If only Cookies kept the Bill Collectors at Bay

I can’t help but read news story after news story about how recent college graduates are facing bleak futures in their employment prospects.  Believe me I know. 

When I graduated from Oregon State in 2003, I should have powered into the work force.  Instead, I decided I needed to take a trip to find myself.  As it turns out, I found myself working at a youth hostel in Minneapolis, MN for close to a year.  When I had to kick a guy out for drunkenly peeing on a sleeping guest, I decided it was time to return to Oregon. 

My return was lack luster.  I didn’t have a paying job; instead I had an unpaid marketing internship with Oregon Literacy, a now defunct nonprofit.  I had one afternoon to find a place to live, so I ended up in a house off of NE 15^th and Alberta that I shared with two women – a raw vegan and lesbian who wore her dead brother’s underwear.  For several years I was convinced that my paternal grandmother’s pearls had gone missing while living in that house, but I’m happy to report that the only things that went missing were my copy of Victor/Victoria and any appreciation that I may have had for Last Thursdays.

So, after leaving and rereturning to Oregon, I found myself in a very familiar situation.  I had kind of lined up a life, but hadn’t thought anything through.  This time when I moved back from New Hampshire in 2009, I had a fancy new law school education and the $160,000 in student loans to go with it.  However, I had already contacted the temp agency that I had worked with several years before, and they were willing to take me on while I studied for the bar and figured the rest out.  I assumed that I’d make AT LEAST $20 per hour temping.  I mean, I was a law school grad, a fast learner, and totally awesome to boot! 

Instead, I spent the next 18 months temping for between $10-13 per hour not working for weeks – or even months – at a time.  So, I got a part-time job working at a craft store for $8.60 per hour.  (Let me tell you, housewives can be brutal when they come in looking for discount scrapbooking paper on Thanksgiving Day.)  Since I didn’t have full-time employment, I was able to apply for an economic hardship forbearance on my student loans.

Speaking of economic hardship, the last couple of years have been ri-dic-u-lous.  I borrowed money from my best friends and my roommate.  There wasn’t a lot of room on my credit cards, but I maxed them out.  My cat developed feline cystitis, and I opened another credit card to pay the vet.  I participated in a medical study for money.  I lived in a house with four 25-year-olds while taking on the role of their mother, designated driver, and social worker.

Things are actually looking up these days.  I’m still not making $20 per hour, but I could definitely do worse than my current job.  Actually, I’d need to take a pay cut to get into an entry-level legal job as a docket clerk or paralegal.  But, I just can’t believe what an uphill battle this whole adult thing can be.  All I can say is that the pay off better be flippin’ sweet.  We’re not talking frosting covered sugar cookie sweet, which are totally sweet.  We’re talking a cure for cancer sweet.  But, you know what?  I’d totally settle for a frosting covered sugar cookie sometimes.