when I grow up

At work today we hosted this guy we'd like to hire. He's a nice guy, about a month away from graduating. I think that it must feel pretty great to have a company want me so much they'd fly me in, take the time to show me around and talk to me all day, feed me, etc. It made me think of my own job search when I got out of college. It wasn't spectacular. I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do. I was living with MT and we didn't really want to leave Pocatello. There wasn't a lot of job opportunities there unless you wanted to work for the insurance company or at the INEL (that's Idaho National Engineering Laboratory), both of which I applied to and did not get. I ended up at the newspaper where I worked for 8 years and learned a lot. It wasn't exactly what you'd call a great job. The good part was that I actually worked with my best friend (LA) and I really did learn how to do a lot of stuff that was helpful when I applied for and got my job with Granite.

Hanging around Jeremy today also made me think about when I was a kid and what I wanted to be when I grew up. My sister had a meme about that topic. Here's my take on it:

• Librarian: I always thought it would be so cool to work in the library, checking out books and talking to people about books. The librarian in Burley was Nita. She had long black hair and was always nice to us. She and my mom became friends. I liked the way she stamped the due date on the little sheet in the front cover of the book or stamped the card. I really wanted to do that. Of course now you use a computer to check out a book. At our library you never even have to talk to the librarian unless there's a problem. I still think it might be fun, though. Do you have to go to school for that?
• Teacher: My sister and I used to play school all the time. My mom says that I taught Grey to read. I think she was just gifted and I maybe just got her started. Either way, I remember playing school and I was the teacher, she was the student. We did reading and math and spelling. I loved it. I still get a kick out of teaching people stuff. I don't think I'm patient enough to do it for a living. My mom teaches kindergarten and I think she must be part saint to deal with 24 5 year-olds every day!
• Travel Agent/Tour Guide: My grandfather was a tour guide in Barcelona. I loved going on his tours, listening to him tell people about his beautiful city. I thought that must be about the best job in the world. Later I thought it would be really great to set people up on wonderful vacations. Most of the time now I think people just book online themselves, but we use a great travel agent for our big vacations. She made me think about this career again. She gets to go on vacations a lot because resorts and cruise lines want her to come to their places so she can recommend the trips to people like me. She's been so many places, I can ask her about almost anyplace and she'll tell me her experience there. That would be fun.
• Something with sports: I love sports. I would love to find a way to work with a professional sports team. This is really just a dream, not too much thought in it.
• Rock star: Who hasn't wanted to be a rock star? Unfortunately for me, I can't carry a tune for very long. I go way off key and it's not pretty. In 5th grade I actually made a girl in the chorus cry because she had to sing with me and I couldn't stay in key and it bugged the crap out of her. Stupid Paula. Good thing I didn't let that bother me. I still sing my guts out in the car and around the house. I just love to sing and it's a lot of fun to pretend you've "seen a million faces and rocked them all" in the words of Bon Jovi!