So said Arnie, as only he could in Kindergarten Cop. I don’t want to whine, but I do tend to post updates quite a lot on Facebook- I don’t use Twitter since I’m not famous and I have enough sites to waste my time on. So often I will say what I’m feeling on Facebook, especially if I am feeling very lonely. One does try for humour, at least.

On such a status thread, I wrote a list of the sorts of jobs I have applied for, which was ’science writer, pharma advertising, website editing, studio running, TV research, education outreach, medical reporting, admin assistant, data entry, temping, lab technician, and media monkey positions’.

Which actually doesn’t cover all of them, but la. The number of applications when I last counted, a fortnight or so ago, was about 70. Number of interviews, 10, and some of those were for two positions in one interview. Feedback from some, silence from others. Maybe I really am just a bit sh*t?

Let’s see if I can post anything helpful about my experience…

…

…er…

…

No, I can.  I did think the SMP course would be more daring and specialised than the Sci Comm course, which is true. I thought I could explain my rationale well enough in interviews, if necessary- for instance, if interviewing for a medical writer position. Which is largely true, but it is very important to be prepared, because the degree does look very specialised, and employers are looking for any sign to trim off the crowd of applicants. I do think that my mentioning that I applied for TV production positions has counted against me in at least one interview, where I would have been better off pretending that I had applied solely for jobs in the sector of the one I was interviewing for.

In order to express confidence, commitment, and enthusiasm, it’s really important to be selective over what you are going to mention- and for goodness sake, plan beforehand and don’t deviate. I am still too honest in interviews and will admit if I had prior reservations to the industry in question, or my past choices- this really doesn’t help. Honesty is not an admirable quality, it is a difficult and vague quality that employers struggle to judge.

Regarding getting a writing job, I think it would really help if I just wrote as many free, freelance articles in my unemployment time. I am now trying to do that. The critic in my head says that I was too eager to get a paying job. The angry voice in my head says that getting paid in return for providing my brain in some service seemed a perfectly reasonable plan after several years of further education. The kid in me just sighs.

Most of the time, interviews do go better than anticipated. MOST of the time. The chance that they won’t, and the damn difficulty in getting a job, means there really cannot be too much preparation. I’m trying not to remember a recent one where I thought the usual burst of adrenaline and good cheer that comes from social interaction would carry me through. It didn’t. One good thing is that you do gain a core set of answers that can be used again and again for things like ‘Tell me about yourself’ ‘Tell me what you did from ___ to ___’.

Regarding TV, it’s difficult to say what would help me get a runner / researcher position more. A few things I am cautiously sure of -

1.) More work experience. At least 4 weeks with a BIG, WELL KNOWN production company.

2.) A driving licence. So many runner positions just want someone willing to drive round London. If you can drive vans, far better.

3.) Networking. Something I am starting to despise in general, entirely on principle, entirely because of how it is confirmed again and again and again by every single employed person I seem to speak to.  It kind of implies that I’m basically a useless, overeducated n00b who hasn’t made enough friends or well-placed connections during all her years. I know that sounds childish, but tell me, how else am I meant to see it? I am really starting to believe that MSc time is just an excuse for a period of time when a person is supposed to be working part-time, or voluntary work, or being the student paper editor (writers get no kudos).

Little things like exuding energy and enthusiasm and being the easiest person to get on with EVER also help, but to be honest, I try so hard to be all that that I’m not sure how much more I could lay that on.

Also, if you’re not a student, work experience is technically illegal. Oops. Wish I’d known that earlier before I sent out my first batch of applications. But asking for WORK SHADOWING is not. So you don’t want experience, when you apply you must write that you JUST WANT TO SHADOW (even though of course, you will be working, not peering over people’s shoulders). Remember that.

Enough advice, can I whine now? Why not, it’s my life. I’m having mood troubles which may or may not be induced by my circumstances- environmentally induced depression, perhaps, but a pretty unshakable-feeling depression. Too bad for me. Just got to endure, but depression really is one of my most despised and feared things in life. It’s either that or some non-mood related medication I’m taking, still what fun- I just won’t know for a good while. So indeed, I’m at my lowest point. There’s not much funnyness to be said about that.

Sometimes life and the future really seem to be just one long slog of indecision, tough times, lack of sleep, and doing things we’re not sure we’re really meant to. I mean with this life, we only get one shot, and we go down that long, erratic path, never really knowing what else might have been, and just trying to make the best of it.

Still, I’d like to tell my younger self that times are tough. I can’t get a job and I’m not really sure why- is it my poor job searching, my lack of ability to fake that I want to be a recruitment consultant (whatever the hell they do), my decision to move back to the West Midlands instead of live in the capital, is it my incoherent degrees, my messy CV… shoot, I don’t know.

