lessons in patience

interns=free labor, or so i thought. throw anything at them-->watch work magically disappear! umm, not quite. i never imagined how much time, effort, and most of all, patience goes into training interns. (it's funny actually. we're going through a sermon series on the fruits of the spirit, and on the topic of patience, my pastor says "it's easy being patient...when you're alone").

 

one of the interns is completely adorable—a tiny doll you want to put in your pocket and take home (and how perfect that her last name starts with 'elf'—i'm totally not making this up). as for the other intern, well, let's just say that after a slow start, she's coming along. 

i have no clue how to be a mentor. i seem to be doing a lousy job so far. instead of encouraging, guiding and nurturing these hapless interns, i lose my (virtual) temper and just boss them around a lot. "do this" and "then do this" and "oh yeah, after you're done with that, do this." exactly like a manic dictator. if i were them, i'd probably hate me. 

but then i get their work back, and wonder how assignments that are so simple can be so... screwed up. where exactly did i go wrong? was it the instructions i gave them? did they need more training? how could they not see exactly what i wanted them to do? in my mind, i had spelled everything out for them...all clear as day, of course.

i try not to, but i can't help complaining about them sometimes (on bad days).

"mom, they're dumb!"

"ahh, you think you're so smart. you were an intern once, too."

"yeah, but i was an awesome, hardworking intern!"

"now that you know so much, you forget what it was like not to know anything."

she's right. 

i have forgotten. the anxiety of doing everything wrong, of not knowing how to do anything...of being bored stiff and left to my own devices. it's weird. and even weirder to think that the gap is closing and someday these lowly, unpaid interns (who are currently learning how to use MS Outlook and track their changes in Word for the first time) will be off and working and succeeding on their own. before i know it, we'll be hanging out and talking about old times, i'm sure...like my old intern supervisor in college, who still says i inspired her to move to new york. or maybe i'll do what my old boss did when we met up for lunch one day, about a year after we both left the company. she introduced me to someone as her 'friend,' and i don't think she knew how secretly thrilled i was to hear that new term instead of 'assistant.' 

i had moved up, finally.