My First Job: Mission Impossible

Graduating from college, I had no grand plan for a vocation. But I did at least know what didn’t appeal to me for a career: banking, advertising, sales – soulless professions, in my estimation. And so, through a process of elimination, I arrived at what I wanted to do: to be a writer or an editor, or both perhaps. But I should have known that all along: my grandfather was a writer and editor, and both my father and mother were editors and writers; in fact, they met at Newsweek. And my college professors had always admired my writing, which shined, in their estimation, in all the endless term papers I had to write to fulfill the requirements of being both an English and political science major.

By COED Staff

For a year or so, I waited table, working late into the evening, crawling home late, sleeping into the afternoon and then getting up for another evening of being a waiter at a caf&#39 on the Upper East Side in New York City. After a year or so, the routine was getting old and was becoming hazardous to my health. So, in earnest, three years after graduating from college, I began looking for a job in the publishing business.

It wasn’t easy. I purposely applied for jobs that amounted to secretarial work at publishing houses, assuming they couldn’t resist giving me a job that required so little in job skills other than the ability to type. From there, I figured, I would work my way up the ladder to be christened editor-in-chief of some glorious publication some day. Small hitch: human resource personnel assumed the same, that I wouldn’t stay put and be content with typing memos and running errands. So, time after time, I was overlooked as I was handed the same excuse. It was a vicious Catch-22.

The summer I began looking for a job was hot as blazes in New York City. You could hardly breathe: remorseless. I can remember shuttling from office lobby to office lobby just to take in the air-conditioning, which felt like diving into a cold pool, before commencing my scalding trek to the next fruitless interview. After 20 or so of these, I was beginning to give up hope. I thought I would never get a job, and I knew I would be good at it. My daytime job to hold me over was still waiting table, and the sight of serving another plate of food was making me nauseated.

A glimmer of hope came when my godfather contacted his daughter at The New York Post to inquire whether she could get me an interview with somebody there. Indeed, she did. Within a week, I was before the deputy manager editor of The Post, a gruff Australian with a thick neck and jowls, and a ruddy complexion that suggested a heavy drinker. &#39I need copy boys,&#39 he said, taking the measure of me. &#39Nothing pretty: getting coffee and cigarettes for the editors; delivering newspapers around the building; being a go-for. Any appeaL?&#39

Of course, I said, a model of enthusiasm. And then I didn’t hear from The New York Post for five months: another trail run cold. Then, late one night, when it was early in the morning, a call came at 4:00. I was dead asleep, having survived marathon Labor Day traffic jams all the way back to my apartment. I had been asleep for maybe two hours. &#39Is this a Mr. David Major? This is The New York Post. Can you be here by six o’clock?&#39 Exhausted, incoherent and dead to the world, I mumbled: &#39No, thank you. I already have a job&#39 and hung up. My girlfriend, lying next to me, stirred: &#39Who was the that?&#39 &#39The New York Post,&#39 I said. &#39The New York Post?! And you said you have a job?! Are you crazy?! Honey, call them back now and tell them you will be there, do you understand?&#39

Two hours later, after navigating the labyrinth subway network of New York City, I entered the front doors of The New York Post and I had began my career as a journalist.