Remember that Youtube smash video of the little boy who had
just come out of dental surgery?
His drug induced mutterings are often quoted in passing, the most famous being, “is
this real life?”. The kid is so
insanely relatable since we have all been in his shoes and know that exact feeling.
I have been working in my lab for over a year now. Very thankfully I am getting paid
after a year’s worth of volunteering there. I received my first paycheck two days ago. It felt so weird.
I intern once a week at the San Diego City Attorney’s Office Domestic
Violence Unit. My supervisors are
victim advocates. Their job is to
be in contact with victims to inform them about open and closed cases and to
interact with the city attorney’s so that they are fully prepared for
trial. Every Tuesday I wake up
early, put on grown up clothes and drive downtown. I park in a public parking lot and cross the streets with
old guys in nice suits. I ride the
elevator of the high-rise building, and scan my card to open the door. At lunch, I walk down to Starbuck’s
with my heels softly clacking and my badge dangling by my side and order the
usual.
It was this moment that
flashed across my mind when I was telling my mom about my first day in the
office. I felt just like Mary
Tyler Moore, walking downtown and completely lost in the shuffle of the world’s
9-5. I could hear the theme show
music playing in my head and could not stop the huge grin on my face. For the first time in my life, I felt
like my dreams had the potential to become a reality. While on the phone with mom, I told her about the Mary Tyler Moore feeling. I could hear the smile creep
across her face and the soft chuckle when she told me she remembered that
feeling on her first day in the real world. We marveled at the thought that quite possibly every girl
feels that way at least once in her life and were then a bit heartbroken to
realize that most kids don't have a clue who Mary Tyler Moore is and will never
hear “Downtown” playing clear as a
whistle in their mind as they walk across the busy street to their first real job. But we have that moment and we treasure
every second.
“Just listen to the traffic in the city, Linger on the
sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty, How can you lose?”