I’d say to her, look, sometimes all your prospects will seem fun and then it’s not so bad, but really I think we’re facing years and years of pursuing difficult ‘careers’ that seem not to offer value for money when plotted against time and headaches invested. About how further education study can be interesting, but is also just one long headache that can never be turned off- during my first degree, I literally felt like there was no time that I *shouldn’t* be studying, and there was a long stretch of about three years where I was physically incapable of enjoying a lie-in. I’d say, professional careers are just plain difficult, and maybe the main satisfaction comes just in the form of a paycheck and a slot in the world and thinking about what you’re going to do on the weekend- so that’s five-sevenths of your daily life pretty much spent without much enjoyment.

I’d say to her, maybe you shouldn’t make these choices. Don’t study science, academia is just really painful, and doesn’t offer enough returns. Don’t listen to those who say you need a university degree- your parents didn’t even go to university and they think it’s all dinner jackets, lifelong buddies and shoulderbrushing with future politicians and bigwigs. I’d say… don’t end up where we might end up now, because you’re really being pretty depressed for a lot of your twenth-fourth year, and it’s not fun, it’s just perpetual irritation and pain and crap. Don’t go down that uncertain path, try another one.

For god’s sake, try another one, because the choices you make are ones you just have to keep building on, improvising on, and it’s like flogging that dead horse sometimes. You’ll love that MSc if you do it, and you’ll come to love your first degree too after a couple of years of hell. But where are we now? Where can we go now? I don’t know. And I wish I didn’t have to care.

It makes me feel a mixture of dislikeable emotions when I make myself think about how long I have been unemployed. Feelings born of looking at unpleasant truths, while trying very hard to remain detached from them. All right, technically, then, it’s been since December 2009. And now it’s May 2010. Approaching mid-May. Oh, —-!

The last few years have been pretty action packed, really, and so this long period of limbo seems especially alien. I don’t want to find that after doing a one year Masters, I then spent the next year not being particularly happy and living at my parents’ home to save rent. It would be like the anti-Masters year. The shadow year. The year that was not.

Is this what awaits this year’s crop of SMP students? I don’t know. But here’s my story so far.

The internship in Laos was great. I have better things to say about it than that single nicety nice adjective, but that can wait for a different blog, a different post based on a topic, just somewhere else. I’m only writing this to get the blog cogs working again, and in the slight hope it might be of interest to some graduating students. But I’d resolved to come back from Laos to *try* to get a job in film, TV, science communication, science advertising, writing, etc. I knew it was going to be hard. I tried.

I am glad that I have tried.

My stats are roughly 70 jobs applied for since January, some snippets of voluntary work, about 8-10 interviews, and no job. I moved back to my parents’ house after the flat of the room I was renting was being sold in March, and so moved out of London. I’ve been commuting back and forth for interviews, and to see friends. I’ve had interviews that seemed to go great, one second interview, and at least one interview that was dreadful. I used to apply for a lot more jobs in the earlier months of jobhunting and even would keep a score of how many I sent a day, although lately in the past month, I have been applying a lot for jobs entirely unrelated in any way to science or media, which I didn’t do so much in the early days. I’ve applied for work experience, which I didn’t get, but I shouldn’t be unsurprised- to get work experience I’m probably facing even greater competition, and should be sending my CV every week.

Currently, I feel pretty bad. Moods go through phases. Sometimes an interview or a reply can lift my spirits right up. Mostly, I think I’ve been going to bed feeling irritated or despondent and really trying not to think about it far too many times to count. This latest period of funk just needs to be endured until my mood picks up again. Oddly, I feel like staying in bed, avoiding having to make eye contact with myself in the mirror (because usually I look pissed off), not answering emails, not answering contact, and yet at the same time being desperately lonely for friends.

Do I regret the course? That’s asking if I regret doing something I thought would be very interesting, daring, and give me the chance to go in an interesting career direction. So no, I don’t regret trying, I suppose. But if I could have my money back? If I could have another choice of Masters?

…well, probably I would do something different.

And it’s simply… I’m not going to dissect or essay on about the whys and wherefores of that statement…

I’m simply going to say, I’m really tired.

I’m really tired of feeling like I’m not getting anywhere, and feeling isolated, and enduring flashbacks of how I got here from my stupid brain-of-conscience which keeps wondering what would have happened IF I had made a different choice, here, or there… I’m really tired of not working. I feel kind of detached from my peers. I’m tired of going to interviews and then getting rejected. For the last two interviews, although it did not affect the performance I gave, I heard myself thinking, ‘I can’t wait for this to be over. I already know what to expect. I don’t know if I even believe what I’m saying about myself anymore, I’ve said these things so many times before, and each time they seem longer and longer ago…’. Hells, I think I can’t even get jobs now that I could’ve a couple of years ago, because my CV looks too unrelated for working in a lab, or vague consultancy jobs involving working in the corporate world, or anything that looks at odds with my creative sounding ‘Media Production’ degree.

I have two days of paid work for something. I have a little film project I’m trying to work on. Maybe some voluntary work in the pipeline.

None of the above makes me feel any different, or any better. For some reason, I just don’t even care.

It’s hard after the MSc. Sometimes times are really dark and weird.