dazed and confused, man...

I had to go to Office Depot today to get a professional portfolio. One of my last school projects to do before I claim my diploma is to put together a professional portfolio: cover letter, resume, a "philosophy of nursing", and any certifications we have managed to achieve during our short stint at UCF. Everyone was complaining that it seemed like a crap assignment: all employers want to hear is that you graduated your program and passed NCLEX, end of story. But since I have an interview coming up tomorrow, I thought I might actually do the assignment and have something snazzy to show the nurse manager when I walk in.

My new portfolio is black, shiny, and smells like the kiddie pool I had when I was five years old. In fact, the overwhelming smell of PVC is so potent that I think I might have made my neighbors high. I have page protectors that are protecting my all my professional pages inside, but I can't zip the portfolio closed around it, so my professional, protected pages are getting a little unprofessionally wrinkled. It's all like a vain attempt to be all professional and adult-like, and it is so unlike casual me that I've left it on the coffee table next to my copies of Bop! magazine and Bonne Bell lip gloss. Sometimes I pick it up to inhale its magical odors.

It's all a reminder that my time as a student is quickly coming to an end... in 6 weeks, to be exact. I finish my clinical rotation at the trauma step-down unit in a week, and papers, projects, and final exams are within weeks away. Originally, I'd imagined graduating with honors, trailing down the aisle in a blaze of glory with my classmates, and jetting off to some fantastic vacation in the Caribbean where I'd perfect my tan and sip mai tai's out of dainty glasses. Instead, I believe I will crawl, half-drunk and scraggly, up to the podium, grab my diploma, walk out, and collapse at home in a post-trauma heap and sleep for about 4 days straight, at least until I have to wake up and go to my NCLEX prep class.