“Most people work hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.”
--George Carlin
George Carlin was a funny guy and his quotes were always golden. These words exactly portray the meaning of what it means to be a member of a school club (or at least the experience I have had.) Here’s my story:
When you come to high school, most kids think about their ability to get around the big, new, scary school and whether or not the senior guys will push them into lockers on Freshman Friday. Actually, I was the nerd that started thinking about college from day one. No, I wasn’t that nerd with the big goofy glasses and suspenders. I was more the nerd with the Birkenstocks and designer clothes but somehow I still cared about school and my future endeavors. As any nerd knows, or any student finds out through being alive, colleges look at your extracurricular activities. Now you’re probably thinking that I definitely sought out the chess club, and the debate club, and student government, and the newspaper. Actually, those kids are too intellectual for me. What I got into was Model UN.
See I thought this was a great way to kick back, meet kids from different schools, and be able to make a new Facebook group that included all the inside jokes from our committee. Honestly, who doesn’t love Facebook groups? They’re clearly second best to Bumper Stickers. But, that’s beside the point. After my first conference as a Freshman, I got really into it. At the end of the year I even applied to go to the United Nations as a part of my school’s delegation to the International Model UN conference held there each May. (If you have a chance to go to UNAUSA, don’t miss out! The Italian delegates are primo eye candy—even if you don’t get into the debating, you’ll have something to look at for two days straight!)
At the end of my Freshman year, I applied to be an officer position. Basically, I was venturing onto the second step of the college application process. See being in a club is a two-fold process kind of like becoming someone’s boyfriend or girlfriend. You got to date and look good before you actually become official. So as a sophomore, I was elected as a chair as one of the committees. I had a horrible experience. My co-chair and I even got a note that tried to “revoke the speaking rights of the White chair.” Now I know I’m not always politically correct but I’m pretty sure referring to me as the White chair, isn’t the most polite thing to do. I mean I go to a school that is 90% white and Jewish. Being called White in my town is pretty much stating the (almost) obvious. I would have been more apt to get the short one or the brown haired one, not the white one. But I obeyed and let the committee control me, instead of making sure I controlled them.
So when the end of sophomore year rolled around, I didn’t even put chair as one of my three options for a position as a junior. Yet, somehow I got chair? It was like ordering a Brooklyn-style pizza, Buffalo Kickers, and Cheesy bread from Dominos and getting the veggie salad sandwich because they had messed up your order. Now if I’m ordering Dominos with my friends, especially if it’s after one of those crazy, unforgettable nights in which various “recreational activities” occurred, then I want my fatty, calorie-ridden, high intensity snacks, not a veggie sandwich.
So yes you could say I was upset. I believe PO-ed was the word. But I went on, and did my duties. I tried to stand out as a junior so that I could get an amazingly sick position as a senior. I wanted Duke, Cornell, and other top ranked colleges to see my “leadership” abilities. So when time came to reapply for positions, I begrudgingly put chair as my third option, never thinking in my wildest dreams that I would ever have to be a chair again.
So I’m sure if you’ve made it this far, you realize that I wouldn’t be writing this whole background on my times in Model UN, if I hadn’t gotten chair for a third year in a row. I mean I don’t even know how it happened. One of the two kids doing the interviews for next year’s positions is a good friend of mine. We always discussed sports and had a bitter rivalry going because he’s an Islander Fan and I’m a Ranger Fan. (LET’S GO NYR—THIS YEAR LORD STANLEY RETURNS TO NY). He even brought in the PR Sec to ask me questions because that was the position I was applying for. How could he not put in a good word for me after what I thought to be a flawless essay and didn’t he remember that my friends and I helped out his team for senior scavenger hunt a few months prior? Nothing made sense. I felt upset that I wouldn’t be able to give all my potential to make next year’s conference the best, but most importantly I felt betrayed by my friends.
So as sly and sneaky as I am, I decided to beat the system. I knew that if I was going to get stuck with this, I was going to do it on my own terms. I mean I’m going to be a senior. SEN10RS 20-PERFECT-10. Was I really going to go through the same ordeal I went through as a sophomore and senior? I tried to get my friends who were secretariat positions to help me out. None of them could promise that they would let me choose my own committees and topics. Now I felt betrayed even more. It was like getting salt in the wound. No matter how shady it was, if I was in the position of authority, and the roles were reversed, I would have never have thought twice not to let my friend do what she had to do to keep herself happy. They claimed they appreciated my “experience” and yet they wouldn’t let me do things on my own accord. I openly contemplated quitting so many times in the first week after positions came out. I was openly vocal about my bitterness. But, think about it, wouldn’t you be bitter if not only your senior friends didn’t give you what you wanted, but your junior friends, the once you knew from Middle School, and some even before, didn’t help you out? Trust me, it sucked.
So time went on and finally we had to go to an icebreaker pizza party so that everyone got to know next year’s staff. (Just wanted to make a note that neither PR Secretary was present at this little shindig). I don’t know what struck me at this party but somehow my opinion flip-flopped out of nowhere. I realized that I should just suck it up and look at the bright side:
a. Chairs have less work than secretariat (and thus I will have more time to figure out to how to get a gun and shoot the Collegeboard for making AP classes exist)
b. I can write whatever I want on college apps as long as it isn’t a total fabrication of the truth (who isn’t above the little White lie?)
c. I can try to win best committee and prove to everyone that I really should have been a secretariat (and best dressed committee of course)
I really can’t explain it. I just got all mushy into the whole camaraderie, we can do it spirit. It was like that scene in High School Musical where they are singing, “We’re All in This Together...” Except, I hate High School Musical. I hate musicals in general. And I thought I hated all those people for not helping me out even more. Yet, I realized that this is something I truly love. The only club I really put my heart and sole into. The only club I was going to use to show my “leadership” abilities. But leadership ability isn’t just about leading from the top. It’s about knowing when to not quit when thing’s don’t go your way. It’s about when knowing to put on your game face. Most importantly, it’s about channeling those feeling of anger into making the best out of the worst situation possible.
So as George Carlin said, “Most people work hard enough not to get fired and get paid just enough money not to quit.” So clearly my efforts were not good enough to get promoted, I just kept the same job. Yet somehow I realized that the payout from the years I’ve put into it, was just enough to keep me on board.
XOXO,
Russia
