Ask Me No Questions....

.... and I'll tell you no lies.

My silence of late has been due to the lead up and clean up of a visit from my brother and his wife. We so rarely throw parties or have house guests, and it has been so long since we've seen them, this was a big to-do. I spent day after day scrubbing, cleaning, organizing, sorting, folding, washing, shopping, cooking etc etc. for this party. Well, TWO parties. One at my grandfather's house, one at our own. For a family to go from never have before to throwing two within a few days of each other, it was quite a flurry of activity.

Both parties were for people to visit with my brother and get to know his wife- many of them have never met her. But I was there too, being the new graduate. I kept being asked the same question over and over again, with eager grins and expecting looks, anticipating a grandiose answer.


"What are you doing now? Any big plans?"


While this is a completely natural question to ask, I wished people wouldn't. Because my plans aren't exciting. I don't even really have anything worth talking about. It's not like graduates these days can walk off the stage, diploma in hand, and walk right into their career. The economy is bad for everyone, people, not just established middle-class families. Not to mention my degree is in theatre. I know that someday I'll have plans worth talking about, like my brother and his super bowl commercial. But for now, who the hell wants a kid with a B.A. in theatre? It's like what Princeton in Avenue Q says "Four years of college and plenty of knowledge/ have earned me this useless degree. I cant pay the bills yet/ 'cuz I have no skills yet./ The world is a big scary place."

I know my degree isn't useless, but you know what I mean. The age-old-adage "you gotta spend money to make money" is very true. I cant afford an apartment in NYC yet. I don't have the money to spend in order to pursue my dreams. I already spent all my money on my degree in order to get a better job to make more money. For now, I'm on the hunt for a better-than-minimum-wage entry level job. Hard to convince a business I'll be an asset to the company when my resume shows my true bohemian/hipster colors. Besides, I don't want the kind of job I'll be stuck in for a century either. Not that I tell the potential employers that. No way I'm telling them the truth. That I only want to work for a year, then move away to NYC and never speak to you again. Why do I want to work with your company? Honestly? Cuz it's easy work that any high-school graduate can do, you pay better than going back to Sonic, I'll sit in an air-conditioned office all day rather than serving food/drinks in the heat of august, I get benefits, and it's the kind of job I won't give a hoot about giving you my two weeks notice in a year's time because you can hire some other graduate like me and I'm completely replaceable.

Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies. I prefer your version of the story anyway- the young graduate, fresh from college with lots of potential, the whole world is her oyster. Yeah, you go with that. I'll be here in my parent's house, continuing to search the internet and newspaper for a way to make money. Let's face it. Oysters are expensive.