November 17th, 2010
Yeah, I had the pep and I had the steam!
I was watching yet another video about job searching, this one on the elevator pitch. The woman with the bad bleach job was explaining how it is done.
“You don’t want to sound like some American cheerleader.” She said derisively.
Great. I thought my time on the field was well spent. I even did a segment in an AIGA 20/20 show on how being a cheerleader helped my design career.
Here are a few:
Proof it again! One poster I had done the year I was a cheerleader was used the entire school year when one coach called me over and said “Michelle, you did that poster?” I hopped over and nodded. “How do you spell Tigers?” he asked.
It said “We’re cheering for you Tigrs!” The worst part was that the cheerleaders used it again the next year, typo and all.
S-U-C-C-E-S-S: I could at least spell the word.
Most of all: I learned that if you can jump up and down on a sprained ankle for an entire game; smiling through tears streaming down your face, with your ass hanging out in front of the whole county, there isn’t much that scares you away from trying.
Though I am naturally outgoing, I learned to be tenacious, to work hard, to take insults with grace, to never give up. (Though right now, I am so tempted.) I am not a natural athlete. I had to work harder. I didn’t get cheerleader my senior year which was devastating. Everything I did then was completely on my own. My parents didn’t even come to my games because, as we know, the girls don’t matter.
So, here I am in a country where people actually shout at me because of my citizenship.
The only thing sustaining me are the great family of friends, a thread of hope that is sometimes as thin as the plastic in my pom-poms and the pathological optimism that maybe tomorrow this job application will find someone who can use an over-qualified, over-educated, overly enthusiastic, woman designer.
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