April 2: "The Home Stretch''

It’s been a while since I’ve been here.

I’ve been busy. Unless, I miss my mark, this past week was the last super busy week of the semester. I had a pair of tests – one in Geography (I made a 97) and one in Journalism Ethics (these scores are posted online, so I won’t know how I fared on that test until next week).

I also gave my last “major’’ speech in my Public Speaking class and felt as though it was my best effort yet. We have one more test, on April 14th and a smaller speech the following week. No finals in that class.

I have two group presentations (one of which takes the place of the Final) and a paper to write for Mass Media Law. In Geography, it’s on more map quiz and the final. I have one more current event paper and the final in Journalism Ethics.

In addition to the class work, I also had an internship interview with Carlisle Corp. In fact, after the first interview, they asked me if I could go ahead and do the second interview. For a student, the internship is a good gig, at least financially. Carlisle Corp., which owns about a 100 Wendy’s Restaurants around the South, offers a 12-week internship where the intern learns the role of Assistant Manager. It pay $12 per hour, which isn’t bad.

I think there’s a fair chance they will offer me the internship. I think they were impressed by the fact that I’ve had 15 years of management experience. Heck, most of the other candidates haven’t had 15 years of experience in tying their own shoelaces, you know?

But as I listened during the interview, I wondered if this is something I really should be bothering with. They definitely expect the intern to move into a regular job upon graduation, beginning as an assistant store manager, otherwise known as the back-up fry cook and the guy who has to close the story on nights and weekends. I figure it starts out around $30,000 per year. Of course, if you are diligent, in a few years, you might move up to store manager, work 60 hours a week and make $45,000 a year.

I began to wonder, is this why I am in college? Still, I could use the $12 per hour. My finances are, quite frankly, frightening.

I also had an pre-registration appointment with my academic counselor, who also happens to be my Journalism Ethics professor. As she was looking over my records, she noted that I still need to take Advanced Newswriting and Feature Writing.

“Do you really want to sit in these classes?’’ she asked. “You’ll be bored out of your mind.’’

So she offered to file the paperwork to let me take these two courses under a “directed study program.’’ That means I can do the writing assignments without sitting through classes. Yippee!

We put together my class schedule for the two summer school sessions and the fall semester. This summer, I’ll be in class each day from roughly 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. I’m hoping to land some part-time work, maybe 20 hours a week, to help make ends meet.

Of course, working and going to school will cut into my social life, in the unlikely event that I should stumble over a social life, which is doubtful.

Oh, I have also lost about five pounds in the last few weeks, mainly by walking on the treadmill at the MSU gym. I am definitely on the “old person’s’’ fitness plan, but it’s working – slowly. I’d like to shed about 10 more pounds. I should be in “fighting trim’’ at that point.

Here lately, the fog seems to be settling in a bit. I still don’t know what I am going to do, where I’ll go, if I’ll have any meaningful relationships down the road.

But these are large, sweeping questions and all of my answers at the moment are little ones.

I have done well in school so far, but I wonder if it really matters all that much in the end. I tell myself it does, mainly because that’s really the only thing I can think of to tell myself.

But, dang, I want to aspire to something beyond being the guy in charge of the guy who asks, ‘Do you want fries with that?’’

I guess, really, the bottom line is I need to find something I can be passionate about.

But what?

That’s the stumper.