Chapter 30: The Nightmare of the Dream Job

I drove down Farmington Avenue shaking with excitement and nervousness. I was heading to an interview for a paid, three-month co-op job at the Hartford Courant. The only thing that could have topped this interview would have been one with the Yankees.

I’d been reading the Courant since I was a 9-year-old, searching for the day after recaps and box scores of baseball games. I’d graduated to also reading Dear Abby’s advice column and snipping the weekly top 40 record surveys the local radio station published. And I was beginning to read more and more of the news stories now that my interest in politics and the anti-war movement had been piqued.

It’s not unusual for readers to have an attachment to the newspaper they had grown up reading. I was no different: I loved my hometown paper. I viewed the reporters with awe. They were my celebrities.

The interview was part of the Northeastern plan. The first year at the school, students went full time. Then, for the next four years, we went to school for a quarter, then got a job in our field the next, then went back to school for a quarter and so on until graduation. The plan took a year longer, but the idea was to not only got experience for a career, but also to earn money to pay for school.

The school didn’t actually get you the job, though. It gave you leads and you had to interview and land the job yourself. Applying to the Courant and getting the job seemed, in my mind, to be my destiny.

Reading and writing were the two subjects I did well in without really trying. So when I examined all the majors at Northeastern (something I probably should have done before choosing the school), journalism seemed to make the most sense.

I knew I was good with words going back to 2nd grade when – just before Christmas – my favorite teacher, Mrs. Darrow, had a contest to see who could make the most words out of “Merry Christmas” and “Happy New Year.” I won a 5-pound box of candy that had two-layers of chocolates. And for the rest of my public-school career, when we had to write sentences as part of an English or grammar exercise, I would invent elaborate one-sentence stories in an effort to make the class laugh, cry or be grossed out.

And, truth be told, being a Superman fan also played a part in choosing my major. I might have been swept up by the Man of Steel’s powers, but I was just as intrigued by the folks at the Daily Planet who seemed to live at the center of the action in Metropolis.  

I hadn’t worked on my high school paper or had much journalism course work. In fact, I had taken only two journalism courses up to that point and one was a journalism history course. I was midway through my sophomore year, after all.

I skipped breakfast on the day of the interview. I was too nervous. Putting on a suit, which was not my everyday attire, didn’t help calm me down. I felt as if I was wearing my father’s clothes. When I found a parking spot two blocks from the Courant, I had to spend several minutes psyching myself up to get out of the car and keep my appointment.

When the guy from human resources sat down with me, he pulled out my resume and high school and college transcripts and studied them for several minutes. A very uncomfortable several minutes. It became obvious he was underwhelmed and didn’t want to give me the test. Why bother?

But finally, he gave me the test. It was an hour of grammar, editing and writing problems. When I was done, I waited, watching time on the big clock slowly tick by, while it was scored. The wait was interminable. It reminded me of the times I’d been in the principal’s office … or at the police station with Page.

Finally, the guy – whose sole job at this wonderful newspaper seemed to be giving grammar and writing tests to applicants – came back with the scored test with a surprised look on his face. He took another look at my tran