Ivy Envy

Two years ago, when I was just a wee soon-to-be college grad, I hadn't a clue what "job stability" meant. I was all wide-eyed and bushy tailed, expecting my B.F.A. to ensure everything in life would work itself out, given a short bit of things smoothing themselves out.

I really had no idea what I was in for. I'm lucky, I have a savings, I know my parents are there for me if I'm desperate (although with the amount of savings I have and my history with the 'rents, I'd rather run myself into serious debt than beg them for help.)

So after a year of interning for a slave's wage, I found myself a full time job in the editorial department of fairly small magazine startup. I've been there for about a year. It's been a great ride, that's for sure, and I'm learning tons. What I'm not getting, however, is a promotion in title or salary, despite that I'm a fairly dedicated worker and I've put a lot of hard work into the job.

Besides all that, it looks as though the company is slowly but surely falling to pieces. It could always surprise me and make a fortune, but there's been an increased dosage of pessimism that leaves me thinking I'm likely going to be out of job in a month or two, or maybe three at most.

Meanwhile, my apartment complex raised my rent to $1050 from $905 (utilities included) for my comfy studio apartment. Gosh, I can't believe I'm paying $1050 for a studio, but that's the cost of living in the Bay Area. I know, I know, I should live with other people because at $35k a year, I can't really afford to live alone.

But the thing is, I've been depressed my whole life until I finally got my own place, and suddenly my brain and emotions have stabilized. Living on my own, I figure, includes the cost of therapy I no longer need (or at least no longer desperately need).

Still, expenses are tight, as I'm spending about $200 more than what I earn per month. It's do-able with my savings, but obviously I can't live that way forever. I kind of figure that eventually I'll be making more money (hopefully sooner than later) and if I can manage to make at least $45k a year I'll be set.

I mean, I'm a spender. I buy things. But I also rarely buy big ticket items. I'm the type that goes into the drug store for shampoo and leaves having spent $78. I did that today. I love little things. Sometimes I need them, sometimes I don't. I'd never spend more than $70 on a shirt, and I usually try to find clothes at sale retailers like Marshalls or Nordstrom Rack. I'm rather stingy, for the most part. Or so I think. It's just all the little costs add up. And then I'm left looking at bright red numbers with a minus sign in front of them on my budget reports in Quicken.

Sometimes I feel like I'm hopeless. When I lose this job, I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I've considered graduate school but the thought of taking the savings I have and spending it all on more schooling, plus going into debt over it, makes me want to puke. I mean, I'd be going to grad school for journalism, and the reality is that the salary I'd make at a job post graduate studies is equal or lower to what I'm making now. That's just how the field works.

Meanwhile, my job prospects at the moment are pretty dim. They're definitely not as bad as they were last year, when I was a college grad with a degree in the arts and basically no experience minus a few internships. I'm way ahead of that in terms of experience now, but still, I feel like the only jobs outside of journalism I can get are in PR. And not that there is anything wrong with PR, it's a perfectly practical and admirable profession, it's just not something I can see myself getting passionate about.

There are SO many things I want to do with my life, and I'm trying hard to do each and every one of them, but some things I just, well, I need more training to do, and I'm not sure how feasible that is. For instance, I'd love to learn how to code web applications, to work for a local startup as a project manager, to somehow magically obtain some serious computer science skills and build out a career from there. Of course it's a bit late for that. I know HTML and some CSS and that's about it.

Well, long story short, when I'm out of a job in a few months, I really don't know what's next. I'm looking for another position now, mostly because I don't want to be left out cold. But I also want to take the next step in my career, as it doesn't seem possible at my current company. I just have no idea where I ought to step, and meanwhile I'm just frustrated with myself for failing to be good enough for my company. It's tough, I'm not an Ivy League grad, and for good reason. I'm smart, but I'm not book smart. I'm not as smart as 99 percent of the people who work at my company. And I try, believe me I try, but it's hard to know that my brain perhaps doesn't have the ability to keep up with my co-workers.

But that's just what it's like in Silicon Valley. Everyone here is smart. Everyone here seems to have graduated from Berkeley or Stanford. Well, I didn't. I've got Ivy Envy, and for good reason. Tons of the interesting entry- or junior-level job ads on craigslist note that they'd prefer (or require) the applicant to have a degree from a "top university." Thus, I'm out of the running.

Sometimes I wonder what the difference is between someone like me and a graduate of one of those top schools. Obviously they're able to focus better and be more efficient with their time. Are they really all smarter than me? What is intelligence anyway? And can I be successful despite having a terrible case of ADD and perhaps not having an IQ that would allow me to so much as get an interview for a job at, say, Google?