I know I said I’m up for a challenge, that I’m totally willing to do this the hard way to get where I want, but gosh it really is difficult.

Patience is a virtue I do not have, a virtue that, unfortunately, a graduate must have. For there comes a time when the ball is no longer in your court, your fate is entirely in someone else’s hands. There is only so much ‘go getting’ one can do before one is forced to sit back and wait.

And it is excruciating.

If, like me, you did a non-specific degree course, then you no doubt have an endless list of possible job roles. Some people would say my degree, English with American Studies, is pretty specific. It’s not. With my 2:1 degree in English with American Studies I could go into pretty much any area, and whatever might have been closed off to me is also wide open due to my course being partly history based. The double whammy of knowledge I received means I’m prepped and ready for any number of jobs. I would apparently be welcome anywhere; a surprising number of English graduates even go into finance. I will not be one of them.

Most of the time people assume I’m going to be a teacher. Am I going to be a teacher? No. I have no desire to be a teacher. Not ever. If in ten years I’m writing a blog on the joys of teaching, you’ll know I’ve failed and wound up where I never wanted to be. No disrespect to teachers; we need them and they are fantastic to put themselves through the hell of teaching children and teenagers, but it’s just not for me.

I think I know what I want to do. But thinking I know what I want to do isn't enough. And it definitely doesn't fill my parents with confidence. So, to make sure I've chosen correctly, that my career choice is the right fit for me, I’m applying for work experience in that field. As much as I can get. I’m applying left, right and centre, high and low, over and under. I come home from work, a temporary job working on reception at B&Q’s head office, open up my laptop and start researching. From then on my evening consists of cold calling, covering letters and CV’s. On a good night I get about four emails out. I’m starting to run out of places to apply. I doubt it's the average life of a twenty two year old.

I’ve been doing this since May.

So far I’ve heard back from two of the places I’ve emailed.

One place being the Southampton Daily Echo. The lovely Anne Dickie, who remembered speaking to me on the phone, replied promptly and set me up with a week’s work experience in record time. I say record time, I mean it in terms of how easily and quickly it was set up. The work experience itself does not begin until February 6th 2012. It’s a long way off but it’s a start, and it’s something to focus on.

My one other reply was not so positive. I got a curt, one sentence reply from a man who must not be named, working at a Hampshire paper which must not be named, informing me that they were ‘full up’ until the end of the year. I was tempted to reply with ‘what about next year?’ but thought it sounded a bit desperate.

I don’t really mind about sounding desperate now. I’m might just go and email him.