What rushes into my heart and my skull I can't control

College. Internship. Graduation. Relocation. Job.
Who knew my life was capable of following such a predictable trajectory?

During my freshman year at IWU, I took a 100-level introductory sociology class which sketched out the basic framework of American class distinctions and the implicit social structures and preferences that guide our red-and-blue, capitalistic universe. Like many survey courses, it provided factual data and empirical research to back up a lot of cultural norms and assumptions that most of us thought were already pretty self-evident (i.e., "Women with higher levels of education tend to earn more, get pregnant later, and are less likely to do drugs." Social scientists figured this out with painstaking research, while I figured it out by observing the staggeringly low number of female CEOs with crack babies.)

For one assignment, my professor provided us with the standard, government-approved system for categorizing class strata by earnings (i.e., such-and-such salary per year designates Donald Trump, while such-and-such per year denotes the working poor). We were to apply this ranking system to our own families by finding out how much our parents earn, locating our class designation, and then writing a paper discussing how our class standing (and its associated typical values and characteristics) shaped our lives and worldviews.

As my professor agreed at the project's conclusion, mine was a "complicated case," for even though my primary caregiver's (Ma's) technical earnings put me on the "lifetime of coal mining and food stamps" end of the class spectrum, the social milieu in which I was raised put me more in the "Prada bags and unearned sense of entitlement" range. I represented the Beverly Hillbilly Class of inherited value systems. A pinch of compulsive thriftiness from the blue-collar set, with a dash of "all possibilities are open to me" attitude from the caviar eaters.

Of course, after years of a comfortable lifestyle, upper-middle class immersion, and prized liberal arts education, I don't think there's much of a question that the "Beverly" side has, overall, won the day.

Illustratively, I was recently talking to a friend (who, incidentally, is a pure blood member of the blue-collar set) about job searching. We had both been thrown into the overcrowded pool of the soon-to-be unemployed and were lamenting our frustration at the application process. We agreed that it seemed as though most everyone we knew who had managed to score high-earning jobs or impressive, tall-building internships had done so thanks to the assistance of some professional-type family member or friend who could give them an "in." We pouted that we, ourselves, neither had the sort of connections that would lend us such a step-up, nor did it even occur to us to try--after all, getting help is cheating. You're supposed to earn what you get by your own sweat, blood, and pitifully limited resume.

According to my sociology class, this no-help attitude can be largely attributed to two things: 1) the U.S. system of education, in which any significant assistance from a higher-standing party is, strictly speaking, cheating or plagiarism, and 2) a working-class mentality, which values independent hard work and also isn't inclined to rely on a professional networking system that, typically, it doesn't have.

Yet, in the end, I did find a job. And when I did, it was due to the relationship I'd already had with S2 through being in their freelancing network, a position I'd found thanks to the internship that I had done with them, which I'd gotten via IWU and its Career Center, which had a long-standing relationship with S2, so they easily and readily connected me to the company.

The 5-7 job applications and resumes that I'd sent out to various random companies, on the other hand, have remained stubbornly ensconced in the silent black hole of unanswered inquiries.

Like I said. Beverly wins the day.