Leaving School One Year After Graduation   




 Graduation wasn't a celebration for me last year. Saying goodbye to my professors, my peers, my work-study position coworkers, the security guard, and the facilities workers was a sad affair. I walked twenty blocks and grabbed a concrete from the Shake Shack, but not even frozen custard could quell my dread. I wandered around New York confused and lonely, went home, got drunk.

The slump lasted for months. I applied to jobs, got no response. I got one response, was told to pay a finger printing fee for the NY Department of Education, and to come in for a series of interviews to tutor kids in Brooklyn. I was told the job was a sure thing. It wasn't. I worked as an assistant to a 72-year-old novelist and as a bike delivery person. I fell off my bicycle and smashed my face. I went back to work 2 days later with black eyes.

A full-time position back at school seemed like a godsend, but I took the job with hesitation anyway. I liked riding my bike. I liked my 72-year-old novelist friend who sometimes paid me to eat lunch with him or to go stay in the Hamptons and who, above all, was the kindest, strangest person I'd ever met.

Still, I was grateful for the benefits and the regular schedule. Things got sour along the way and when my boss questioned whether I liked the job in a half joking way, I told it to him straight. My legs were shaking when I told him I was going to put in my resignation. I was not relieved. I did not feel strong. I felt like an insolent child, forgetting what was so wrong to begin with.

But things fall into place. I got a freelance writing job at a tattoo magazine the day after I quit. I got a call back for an internship while I was interviewing at the tattoo magazine. A boy on the street liked my tattoos and asked me if I wanted a job at a high end retail shop (see, haters, instead of hindering employment, tattoos are helping me to secure it). I have two delivery shifts again.

So, leaving school isn't easy this time. But it is easier. It's time for me to move on...to something. And the work won't be easy by any means and it won't be as comfortable, but it will be more fulfilling. And, eventually, I'll figure something out.