Baby Steps

So over the weekend I had the privilege to watch my boyfriend graduate University. I met him during his Fresher week, he was just starting his first year, I was about to embark on my third and final year and now here we are both graduates, and I can hardly believe we have made it here already. That now, for the first time ever neither of us are students.

Here we are at his graduation!

However I am proud of both of us for following our dreams and getting a degree, I have found it has filled me with a lot of worry and fear now. As a graduate every-ones expectations are so much higher, a simple entry level job simply will not do, and you are expected to have this whole plan in place, and these wonderful jobs with fantastic salary's are meant to be flying at you left right and centre. But they're not. 

I know my family is very proud of me and my boyfriends family are equally chuffed with him, but all weekend the question on every bodies lips is "What next?" they want to know what jobs we have applied for, and when we are going to move into our own place, have we started driving yet ? or thought about where we might move to for work ? any interviews lined ? I know their heart is in the right place but, I don't know the answers ! I wish I knew, but I don't even know what job I want let alone how to go about getting it. 

When you're a child you have this image of your life, as if its a thread that will weave in and out of opportunities and goal, and more threads with join in and twist together as you get married and have children and, in the end your thread has made a beautiful tapestry of all you've done, but the reality isn't quite so smooth, your thread get tangled and knotted and you fray it as you work away at the mess and you carry it round in stomach everyday feeling it getting more knotted and tangled and its just not working out the way you wanted it to, and you feel like such a let down. 

I finished my degree and I still work in retail, and I don't like it at all, and family and friends will joke about me working there when I have a degree to my name, while others point out how they have a better job then me and they never went to uni, and it starts to hurt. 

And here I am watching my boyfriend take these baby steps into the world of work and I am worried for him, worried that he ends up trapped like I am, not knowing what path to take or in which direction, worried that the constant job applications will wear him down, worried that this time next year we are no further forward then we are now. 

You are always told to follow your dreams, to reach for the stars, but no one tells you what to do when you holding it in your hand and it's starting to burn.

Rella Xx

Reading for a Living

I think it is safe to say my dream job would be to read books full time, just have people bring me books and I could just read them at my own leisure and if I liked them tell people about them. 

Just imagine it, I could sit in a comfy chair with a cup of tea and surounded by all these books, and when I am down, people would file in and sit around me and I could tell them what I thought.

Perfection

Looks at this ! It is beautiful!

I Love everything about books, reading them, how they look, the images that dance across your eyes as you read and that feeling of satisfaction you get when you close a book after finishing it, and you just sit and reflect on the adventure you have been on. 

I can talk about books for hours, if its a good book a bad one I will always have something to say about it. So I think that's what I am going to use this space for, as well as writing down the thoughts that run around in my head I think I will also write about books. 

So bear with me and I will start getting things up here, in the mean time I have a Goodreads page here that you can have a look at. 

Rella Xx

Full Time Job hunter, 30 Hours a week Plus overtime and Weekend - Annual salary £0

So over the past few weeks I have been looking for a new job, I currently have the same retail job I had when I was seventeen, only now I am in my twenties and have a degree, and feel so desperate for something new, a job that reflects all the hard work I have put in over the past few year. 

However it seems London just isn't employing! I spend my free time on websites applying to anything and every time, re writing my CV, or tweaking my Cover Letter, navigating career websites and shooting off emails in a fashion more spectacular and rapid then a fireworks display, and just like fireworks once the smoke has clear from the sky all I am left with is black nothingness, stars too far away to reach and a sense of how very small you are compared to the expanse above you. 

The amount of questionnaires and surveys I have had to fill out listing my "Great Qualities" and "relevant Experience" and explained in detail what I can bring to the role, I feel I could fill a whole book with. If only there was a section on a CV for the skill set of " making a dead end job sound like a wealth of knowledge and opportunity, and making it seem like I am in fact the great employee ever, but I am will to sacrifice this amazing job just for your company because I am that excited and passionate about photocopying" then my CV would be top notch. 

But the thing is I really do want that photocopying job, I really do want to send off emails and answer calls. I don't want to ask people if they "want a bag with that?", I am so ready for that job my degree promised me. It's just a shame the degree isn't a Get Out of Retail Free Card.

Rella Xx