Monster offers a resume writing service. You can submit your resume to them and they will magically transform any irrelevant or non essential job skills and work history into something that employers will be interested in hiring you for. Well, at least that is what they would have to do with mine. MJ thinks it could be a good tool for updating his own resume and decided to throw my name in the hat for a resume make over as well.

My response. "Now why would someone like me hire a professional to work on my resume?" As far as I'm concerned my value in the job market is on the low end and no amount of resume doctoring is going to change that. I am not up and coming young professional with a bright career in [insert high power job title here]. At this point in my life aside from some unforeseen or catastrophic circumstances I really have no intention of even looking for another job. Getting the one I have wore me down enough.

"Well, resume writing service is an investment. You never know what might come up and it doesn't hurt to browse." Maybe for him.

The thing is, I have never had much luck when it comes to jobs. Perhaps I sell myself short. Maybe I haven't tried hard enough, looked in the right places or marketed myself well enough. I am just not that person who managed to snag that great job or passes their resume to a friend who knows someone at such and such company. I am actually embarassed by my resume so maybe this is a good thing. It certainly can't hurt. I never knew what I wanted to be and I still don't. I majored in Sociology and all I knew was that I didn't want to be a teacher. My first job out of College was a Claims Adjuster. I interviewed at 2 other insurance companies before I managed to get that. Oh, how I despised that job. I wasted years in an industry that I no longer wanted to be in and without any other job skills I knew I was headed for a major salary cut.

Federal jobs have good benefits and the pay was better then what I was finding in the private sector so I relentlessly scoured website after website and applied for job after job. Their application processes is detailed, cumbersome and time consuming but I kept at it hopeful that if I was persistent enough something would come my way. It was exhausting. Over a year of that and I never even got an interview. Ever. Thank goodness I finally got a break and got hired in the campus police office. After about 6 months I continued to apply for Federal jobs and other state jobs that paid at least what I was getting until I finally gave up for good. Half the time I think they post those positions just to say that they did it because the person who gets the job is usually sitting in the office across the hall or someone who knows someone that's doing the hiring. Luckily, I got a transfer from campus police, which was NOT a good fit for me and I am happy where I'm at. More money would be nice but you can't have it all.

I used to beat myself up and feel pretty worthless inside because I haven't accomplished much career wise. I mean, what a looser right? Women these days are ambitious, and doing well financially. A lot of men like successful women. I've got friends with Master's degrees, who own homes, have successful careers and high earning potential.

I still don't know what I want to do so getting a Master's seems pointless. Actually, I have a few ideas of what I might consider but I paid off my student loans years ago and I'm not about to start over especially when it's not likely that I would get a job that would pay off in the end. I have settled on being an office assistant. Right now, it's enough just for me to have a job that doesn't make me want to jump off of a bridge and end it all. If I'd made it as a model maybe I wouldn't have cared so much but I that didn't work out! I will never truly be satisfied with mediocrity but I am at a point in my life where I have begrudgingly made peace with myself and where I am at. I used to hate myself so much but over the years I have learned to let go of some of that self loathing. It's more of a big joke to me now that I better not get fired, laid off, or have to leave my job for any reason because I may never get another one!! I guess I don't look too great on paper but I am a good employee. Every boss I've ever had has loved me once I got hired but getting in the door is hard for me.

In my shock of learning that a resume expert was going to be re writing my resume I forgot to thank MJ for being thoughtful enough to even do that for me in the first place. I may have given up on the notion of ever making more money or having a "good" job but he hasn't and I think that is so sweet. He has his whole military career and an excellent civilian job to come back to that he still gets a paycheck from even though he hasn't actually worked there in almost a year since he got deployed. New job opportunities just seem to fall in his lap and he is well qualified so he kinda has an entirely different outlook on the whole job and career thing then I do. I am so glad that MJ saw other qualities in me that made him want me. The employment gods may not shine upon me but the love gods did when they sent me him.

It's funny how I have this child like anything is possible mentality when it comes to modeling or winning that dream vacation but not when it comes to my career prospects. Without direction or a passion for something practical I am lost. Not everyone is meant to have a career and I may never make a living by following my bliss. So, instead I will keep content with doing what I love which is writing what I want and modeling when I can. Instead of wracking my brain trying to figure out what I want to be I finally just decided to be who I am.