Today was my very first day at my brand new internship. I took my less-than comfortable seat on the train and basked in pure excitement and anticipation as my summer officially began. But wait, I am ahead of myself, the first detail of this story is how I left my coffee (that my father so lovingly brewed for me) in the car. So my coffee is in the car and I am at the train station – I panic briefly but quickly enter problem-solving mode and buy a less-than mediocre cup of coffee from the train station. Then I get on the (extremely crowded) train. I get comfortable, pop my headphones in, and sit while the train bobs me side-to-side slowly sipping my coffee. About 30 minutes in I realize my coffee cup has a leak, that’s ok, I remind myself, I’ll just be veryyyyy careful while I drink it. Though I should’ve known that nothing I – Samantha Renee Guarnieri – do is careful and/or graceful. SUDDENLY I feel a warm drip on my chest, only to look down and realize I’ve spilt coffee on my freshly washed WHITE t-shirt. Let me remind you, it isn’t even nine o’clock yet and I am on my way to my first day at my new internship and I now have an awful coffee stain on my clean white t-shirt. I am bummed, SO bummed!

So I sat and sulked for a little bit before deciding that this minor catastrophe was an opportunity to learn a very important life lesson. The life lesson I learned today was that one can truly never be too prepared. Here I was, early in the morning, en route to my first day with a packed lunch, meticulously selected outfit, and even an extra pair of shoes in my bag just in case. In my mind nothing could’ve gone wrong because I was prepared – though to my dismay, not too prepared. Basically, shit happens and there really is nothing I, or you can do about it. We have to accept the coffee stains and move on with our lives.

A very awkward picture of my coffee stained white t-shirt.

Samantha

Because sometimes I feel like no one is listening.

You know when you’re talking to someone who you can tell isn’t really listening to you? Kind of like talking to a wall or even to yourself. Well, that is often how I feel. I don’t mean this in a way to feel sorry for myself. It just is what it is i guess. But I find that as much as I love speaking, I love writing even more. I honestly feel like my mind is made up in a way that makes writing out sentences easier than forming sentences with my mouth. Maybe that is why people don’t always listen, because sometimes i don’t make a whole lot of sense when I speak. I enjoy writing in that you are able to re-read and re-write before hitting “submit” or “save.” But in speaking we don’t have that option, you said it and that’s it – there’s no deleting or editing what you have already spoken. Also when I write I feel like people are actually reading, even if it is simply one person, that one reader is actually reading and comprehending and listening to what I have to say. Though in talking, my listener does not have to listen, he or she can merely get away with hearing what I say but not taking the time to understand what I say. Writing gives me the opportunity to be heard and a chance to be understood, and that is why I write.

I recently won two writing awards for a paper I wrote on prison and society, so – not gonna lie – I’m feeling pretty good about my writing talents at the moment.

Samantha