The Leanover.

I will also be interning here over the summer.

Obviously, I'm extremely excited.

The interview was pretty quick, surprisingly so. But I was a little surprised by the questionnaire. I think that in school, we are trained to act a certain way, to say particular things, to present ourselves in such a manner as to make the person interviewing us view us as desirable.

But then I just sort of forget all of that when I get into these "less than traditional" areas of work.

For my new job, Julia, the owner of Public I finished the interview with, "What are some of your favorite designers?"

And I actually jumped up in glee in my seat.

Yes, I know.

Here's the thing: Yes, we all have certain things that we love. We have our personal interests, our desires, our favorites, but we often have to suppress those desires in order to conform to what society expects of us. I've discussed this more in detail when facing homophobia as someone disgusted by it, but not as directly hurt as my gay and lesbian friends. In terms of jobs, DePaul, like most modern universities now, are preparing college students not for the "questions of life" that we hope to pursue throughout our continuing years, but rather on how to get a job, how to prep the resume, how to write the right cover letter. We have fashion shows that focus on business attire. I've never been. I don't plan on attending one. I think I might have to jump out the window if my life resorts to that (especially since I went through all of this in a little program called INROADS).

That's why, in interviews, it always catches me off guard, even if it somewhat applies to the job that I'm interested in, when the interviewer asks something that I can connect to on a very personal level.

Favorite designers?

Ah, yes!

Well, Comme de Garcons, of course! And what would life be like without Dries van Noten and Helmut Lang? And I would feel imcomplete without a little Ann Demuelemeester. And let's not forget Yigal Azrouel and Phillip Lim and Rag & Bone.

I might have spoken just like that. I'm not quite sure. But it's VERY possible.

The same goes for my new internship. When asked, among other things, my most memorable concert (I gave a three-tiered answer: my first concert (Michael Jackson), my first concert in which I paid for the tickets, and my most memorable recent show), and my top 5 favorite albums (not going to list them all here, but the list does include Joy Division, obviously, as well as Talking Heads, Blonde Redhead, The Clash, and Michael Jackson).

To the original point though, our personal interests, our favorites, our tastes: it's really enthralling to be in any surrounding in which that is not only okay but the norm.