They Never Said It Would Be Easy

Spring 2016

I had two quarters left until I graduated college and although I wanted to make the most of it socially, my number one priority from January until June was my publishing internship. In order to fit my internship in with my school schedule, I scheduled my classes for Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays and kept Thursdays and Fridays open for my internship. Because of my full schedule for the remainder of the school year, I only had one scheduled visit to see Colin and my friends and that was spring break. Until then, I was focused on school and my future career.

The morning of my first day at Bennett Fischer came and I was really nervous, but also pretty excited. I woke up early, took a hot shower to calm my nerves, and put on my business attire. I drove to the office a bit early so I could call Colin before I went in.

"Ready for your first day, G?" Colin asked.

"Ready as I'll ever be. I'm really nervous for some reason," I responded.

"Nerves are a good thing. That means that you care."

"You're right. I'm gonna go inside now. Wish me luck."

"You got this G. Call me when you're done!"

I went inside and Bennett was waiting at the front. There were three other people that looked to be about my age. I was guessing that they were new interns too.

"Good morning everyone. Welcome to your first day at Bennett Fischer Publishing. I am Bennett Fischer, as you all know, but you can call me Bennett. I'd prefer if you didn't call me Mr. Fischer, it makes me feel old. I would like everyone to introduce themselves. State your name, the school you attend, and your future career aspirations."

"My name is James, I currently attend USC, and I want to eventually become a speechwriter."

"My name is Eli, I go to Loyola Marymount University, and I want to be a novelist."

"My name is Morgan, I go to UCLA, and I am hoping to become a screenwriter."

"My name is Gianna, I go to UCLA, and I would love to be a novelist one day."

"You guys will be working together for the next six months, so I suggest that you guys try to get along. Making friends will make this job a lot more fun. Now I am going to give you guys a tour of the office and show you guys where you will be working," Bennett said, guiding us down the hallways.

My first day at the internship ended a bit early. The goal for the day was to introduce us to one another and show us what we would be doing each day we were there. Tomorrow, we would all start reading work that has been sent in and give Bennett our opinions on each piece. Then he would decide what work would potentially be published. This was exactly what I was hoping to get out of this internship. I wanted a chance to read other work and see what it takes to get published. Hopefully I would make a few friends along the way too.

A few weeks had passed and I had gotten used to my schedule. I was pretty busy with school and interning, but I still made it a point to find time for friends at least once a week. I lived with the water polo girls so I was still around them all the time, but I hardly ever got a chance to go out with them. As the weeks went on, I became closer to the other interns at Bennett Fischer Publishing, so I wanted to find time to hang out with them out of the office.

James, Eli, Morgan, and I had plans to go out one Friday night after we got out of the office. It was nothing crazy, just happy hour at a local bar. We got appetizers and drinks and talked about the internship and our lives outside of it. James told us about how he planned to move in with his girlfriend once they both graduated. She was going to move to LA and they would find an apartment together. Eli mentioned how he planned on staying in LA to pursue his dream of becoming a novelist, just like me. He thought that LA was the perfect place to write because there was so much to experience, so much to inspire his writing. Morgan was definitely staying in LA because she wanted to become a screenwriter and work on Hollywood films. I told them about my plans to stay in publishing for a little while and then write my own books. I mentioned Colin and how we had plans of living in LA while he worked as a journalist. When the night ended, we all agreed to try to meet up after work as much as possible. We all got along really well and we wanted to stay in contact after graduation. We figured that we could all help each other in some way throughout our future careers. LA is about who you know, right? We needed all of the connections we could get.