The Beginning of the End

It's finally here. For the past 22 years this moment in my life has been lingering on the horizon, unreachable, but always there, lurking and waiting, and now I'm upon it. Somehow, without my even noticing, I crossed the valley and reached the point where sky meets land, the point that everyone assumes does not really exist until they are right on top of it and the breath is knocked out of them and they can feel their hearts seizing up. In about 3 and 1/2 months I will finally be graduating from college, a moment that stirs within me the most incredible mixture of utter terror and unadulterated joy that I've ever known. Maybe I'm being melodramatic, but I am absolutely terrified to think that soon I will be entering the work force, that I will be a "grown-up." I can't be a grown-up; I still get nervous raising my hand in class, even when I'm completely and totally confident that I have the right answer. How am I supposed to go on job interviews? How am I supposed to put on panty hose and sensible pumps and command to sort of respect that the businesswomen on TV have taught me to expect? I've already begun applying for jobs in places like New York and Boston, places that I've so romanticized in my mind that I imagine just living there will give me the sort of confident swagger that a young professional should have. I know it's too early to start applying for the kinds of jobs I want (publishing, magazines, all of the industries that my father assures me are quickly dying and so are wastes of my time, but from which I can't seem to turn my attention); most of their openings are looking for immediate hires, but I feel like if I can just get my name in their heads, maybe they'll look past my mediocre grades and minimal involvement. Maybe my sheer persistence will finally crack them and force them to give me a job. Maybe, like Anne Hathaway's character in The Devil Wears Prada or America Ferrera's character on Ugly Betty, the decision makers will be intrigued by my "differentness" and hire me on a whim, only to realize it was the best decision they have ever made. Or maybe I'm, once again, romanticizing the future and I'll end up working the drive-thru at the Burger Doodle and adopting stray cats, but I really hope not. I guess, at the risk of sounding absurdly cliche, only time will tell.
Here's a song:
It'll All Work Out by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Signs That You Are a Pretentious Asshole

Have you spent nights tossing and turning, just wondering if your prentention was really enough to warrant the title of "pretentious asshole"? Sure, you had the Hermes ties or the Longchamps luggage, but was that enough to take you from simply snobbish to truly pretentious? Here is a list, a collaboration between my brother and myself, two of the most pretentious assholes you may ever come across, that can put your mind at rest. It was inspired by a blog post of the same name, that was simply insufficient. What they were describing was a hipster douchebag, and no true pretentious asshole would be caught dead drinking PBR or listening to Animal Collective. If at least 10 of the following apply to you, then congratulations, you are a pretentious asshole.

-You attended prep school (boarding is better, but day is fine), preferably in the Northeast or Virginia.
-You joined or plan on joining a country club immediately upon graduation from higher education.
-You have the numeral III or higher behind your name.
-You have referred to others as commoners, peons, rabble, prole (proletariat), LC (lower class), or not PLU (people like us).
-You insist on pronouncing non-English based words with their respective foreign accents and correct others when they do not.
-You snub those who attended public school.
-In college, you joined a top-tier fraternity/sorority and a secret society (if applicable).
-After college, you joined a secret society (again, if applicable).
-You refuse to eat Chili's, TGIFriday's, Bennigan's, or any other chain, eschewing them as "middle class," and opting instead for local dive restaurants because they are more "authentic."
-When someone walks by in particularly ostentatious garb, you roll your eyes and whisper "new money" to your group.
-You have an extreme aversion to "hip" bars and, instead, insist on wearing trendy clothing to dive bars.
-You frequent private clubs.
-You only use the word "classy" ironically, as no one raised properly would discuss class in such a crude manner.
-At least 3 of your 4 grandparents went to college during the Great Depression.
-You have engraved calling cards.
-You own opera-length kid gloves or a white tie and tails by the time you graduate from college.
-You have known what the term "costume de rigeur" means since you were 5-years-old.
-After college, you wouldn't be caught dead buying furniture from a furniture store.
-You know the difference between a "woman" and a "lady."
-You had to pick out china and silver patterns as a child so that your godparents could by you pieces for Christmas and birthdays, even though you are set to inherit silver and china from both grandmothers.
-You know that "season" has nothing to do with weather or time of year, but can either be good or bad depending on whether or not you're asked to be a deb or stag.
-You know that a true gentleman's club does not employ strippers, and escort is not a euphemism for prostitute.
-You know at least 5 people whose first names are variations on their mothers' maiden names.
-Whenever you mention a new friend, your parents want to know where they're from and who their people are.


Remember, you're either born to be a pretentious asshole, or you're not. If you weren't, it's okay, you're just less of a human than those of us that were.