the Summer of Sanjiv

by sanjiv solanki

(( page 2 ))

Anyway, after that, with my life as a not-so-swinging, overly-intellectual undergrad officially over, I came back home where I was living with my parents. At this point, I’d already been rejected by the local newspaper for a position as an entry-level editor. They had made me take a little grammar test, the kind of thing I usually ace. But I guess this time I didn’t ace it, I wasn’t even called back for an interview, and my initial foray into “real world journalism” ended somewhat less than successfully.
I tried getting other jobs, at a local sports radio station and at some of the supposedly-independent magazines around Dallas. You know the type, the magazines that try to come off as being really hip and laid back and disaffected with popular culture.

Apparently, they’re so hip and laid back and disaffected that they only want to hire writers who have about ten years of writing experience or some such nonsense. Because, after all, only a seasoned writing veteran could write a halfway decent movie review in a magazine that they’re just giving away.

It was good experience for me, unaccustomed as I am with dealing with rejection and disappointment in this field of employment in which one will likely meet with lots of disappointment and rejection.

I reasoned that it wasn’t that big a deal not to find employment right away. In fact, it was probably a blessing in disguise. This would be, after all, my last real chance at a summer vacation. Why not relax for a little while? My mornings were free, my afternoons were free, my nights were free, and I had some mad money saved up burning a hole in my post-graduate pocket anyway. It was going to be “The Summer of Sanjiv.”

But I’m a creature of routine, and it didn’t take long for me to fall into one familiar to me from previous summers. You see, I’ve got a whole system worked out: I’ll wake up around 11 a.m. to watch the rerun of Baseball Tonight on ESPN, usually while I’m working out. Then, after or during lunch, I flip over to TVLAND for reruns of The Brady Bunch and Happy Days. It’s nostalgia nirvana. By then, I’m wiped out, and I take a short, two- or three-hour nap. After I wake up, if I don’t go to a friend’s place and hit the pool or start a marathon video gaming session, I’ll flip right back to ESPN for Around the Horn, followed immediately by Pardon the Interruption.

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