can talk about the couple sitting next to each other who might be perfect but alas miss it because they have headphones in or the businessman who is checking his email on his personal smart phone and work Blackberry or the beautiful writer writing her life story on her iPad. OK so maybe I just want an iPad but hopefully you get my point and it’s not that technology is taking over our lives it’s that this time could be used in a more constructive way. Talk to the person sitting next to you. Read a book about the history of the zero. Sit in silence and just regroup.

I don’t know how much time I have left on this beautiful Earth so that is why I am going to talk to the man next to me. Here I go…I am going to do it…it’s gonna happen…OK maybe tomorrow. No, no not hypocrite, artistic exclusion.

Baby Later

I am going to say the one thing that makes people very nervous: I  do not want children. I enjoy kids in small doses but settling in for a lifetime of tantrums, fighting, parent teacher conferences, and debt, seems unnecessary and unhappy. Yes, parents will tell you that there are moments that make it all worth it but as a former child I think I can say with authority, there will need to be a hell of a lot more to  make up for the shit my brothers and I put my parents through.

I know I am  in the minority and I know that it would be really easy to say that I haven’t met the right person or I will change my mind but as my friends know, I really do not like children. I get along better and prefer adults. Babies are needy, toddlers move faster than I am willing to, I actually enjoy children between the ages of 4-10, pre-teens are too much like teenagers and teenagers are…well…teenagers. I have noticed that once a teenager hits 20 I suddenly like them. Maybe cause I have flash backs to some horrible times I had with fellow teenagers in middle and high school and am so not willing to deal with their drama.

Since moving back from college I have been able to see and understand better not only how hard it is to be a parent but the cost of being a parent. I mean having one kid must be hard but then there are families that do it multiply times?! I had to babysit these two little girls one day from about 3 pm until about midnight. So we spent the day outside playing and by the time they went to bed at 8:30/9 I was exhausted. I had to take the entire next day just to recuperate. I realized that my mother did that as well. The mere thought of doing it as a single parent just gives me nightmares. I thought, I can’t imagine this day in and day out. They were also on their best behavior with me which I KNOW is not always the case. I mean are those amazing moments worth all the work. I hate to say it but from my vantage point it’s not. I respect anyone who decides  to have a family but I do no think it is for me.

So will this change? Maybe. Can I reserve the right to change my mind? Yes.  Am I completely satisfied with my decision as of now? Absolutely.

Secrets of an Internship

So, it was during my lunch break when I was browsing and reading some of the stories on WashingtonPost.com, Cnn.com, and NYTimes.com when I stumbled across an article that was making a short of announcement. This article or blurb really, was talking about the start up of a blog called “Spotted: DC [Summer] Interns“. What had I just discovered? Could it be…it was!!! A blog about the trials and tribulations of the people who have to work with DC interns and, from what I read, the stupid things they say and do.

                I have to be honest; I technically do not work in DC. The blog cites interns that work on The Hill, federal departments, or downtown offices. I am still in Virginia but that is just semantics. And I am going to, for the purpose of this blog entry, cite that I did work at the DSCC last semester so I was close. I have never worked with idiots in an office. I have done Exxon Mobil’s Community Summer Jobs Program (Foster and Linden) which features a host of different non-profits that have one intern but this year at NRECA is the first time I have worked with other interns at the same company. While I don’t work directly with any of the interns I did get to meet all of them on Orientation Day. They are all very smart, willing to learn, and know that not every single moment of this internship is going to be spent doing something that engages and challenges you.

                To be an intern is to get coffee, run errands, and make copies. It’s a natural cycle of things. Somebody has to do it and even though I have never worked in a House or Senate office I suspect they would have a lot of those mundane jobs to do. So to those interns who are no happy with this situation I have a few things to say to you:

1)       If you are getting paid, please stop complaining.

You should be forever grateful to whatever higher being you believe in that you got a paying internship in DC because believe me there are 10 people who would love to be paid to make coffee. To those intern who are not getting paid, it sucks but it could be worse. You could be at home doing nothing this summer.

2)      You get out of an internship what you put into it.

Yes, sometimes copies must be made, coffee must be poured and delivered, and errands must be run. Internships are not about what people give you. They are about what you ask for. Get to know that people in your office. Do not be afraid to ask them if you can join them in meetings, not to take part but just to watch. That is where the knowledge and learning comes in. If you passively sit back and wait for people to invite you to things, you will be waiting awhile.

3)      There is always someone smarter than you.

I would suspect that every summer House and Senate offices get students that are bright and smart, but think they are the smartest at everything. I know this will be a hard thing to swallow but there is someone smarter than you. Coming to terms with this will make you sound less of an idiot at times. Getting snarky or angry at these people just makes you look like a spoiled child.

4)      Please dress appropriately.

When you go to work in cheetah print heels, skinny leggings pants, and a shirt that shows way to much of you cleavage you make our entire generation look bad. Go out and buy some slacks and non-animal printed heels. Also, the heels make look nice but they can be impractical especially if you are going to be walking from the office to the Capital. Bring a pair of flats with you. And gentlemen, all I will say to you is this: a man in a suit is sexy. Get some that fit.

And last but not least…

5)      Stop complaining!

You are an intern. This means that you get the coffee, make the copies, and run the errands. Get use to it. Life sucks at the bottom and we all know it. We really do not need to hear it from you constantly.

Being an intern is what I have done for the past 5 summers and it is where I learned many things. From learning how a copier works (they can be more confusing than you think) to how to read a Metro map (they are surprisingly easy). No task is too dumb and if you really want learn the tasks won’t matter. Interns are an important part of a House or Senate office and if you are heading up to The Hill this summer to intern please for the love of all that is holy try to not embarrass your fellow interns. The last thing you want is to be is ‘that intern’.