You lose some, you win some

Got turned down for a spiffy summer job with the feds today. Now, I have nothing to complain about, because last week, one of the firms I had a callback with back at the very beginning of September contacted me out of the blue with an offer for the summer. I had finally given up on hearing from them, and I was so zonked from trying to write the crappy paper draft, that my reaction was pretty much, "Huh. That's good, I guess." But now I'm feeling especially relieved.

I am pretty bummed about not getting the government job, even though spending part/all of the summer in D.C. would have been complicated, because I'm much more interested in government work than firm work in the long run. I am just not at all interested in the business side of being a lawyer. And I'd really thought that the interview had gone well. But what's funny is that in the last 24-48 hours or so I'd suddenly started thinking of all the places in the interview where I could have, and should have, expressed my burning devotion to government work--and didn't. And I realized a couple of things:

• interviewing in the legal world isn't any more about being honest than it is the academic world. In academia, whatever institution you're interviewing with is EXACTLY the kind of institution you've ALWAYS WANTED to work for!! Community college? Great! Elite graduate-degree granting university? Lifelong dream! Small liberal arts college? Where I've always wanted to be! Law is EXACTLY the same way. Interviewing with a firm? I want to make partner as soon as possible! Public interest? I've been working toward this goal for years! Government? Only way to go! and so on. Why I needed to remind myself of this, I couldn't tell you, but I forgot it for a bit. (Maybe because big firms are kind of like the R1s of the legal world, and kind of take for granted that you want to work for them? A lot of people see government as a kind of second choice field, and as a corollary, government people want to see that you're REALLY dedicated to the work. Which I think I didn't emphasize enough, because I'm so used to thinking that government work is way cool, that I don't even think I HAVE to emphasize it!)
     
• I find it really difficult sometimes to admit to anyone (even myself, I think) what I really DO want to do. It's a combination of things--for as long as I can remember, I think, I've had this attitude that you don't let people know what you REALLY care about, what you REALLY want to do, because then they can make fun of your aspirations and how you'll never achieve them and how pathetic you are. (And no, I would never ask a guy out on a date, either, even though I think women should feel free to.) If I walk around saying I want to get the lead in the school play, and it doesn't happen, everyone will laugh at me for thinking I could do it. But if I don't look like I'm trying to get the lead, then when I don't, no one will think any worse of me. Or in other words, it's worse to try for something and fail than it is not to try in the first place. (Even if not trying kinda guarantees you can't succeed...)
  
  I think most of this is my own personal neurosis, but working in academia, I suspect, doesn't help. I mean, you're not allowed to want a SPECIFIC job in academia--you're supposed to take any job you can get and be glad to have it! (My god, I suddenly feel like Oliver Twist or something.)
    
  Of course, I kind of took this to the illogical extreme of not telling an employer in the field I really want to work in how much I want to work in that field. Because somewhere in my head I think that expressing a specific desire is going to come across as arrogant and presumptuous, and is worse than hedging. Even though the interviewers probably WANT me to want to work in their field. What can I say, I'm smart like that.   

At least, I think that was part of why I didn't get the job. But for all I know, in the end they decided that since they could fill all the positions with students from Yale, Stanford, and Harvard, they would--who can say?

But again, I really can't complain, especially because I'd never thought I had much of a shot at this position and applied largely on a whim. And because I have a job anyway! Which, as firm jobs go, is pretty much a perfect match for me; let's face it--I'm an unusual enough candidate when compared to your average law student, with good grades but not spectacular grades, that any firm interested enough to hire me is likely to be a little less traditional itself. I'm pretty sure that they made an offer to someone who turned them down before they got to me, but you know, it doesn't matter to me whether I was their second, third, fourth, or whatever choice, since I got the job in the end!

And at least now I don't have to worry about a summer job, and can spend all my energy panicking about what I have to get done this semester instead.

Comments

[idwsj]

For the part you won, congratulations. It's time to start polishing off some swanky new business cards ;)

[undine]

Congrats on the job! And that it's a "perfect match" makes it even better.

[New Kid on the Hallway]

thanks, guys! :-)