My spouse and I are about to move to a different state, and we’ve been spending our time applying to jobs, scouting apartments, and sorting through our belongings. I stopped working at Starbucks a little while ago, and I find myself once again facing the same huge question I faced six years ago, after graduating high school: what am I going to do next?
The details of that question are pretty different now than they were then, of course. I knew I was going to attend Calvin, and I knew I wanted to pursue writing. But I was uncertain about basically everything else. I didn’t know what kind of career I wanted, I didn’t know if I was going to do well in school, I didn’t know how I was supposed to approach making friends, and I didn’t know even the first thing about living on my own.
At the very least, when you attend college the same year after graduating high school, you add another four-plus years of structure on top of the pattern that you’ve been following since you were in kindergarten. It’s a comfortable one, so finally coming out of it after graduating again is… well, terrifying. Personally, I’ve spent the last two years stalling the theoretical momentum of college and working at Starbucks instead—hoping to eventually move on to get a job in my field, but telling myself I wasn’t ready for that next thing just yet.
It’s been six whole years of life since I graduated high school, and it’s frustrating to find myself once again at a place of profound uncertainty about even the next few months of my life, let alone the long term future. I have a degree now, but I’m less certain than ever what kind of job I want to have. I knew I never wanted to work at a company like Starbucks long-term, so what have I been doing there for two years? How am I back at square one again?
It’s unfortunate, but most people have to work in order to earn money in order to live. When working is the foremost required thing you have to do in order to live, it’s easy to let that work take center stage, which means if you’re not sure what work is going to look like that uncertainty is center stage instead.
But the thing is, even while I’ve been working and earning money, I’ve also been living. As soon as college ended, I moved into my first apartment. I got married. I discovered coffee. I developed a new interest in labor rights. I played a lot of amazing video games, and watched a TON of DnD. I moved out of the apartment. I became a swiftie. I started learning how to cook, and I picked up bullet journaling.
I may not have been making strides in my long-term career, but working at Starbucks is arguably the least notable thing I’ve done in the last two years, and it’s unfair to myself to pretend like nothing has happened in that time.
As for the future: yes, I’m uncertain about the work I’ll be doing. And about the friends I’ll have, and the place I’ll live in. But I have a lot of ideas, too. I’ll try to move into an apartment whose ceiling doesn’t leak. I’ll try to upgrade to an espresso machine. I’ll try to get involved in a union. I’ll try to make new friends and play DnD with them. I’ll keep playing video games, listening to music, learning to cook, and doing all of these things alongside my incredible spouse, whose presence ensures that even the uncertainty isn’t something I have to face by myself.
I would love it if I could land a stable job doing something I enjoy. Obviously. But in between writing cover letters, packing up books, and looking at 3D digital tours of apartments, I’m trying, as much as I can, to return to the hopeful certainty of a new and improved set of passions and pursuits that are really exciting to me. A lot of the big stuff is up in the air, but at least I feel like I’m pointing in the right direction.
Philip Rienstra (‘21) majored in writing and music and has plans to pursue a career in publishing. They are a recovering music snob, a fruit juice enthusiast, and a big fan of the enneagram. They’re currently living in St. Paul with their spouse, Heidi.
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Your honesty and the perspective you arrive to is a comfort to read, being in a similar place myself. Thanks for sharing, Phil.