Capitol Spill

As Life in D.C. Comes to an End

The ways in which I handle goodbyes depend on the situation and the next time I will be able to see whomever I am leaving. I also tend to get attached to people easily and then it makes me sad to think about having to leave groups of people and not being able to see those people again. However I think that even though I do not like change very much that, I think I deal with it pretty well considering the amount of change we go though and with having to adapt to a new schedule each semester and adapt to the different ways that professors work. I also tend to be the type of person that does not like to stray from my route or I get thrown off. However in relation to my internship, I think I will miss the importance of the work I was doing and the assistance that I was giving to my co workers. I think that I will also miss my co workers themselves and the discussions about different issues and witty discourse that I had with them. Still I am satisfied with the ways in which I handle goodbyes because I would rather care about people too much than be disconnected from people that I work with. The most difficult thing that I will have with ending this internship is that I am still learning and growing in the ability I have in completing the tasks I am assigned. The relationships that I have been building are getting more comfortable right as I have to leave. The ways in which I can ensure that I leave my internship the way that I want to is by making sure that I leave in a way that those in my office remember me in a positive light. I want to do this in a way in which when they think about they think of a hardworking, loyal person who is an important asset to the team.

I want my co workers to remember me in a positive light because in recent weeks I have decided that if I had the opportunity after graduation I would come back to DC to work in a Representative or Senators Office or even in the office of committee. One of the things that I have learned in DC is that it is important to already have connections with people in the city because people move around to different offices pretty frequently. Besides the fact that coming back to DC would be a lot different without the support system we have had here at ASP, I still think I am adaptable enough to figure things out on my own. Even in the days when I think to myself that I cannot function on my own I think if I was thrown into a situation by myself I would be figure it out. Regardless of what I think about myself I know God will provide for me in the way I need, not in the way I want. In everything in life I need to remember the truth that God cares about me and I need to trust Him regardless of how difficult it is to accept and how frequently I get distracted from it. At the end of my internship, at the end of this semester, at the end of my college career and as I embark on a new journey post graduation, I know that I will need to hold on to God ever stronger as I start to live out my life.

-AC

Staying in touch after leaving DC

                Something I have definitely learned this semester is understanding networking. Back at school, I have multiple teachers speak about networking, but honestly I had no idea what they meant by that. I thought networking was artificial friendship. I thought networking was just passing out business cards and adding people to linkedin. But I now understand that networking is creating a network of professional friends. It doesn’t mean that those friendships are insincere or fake but that those contacts can help further your career.

                When I first came to my internship, I was very stiff and uncomfortable. Then I began to see people in my office as actual people. That may seem shallow or strange but it is easy to get focused on work at my office and ignore everyone else. Getting to know people in my office has been my favorite part. Everyone really surprised me; I began realizing that some people were really cool and laid back people. When you allow yourself to open up and show your personality to those around you then people will also trust you more and give you more responsibility.  For example, you can do great work wherever you are, but that doesn’t always get people to remember you. When I first entered my internship, I was doing good work but I wasn’t really trying to get to know anyone. As a result people forgot about me. When I started to become interested in people’s lives around the office, people began liking me more and also remembering me for my personality and my work as well.

                When people know you on a personal level, it makes it easier to stay in touch. Internships give us opportunity to create a professional network before we graduate. If we leave those internships and forget about the people we worked with, then it is a lost opportunity. The longer we stay connected to those we worked with, the longer we will stay on their mind and someday can help advance our careers. Staying in touch is important, and now even easier than in the past. We can keep in touch with past co-workers through linkedin, twitter, facebook, foursquare, etc. The internet has made connecting with people an easy task for anyone.

National Treasure

            I love museums because they’re full of treasure.  Specifically, I love to look at national treasures that only a prestigious museum could collect.  Things like uniforms from the Revolutionary War, teacups used by first ladies, a gavel used by a Supreme Court justice, or a piece of the Twin Towers.  National treasures help communicate who we are as a nation and preserve our stories. 

            I got a very unique opportunity at my internship to witness the preservation of one of America’s national treasures.  One day I was talking with my supervisor about who I had networked with in our workplace and what else I still wanted to learn.  She suggested that we take a peek into one of the conservation labs so that I could see how the conservators take care of objects.  I was excited about the prospect of a new experience, and did not realize how soon it would come.

            Less than a half an hour later my supervisor walked into my office and told me that we had a meeting with a paper conservator.  I jumped out of my seat with a smile on my face, ready for the adventure.  On our way to the paper conservation lab we passed the objects (metal, plastic, wood, etc.) lab where an enormous propeller was being repaired.  These are the days that make the whole semester worthwhile.

And One

            Watching the NCAA Men’s College Basketball Tournament recently I can’t even remember how many times I saw a player get fouled and still make a basket. When this happens it results in the coveted and valuable “and one” call where a player gets two points for the basket he just made and also gets one free throw shot for the foul. He thus has the potential for a three-point play. When I would watch a game it always seemed like I got very excited and charged up after an “and one” call. One reason for this is because I believe it displays skill and effort that goes above and beyond a normal play. Sure it’s great to make a basket… but if you can do that while being fouled that really says something about a player’s ability.

