Converse or Heels, It Doesn't Matter Much:

http://lightrailconnect.com/

Since I have been interning for Light Rail Advisors, LLC--a real estate development company that has a website and a published, bi-monthly magazine I have really begun to expand my knowledge of business and the inner workings of a professional company. I have become so accustomed to chatting with snotty 15- year-olds about their weekends plans while they say "pound it Miss" that it is so entirely refreshing to speak like an adult, with adults. It was a bit intimidating at first, I felt like I had to change into my "adultette" costume before I walked in the door. I felt like I had to alter my demeanor, my attitude, my speech in order to present myself as a functioning, capable woman. As an undergrad I went straight from sitting in tiny classrooms with professors who smoked and drank massive amounts of coffee and let us indulge in our thoughts about literature and culture all while speaking, or stumbling rather, over dodgy Italian, to sitting in more tiny classrooms where I work with Spanish speaking students who laugh and joke with me in my Converse. I am not what you would call well versed in conference calls and email deadlines. I am a Humanities major. I was not prepared for this world.

But so far, it's a world I really enjoy. I find that deadlines and accuracy and professionalism mesh well with my Type-A personality, my drive for perfection. It is an interesting twist that I did not expect my life to take. Maybe had I been a business major it would have been a very smooth transition, to move from wearing suits during lecture to writing resumes and networking my butt off. However, I'm glad that for me, it's a learning process. I have had to learn how to write press releases and send company newsletters and meet for after hours meetings, and I have learned it all on my own. I didn't have a professor to teach me the appropriate way to compose a business letter, I had a professor who taught me the value of a language very different from my own, I had a professor who critiqued my knowledge of Dante's Inferno.

It is sink or swim and I'm growing a pretty good pair of sea-legs. . . I think I'll swim.