Resolution to get a job
Now that the whirlwind of Christmas is over the realisation of what I need to achieve in the coming year has begun to hit me like a brick wall. That's not to say it's not going to be an exciting year, but it's certainly going to be a busy one.
I always like to have a plan, and to know what's ahead so that I can work towards goals and targets. However, this year is going to include a very important target as after I graduate. I'm going to be looking to start my first 'real' job, whatever it may be.
I'm hoping that I'll be fortunate enough to get work for a radio station or a production company as a junior researcher or broadcast assistant somewhere, perhaps in London, but given the current employment and economic circumstances I think getting any job after university is going to be easier said than done.
I would imagine there are a lot of young people who are feeling equally uncertain about the future. I think the best thing I can do is to just keep working away at things, gaining experience and with a bit of luck things will turn out OK.
Something that has interested me for a long time is the ways in which parents deal with the inevitable developments in their sons' and daughters' behaviour as they mature and become adults. I've discussed this aspect of growing up with other adults and my parents as well as people my own age, and I've come to the conclusion that it all goes in one big cycle.
Here's an example; a year or two ago I might have had to ask to be allowed to go out drinking into the early hours or to have a girlfriend to stay. Heated discussions would almost certainly have ensued between my parents and I, based on my thinking that they were being a bit square, and them thinking I was not yet old enough to be allowed the level of freedom I was asking for.
I would argue that they must have hated it when their parents curbed their freedom, and mum and dad would respond that it was their house and I was living under their roof and therefore their rules.
Now that I'm only months away from turning 21 these rules seem to have relaxed and consequently the arguments have stopped.
I've come to the conclusion that these arguments occur because parents wish to protect their children and make sure they don't take on too much, too soon as it were. Now that I've grown up a bit I can understand this better; seeing it as a level of care that I can now be grateful for, even though two years ago I would have loved to have had parents who would, 'let me do what I liked, when I liked'.
I would always argue: "I bet you hated it when your parents kept you in so why are you doing it to me?"
This is what really interests me - the fact that when you're a young person you just want to do whatever you like and the parental input is more often than not a total pain, but when you become a parent you're prepared to go through very emotionally painful arguments to protect your kids. I remember in the heat of an argument, vowing that I would be a 'cool' parent. I'll be fascinated to see what I'm actually like if one day I do become a dad.
Moving from parental influence to that of the church, I was very shocked to hear of the comments made by the Pope about homosexuality and the environment. Speaking just four days before Christmas, in the middle of the season of good will to all men, Pope Benedict announced that saving humanity from homosexual behaviour was as important as protecting the rain forests.
Although I don't consider myself to be religious at all anymore, I have been brought up as a Christian. I cannot understand how the Catholic faith can allow itself to be led by a man who clearly has unjustifiable anti-homosexual views. Pope Benedict is in a position of considerable influence and should be using that power to promote peace and tolerance, not to alienate a part of our society which has just as much right to live as they please as any other.
One of Jesus' two principal teachings was that you should love thy neighbour as thyself. It does not say, 'love thy neighbour as yourself, (unless your neighbour happens to be gay)'. Apart from the fact that his comments are, in my view, entirely unacceptable, they are also very offensive. Even if Pope Benedict actually believes that to be true, surely one of his advisors should have suggested that the season of peace and goodwill was perhaps not the best time of year to take a pop at an already marginalised group. It begs the question as to whether the media should actually give airtime to any specific religious leader, especially one who is prepared to punt ideas like that around the world's media.
An early Christmas present came in the form of my new website which my house mate Andy has built for me.
www.roryauskerry.com will be a first point of contact for potential employers as I hunt for jobs this year. It's also an ideal way for me to provide easy access to my podcasts. Andy is a bit of a wiz at this sort of thing and although I'm trying to teach myself how to build sites, I don't think I'd ever get one to look as nice as he has managed to. I hope you'll have a look around. Cheers.
