Hot Mess for Breakfast

It's been a while I know! But SO much has happened in the past month that it would be horrible for me not to update you all. (You all, as if I had a following...ha). The biggest and my best accomplishment? Landing an internship at SPLASH at the Chicago Sun Times, their newly launched high society, celebrity, and style section. I was BEYOND lucky I didn't have to do any of the junk that comes for applying for an internship: the application, the recommendations, the resume. All I did was walk (flustered, since I had to leave class early and catch the train) into the Sun Times offices, conduct a profile based interview with their editor in chief (who is so-freaking-fabulous) for a shadowing assignment in my Intro to Journalism class. By the end of the interview and a quick tour around the offices (no more than an hour) I was asked if I was interested in interning--by the editor in chief herself. Everyone--my professor, my classmates, my colleagues, are asking me what I did to nab this internship. I will say it once and a million times over:

I did nothing!!!

I didn't look as sharp as I usually would considering I had a bright and early 8am class that day. What looks good through puffy and swollen red rubbed eyes at 6:45 doesn't look so hot six hours later. But I looked decent. (My hair was sort of flat once again due to lack of time). Because I knew I'd be racing against the clock and the train, I wore flats and didn't bother to pack an extra pair of heels. (Journalists are supposed to be frumpy right!? Hahaha, of course not!). I got there at 3:30 on the dot (go. me.) and nervously conducted the interview which I was so lucky flowed like a natural conversation instead of a quirky Q&A. If I were Susanna (the editor I interviewed) I would have seen a flustered, doe eyed, nervous and awe struck girl (because when you heard this woman's luck of the draw story how could you not!). Thank GOD whatever she saw through her eyes was something else. I don't know what she saw in me during our conversation---if I had to take a guess it would have had to been my passion in what I was saying.

Every new person I meet at my "job"--I call it that for internship can be so dang long to type out all the time, though don't be fooled, I'm not paid!!--thinks I'm 21 and up or even graduated. Their faces when I say I'm a freshman and only 18 crack me up every time. Maybe it's how I carry myself, maybe it's just the typical assumption, but I'm thankful for the confusion. It shows them that "wow. She must have something" for me to be there so young.

Don't get me wrong, there are days I definitely feel like an "intern" over a team member, especially when working with the other two interns there who are college seniors and look at me as if I'm a toddler. I'm only two weeks in and have already shown where I shine best--ie. my writing. My editors have promised to hand me over more writing assignments since they were so impressed with the (short) articles I wrote cold turkey. I'm planning on diving into work even more come winter break, because I need all the distraction I need to brace the possible (unless this girl can find some money) six weeks without my boyfriend, six more weeks without seeing my best friends, six weeks of killing that dwelling winter break boredom. So in essence, my editors haven't seen full force Bianca yet.