What is a gap year anyway? Exorbitant trips to Europe or Asia, so middle class young people can ‘find themselves’ and discover what their ‘true calling’ in life is. Really, it’s just a way of saying ‘I just want a really long holiday’ while not being labelled as a slacker.
Which is completely fine. When else in our lives will we have to chance to take a year to learn outside of classroom, free from restraints and responsibilities. Young people should travel to open up their eyes and learn that there are more important issues than who is wearing what to the formal.
If only that is what I did. Instead, I got a job. (If I’m completely honest, I got this job to pay for my exorbitant trip around Australia at the end of the year where I planned to ‘find myself’ and discover my ‘true calling’.)
And so, at 17 I got an uncommon insight into the strange world that is full time office work. As a lover of ‘The Office’, but someone who was under the belief that it couldn’t be anywhere near to reality, I was surprised at the similarity of people I worked with to Dwight or Michael, at the existence of workplace relationships like Pam and Jim (or Dwight/Andy and Angela), and at the unbelievable dynamic of office politics that would be almost humourous to an outsider. The extraordinary mundanity of the day to day under blaring fluorescent lights and tight proximity to other people was enough to cause strange tensions between staff. Maybe this is a reflection on a badly run office or a reflection of the ability for 9-5 lifestyle to drain the spirit of the most perky.
Nontheless, I gained invaluable experience during this year and a new appreciation for how easy I had it at school and how easy I would have it at university the following year. Once you have worked full time, 8am lectures become less daunting (though still horrible).
Having saved up enough money for my trip and rearing to go, I quit my job in December. I’m not sure if it was graduation goggles, but I was actually quite sad to leave the quirky place where I had worked for the last ten months and realised that I had actually made friends, which I still have today.