            I want to equate this issue of “and one” to work in the professional (non-sports) life. One topic that I have been thinking about a lot lately is initiative. During the mid-term meeting between my supervisor and faculty monitor one of the areas where my supervisor noted he would like to see me improve is in my taking more initiative in the office and on my team. To be honest at first I didn’t know what to make of him saying that and did not clearly know what he meant. What does it look like to take initiative? What does that word even mean? More specifically, what would that look like in my office?

            I began to think more about that question and how I could improve more in my initiative taking abilities. One thing that helped me was looking at some of the other interns in the office. There are 20 of us and so we have a wide range of people and personality types. Since I have been interning at work at least three interns have been hired on to the organization in temporary positions. Boom…then I started to understand at least one facet of initiative. I thought how I would probably not think about applying for a job so early, or that I would not be confident enough in my abilities to think I could be successful. However, for these other interns they sought out job openings, talked to the right people and had the confidence to apply and see what would happen. It ended up working out well for them.

"How to Manage My Time"

    As many college students know, figuring out a way to manage your time is extremely important when in college. I knew one day the skills my mom taught me would come in handy, but did not realize that would mean I would need them this soon. My mom always taught me how to “get organized.” She always told me I needed to have a plan, set goals, and to not freak out when I got overwhelmed. She said that making a plan was always your first step in managing time. If you sit down and decided what stuff needs to be done first and set a goal to have each task done, you will not stress out as much. For me, when I get overwhelmed with class or work I tend to have meltdowns. I was so afraid that with all that ASP is making us do in class, as well as, our internships, I would soon have one of these breakdowns. My internship is coming to an end soon and within the last few weeks I have been so swamped at work. I soon realized if I wasn’t going to freak out I needed to relax, sit back and look at my situation. My school work has been so much that I’m surprised I’m even sane right now, much less needing work to worry about. Work has also been giving me so many tasks to get done that I’m not sure I can do them all. When I stopped to think about how I could plan a way to get everything done on a timely manner I realized, I just have to do my best and get what I can, done. There is no reason for a student to stress out so much that they can’t even function.

    I decided after making a plan I would set some goals. When I was at work I would just work very hard to get as many of my tasks done as possible. If I didn’t finish these tasks by the time my day was over, the work would have to wait to be completely by the next day. I had to just tell my supervisor I couldn’t take work from the office home with me because I have class work waiting for me right when I got home. When I get home after a long day of work I would instantly begin working on assignments that were soon due and would stay up as late as my eyes would let me to finish my work. I have constantly done this routine everyday and it has seemed to work quite well. There are times where there just is not enough time in a day to finish all the things I have to get done, and those are days where I do have meltdowns. I tend to stress when I have stayed on top of things to get them done and still manage to have more work to do. I find myself having to stop, calm myself down, and remind myself that I have been working extremely hard and the finished product of my assignment will show that off when I get grades.

An Alliance Sealed In Blossoms???

I am really excited to be here in Washington, D.C. working on Capitol Hill during the National Cherry Blossom season. My latest research project that I am working on for the Legislative Director in my office is giving a historical analysis of many intelligence issues.  One of these issues has led me to discover an interesting part of the history of the Washington, D.C. Cherry Blossom Festival. The Cherry Blossom season is officially from March to April; However the Festivities begin on Saturday March 26th. This festival represents so much more historically than most people across the United States realize. The celebration is a time to not just come together and celebrate the arrival of spring, but the Cherry Blossom Festival is also a time to celebrate the bonds of friendship developed over the years between the United States and our allies.

My research for the Legislative Director in the Congressman’s office has shown me that the initial starting point for the celebration of the Cherry Blossom festivities can be traced back to March 27, 1912. On this particular date, a ceremony was held in which two Cherry trees were planted on 17th Street in the Southeast quadrant of Washington, D.C. These trees are still there to this day. Between 1913 and 1920 the Japanese Government sent 1800 trees of the Somei-Yoshino variety of cherry tree as a gift to be planted around the Tidal Basin. The first official Cherry Blossom Festival was held in 1935 by many civic organizations. In the year 1938 with the construction of the Jefferson Memorial many of these trees were scheduled to be cut down and turned into mulch. A group of women chained themselves together to prevent this destruction. The Government made a deal with the protestors agreeing to plant trees along the south side of the basin framing the memorial in exchange for cooperation creating two years later the Cherry Blossom Pageant to commemorate the events that had taken place.

