Thursday, August 31st, marked the last day of my internship with the Federation of State Humanities Councils. The nine weeks I spent with that organization had been a whirlwind of with plenty of ups and luckily, only a few downs. Finishing the laborious history project for the organization was a major high. Not only did I feel accomplished having sorted through 20+ boxes of files and documents, but it gave plenty of time for me to be outsourced to other projects that needed to be completed in a hurry.
I began to assist the Federation’s Communications Manager, Natalie Pak, in compiling a briefing book on each of the 57 state humanities councils to be presented to the new National Endowment for the Humanities’ Chair. Never again will I underestimate how difficult is to try and collect lots of information from lots of different people or how long it takes to edit and format 120 pages of text to look exactly the same while all having a similar tone of voice. I will say that while it difficult and formatting was just frankly annoying, I really did enjoy working on it. After reading through lots of history about the Federation and the state councils, it gave me the opportunity to really understand what these organizations are doing in 2014 and their plans for the future.
The National Humanities Conference’s online program was my final and most enjoyable project for the Federation. I found that giving a hand in designing a format and template for a program was a lot fun, and also a lot of hard work. Compiling a conference program while both in a crunch for time and waiting for outside information can be stressful, but it was amazing to see a majority of people in the Federation office come together and finish such a big project in only two weeks. I also became very much acquainted with Microsoft Word. I thought I knew Word pretty well before…now I really know just how useful (and inconvenient) it can be.
The buzz word for the CAPS Fellowship has been vocation. While I can’t say for certain that I’ve found mine at the Federation, I can say that I learned a number of important things about searching for vocation. I’ve learned that it’s almost always easier to figure out what isn’t your vocation than it is to find what is but more importantly, I learned that working in a position that isn’t part of your calling is still important because you never know what doors will opened or short experiences you’ll have that will lead you to your vocation.
Being in Washington D.C. for the summer was both wonderful and exhausting. I felt an obligation to go out and experience as much of D.C. as I could, and I’m happy I did. The two other CAPPS Fellows living in Arlington, Nate King and Caleb Rollins, and I went out every weekend to see the sights and learn the ins and outs of Washington. While my stay in the District seemed to end abruptly, Michigan was a sight for sore eyes. It was definitely time to come and get away from the hustle and bustle of the city…at least for a little while!