some thoughts on guarded interests

human nature is so contradictory. i was talking with a friend while waiting in hall for lunch, and he was asking me if i was going to stay on in oxford. i told him about my plans to go into publishing and how i wanted to work with the OUP. i eventually explained to him that there was a summer internship for it, at which he broke in and said, "ohh i would love to do that as well. i should apply for that."

i confess that my heart sank a little, especially given the fact that i had a similar conversation with another friend last week, to whom i emailed the OUP application details.

it looks like every single english student out there who does not feel that academia is right for them, wants to go into publishing. i have to say that i have never felt so territorial about something, which is a new feeling because i think myself exceptionally un-possessive and non-competitive hahaha. but now with the whole career thing looming in the horizon, and my own personal stake in wanting to stay in at Oxford and secure a temporary job here at least, i feel that i should perhaps want to be careful about telling everyone about this wonderful opportunity OUP offers. is that bad? yes. is it justified? hmm. not sure.

when i try to rationalize my selfish feelings and inclinations, the argument in my head descends into some kind of... "but i want it more" and "they don't even want to stay in oxford! they want to go home! why don't they let ME stay here when i want to...". but i realize that i can't attribute their interest as a kind of usurping of my plans. sigh. i don't know.

gosh i just realized that maybe this is what being kiasu is about. is it? maybe this is why people are always so damn guarded about their job and grad school applications, interviews, etc.

sigh but i REALLY WANT THIS INTERNSHIP. i don't want to lose it out to them (albeit very nice and intelligent friends, both of whom are doing a master's in English) because well, i would just feel bad about it. i would really like this internship so that i can have a higher chance of being employed with the publishing house. the petty side of me consoles myself with the fact that at least i've had publishing internship experience... ....

and i guess i will have to be competitive in some way and write one hell of an application this coming winter. i hate being this aggressive, but i see no other way around it.

i think i write this post also because i'm slightly annoyed that one of the girls in my seminar has asked to switch presentation weeks so she can talk about John Cheever, with whom she has "fallen in love with" and because of some illness (which i don't see as a legitimate excuse as she still has 2 weeks to prepare for her presentation!) there were 3 of us originally doing that week's presentations, and my two peers insisted that there was no way they could switch, which leaves me with no choice but to switch. this means my stress levels are shooting up because i'm presenting one week advance and no, i've not started the reading. and the reading is about VISUAL ARTS. this was the one week i said to myself, "no, i'm not doing this one" because i know nothing about visual arts. however, the one redeeming thing about this all is that perhaps i get to talk about Benjamin (who i kinda like and at least have read a bit of), and i see that one of the texts is To the Lighthouse. the problem with To the Lighthouse however is that it is so overdone so i don't want my talk to be cliche ridden. but hopefully the professor in charge of that week will be nice enough to meet with me so that we can go over my amateurish observations on modern fiction and visual art...