The Temptation to be Relevant

    It starts at a very young age in our society today, to be the best at something and be able to show off to all the other kids. In our society we are constantly trying to become the best at sports, the best writer, an important politician, or the best intern in my case. So many people today are tempted into the idea that in order to live a successful life you need to be spectacular at something in order to become noticed, especially in a city like Washington, DC. This question goes way back in time, the quote by William Shakespeare always comes to my mind, “To be or not to be, that is the question”. Should it really be “the question” that everyone is focused on, or is it possible to just live humbly and do things for God’s kingdom? I hope that it is clear that the latter part of that question can be accomplished. Now, nobody said it was going to be easy, and in fact I have already run into the problem of not feeling relevant in my internship due to the repetitive/dull work. Yet, I realize that this type of work needs to be done and is an integral part of the organization. As a result, I have the belief that this idea of living humbly can be accomplished with the help of God’s power.

        In my internship, the one thing that surprised me about my co-workers is that it is not a competition to see who the best intern is.

A City of Surprises

Washington, DC, continues to surprise me.  I’ve now been here for two full months, and I continue to find large (and little) surprises all along the way.  Definitely one of the biggest surprises was my visit to Anacostia earlier today for Bus Day.  I’d heard stories about people who wound up wandering into Anacostia on their first weekend in DC, and the stories were not very flattering.  Therefore, I expected something similar when I went down to Anacostia earlier this morning.

Imagine my surprise to find that many (indeed, most) of the people we encountered down there were very cordial to us.  When we first went to a church off the bus stop, we met a woman named Fern who introduced us to the pastor of the church.  She took time to explain the history of their church to us before taking us on a mini-tour of Anacostia.  She took us down to another church where they served breakfast and lunch on Saturday mornings.  Fern was incredibly hospitable to us.  She took time out of her own day to show us around the area, letting us know about the different parts of the city down in Anacostia.  She even gave us her phone number and told us to call her if anything came up.  She invited us to attend her church sometime, and she was absolutely wonderful to us.

Later on that afternoon, we wound up being the first people to visit a museum in Anacostia on Muslims in America.  The museum was being run by an older African-American Muslim couple, and they took time to show us around their museum.  They let us know about what they had been doing over the past several years.  They had left the United States, traveling to different areas in the Middle East and Africa as a traveling museum before finally managing to purchase an old Muslim school as a permanent habitat for their museum.  The wife was the one who showed us around the museum, and she was incredibly kind and gracious.  She was very excited to see us as the first patrons in her museum, despite the fact that we were six white Christian kids in a primarily African-American demographic.

Internship Shminternship

             My internship continues to be my favorite part of my DC experience. It is at my internship that I can see examples of what I want my professional life to develop into. I also get to act as a professional and interact with other developing professionals. I have learned that this does not mean that we cannot be fun. I think a big part of being a professional is learning the correct way and time to have fun through your vocation. Our hour-long lunch breaks are probably my favorite part of the day. Yes, I love the feeling of accomplishing tasks throughout the day, but getting to relax and get to know the other interns at lunch is extremely valuable.

            Lunch is a great opportunity to see what the other scholars are doing through their interns. It is easy to get caught up in the importance of your individual task, but it is important to realize how much bigger the organization is than yourself. Through talking with my fellow interns, I learn so much about what is going on around me and am educated on so many important issues that I may not have to chance to get to explore otherwise. Also, I get to be myself and we can joke about these issue or other, less serious pop culture issues. This makes for a great work environment where we all help each other and talk about everything from the latest episode of jersey shore to the top stories on Al Jazeera. Because of this, we all have a universal respect for what each scholar, research assistant, and intern is doing.

My first internship: Episode II

    Hallelujah!  After nearly two months of work on the Scurlock photography collection we are now ready to begin work on our own personal projects.  Each intern has been given the opportunity to choose an unprocessed collection to work on.  We will have a chance to put our names into the history books, or the archives at least.  I have chosen a collection named the Ronald Gabriel Collection of Baseball Memorabilia.  Ron Gabriel was an insanely devoted Brooklyn Dodgers fan whose life was shaped by the great game of baseball.  As a boy he grew up two miles from Ebbets Field, comparable to the distance I walk to work every morning.  When he couldn’t make it to the games he would listen to the announcer’s voice echoing through the streets and into his window.  He used to write letters to ball clubs asking for autographs from the players.  He was amazingly successful at this, evident in his scrapbook, which spans 144 pages and contains over 1000 signatures. 

            Most young baseball fans lose their passion for the game once girls, cars, and rock & roll push all other thoughts out of their minds.  Not so for Ron.  Just three years after winning the 1955 World Series against the New York Yanks the owner decided to move his team out west to Las Angeles.  Ron was shocked, angry, and above all felt betrayed by the businessman who took his team 3000 miles away.  Instead of transferring his allegiance all the way across the country Ron remained loyal to the Dodgers… of Brooklyn.  He started the Brooklyn Dodgers Fan Club in 1975 in honor of the 20^th anniversary of their Championship season.  He also published a newsletter called “Dodgers Line Drives” which lasted until he died.  His baseball knowledge peered far beyond his own team; he was a renowned baseball historian and once acted as the Vice-president of the Society for American Baseball Research and was responsible for starting their Washington Metro Chapter.  In addition, he was frequently asked to speak about Jackie Robinson as a guest lecturer at George Washington University in a class called Race, Sports, and the American Dream.