Introduction

Two months after graduation, I am now, finally getting a small introdution to the "real world." In just today, I have sent out two resumes to employers with serious interest, I have appointments set up in the next week to meet with two groups considering me for a position, met with another last week and I have another with whom I will soon be setting up a meeting. Bottom line: I am crazy busy with job opportunities. And I'm excited about them.

This being said, they are all relatively outside of what I have been trained to do in college: be a journalist. I don't think you can call yourself a journalist unless you adhere to some strict principles, and of those principles, being idealistically independent is one of them. Now I imagine as a DJ, you can make some of your own decisions (should I play Britney or Eminem?), but there's not a whole lot of investigative reporting opportunities in disc jockeying.

So it comes down to whether I am interested in taking an opportunity in which I could eventually make my way in to what I call "real journalism." Now we shouldn't make any mistakes, either. Just a couple months ago I turned down a job that was heavily based in journalism (as a newspaper reporter), but the job paid very little. I am intersted in making a living wage, not "enough to get by." And these jobs seem to give me an opportunity to make bank.

At the same time, I could put out some clips on the side (as long as there were no conflicts of interest - I am so idealistic, aren't I?). Eventually I could use those clips to show that I was interested in writing, and eventually graduate to a magazine job. But I'll keep the doors open to sticking with the corporations and making bank. You never hear about journalists retiring early and settling in St. Johns - do you?