crazy white girl with a keyboard

When I saw the ad for my current job, it was like a bolt out of the blue. Home Depot was trying to woo me back and it was early January 2007, just after a trip to Hawaii. My mom was reading the paper in her room, and as I talked to her I casually flipped open whatever section was infront of me and saw a mid-sized ad (still have the clipping!) for what I knew was my dream job; working at a photo desk. I make a practice of constantly looking for jobs, even when happy and secure at one, but I really wasn’t looking for anything at the time, which was the odd thing.

Being the wiz I am, I reworked my resume and sent in my application that same day, although I hadn’t planned on working for the next year.  Of course, I also said I wasn’t going to get the job. However, within a month, the job was mine, and I was flying high. It was, and is, my dream job. I still get a thrill when I press the elevator button to go up to the newsroom, and seriously cherish my job. Somebody pinch me!

However, I did something curious today, and I don’t know what will happen. I’m torn over it, and truth be told, I almost wimped out on the follow through.

One of my guilty pleasures is reading celebrity gossip blogs. It’s my downfall. I used to have a horrid collection of links to scroll through, but I’ve since pared back to the most garish and well written (names withheld). My aunt used to have National Enquirers stashed around her house and I would live to read them when I visited her, so I blame her for my secret addiction.

In any case, I kind of love/hate paparazzo and celebrity driven media. It sickens me, and yet fascinates me. We subscribe to the Reuters newsfeed at work, and they have expanded their ‘entertainment’ sector recently, so it can’t be all evil, can it?

But I digress. I saw a photo credited to a certain media provider today and like a bucket falling from the sky onto my head, I thought “I wonder if they’re hiring.” They were! And so, I applied for a job at a bureau of one of the biggest entertainment photo wire services in the world. It’s pretty much the same job as what I do now. It also has the same random, scant shifts a few days a week, making me pick what scraps I can from the sick or vacation pile, working odd hours on weekends (or as they advertise “unsocial hours”). But it’s in a cool city and it’s for an interesting company.

I think if I really felt married to the idea of working for them, I probably would not have posted for fear of humiliation. However, as it stands, I’m all about risks and new opportunities, so here goes nothing. I love my job now…but there is nowhere to go but up.