After nearly six months of waiting, I started my internship with the USEF on Monday. In my head I had grand ideas of immediately being given a long to-do list of articles to write, interviews to conduct, videos to edit, etc. Instead, I waited in the office for an hour while the secretaries tried to find out where I belonged since my boss was on her way back from the Festival of Champions in New Jersey and the human resources head honcho wasn't in yet.
I would be lying if my week got any better on the ideas I had at the top of this blog, although I did get to find clips of a Canadian event rider who had been named to the Olympic team so we could send it to one of the canadian channels to air for a segment. The office was maddeningly busy except for me. The other intern was doing stuff for an event she's been hired solely to work, my boss was running around trying to get stuff ready for weekend two of Festival of Champions, and I was sitting at my desk waiting for an order. At one point, I actually built the two bookshelves that had been ordered (with the other intern) because it gave me something to do.
During the first few days of the no work, I was getting frustrated. After all, I had drove across the country for this internship after waiting for six months to start and all I was doing was sitting at a desk doing nothing. But then I put everything in perspective.
* First, the USEF internship is something that not everyone gets to do. In fact, right now there are only three interns in the whole office. That's a ton of space and not a lot of interns.
* Second, I came to the USEF partially because it is an Olympic body. Sure, I may not be getting any experience at this particular event (the selection trials for London are being held at FOC) but I am able to observe how everything works around the office and prepare myself for the next organized chaos.
* Third, I am here for six amazing months and am already in love with the place. In the grand scheme of the almost 26 weeks I am at the internship, this is only 4% of the opportunity. Sure, I may not have had the chance to shine this week but I did put myself out there and let everyone know I was willing to work so it wasn't a total bust.
Today I got a brief "tour" of the Horse Park when we ran magazines out to the racks at three different places and even got a chance to watch a few jumping rounds when we had some issues with the gator and needed to be rescued at Rolex Stadium. This is the stadium where I've seen amazing things happen on television but have never seen it live, let alone actually seen an event in it.
One of the jumping rounds in the Stadium today.
So while this week didn't go as planned, I have 25 more weeks to experience and hopefully, if I'm lucky I'll be allowed to stay here. There's no doubt in my mind that I want to work in the equestrian field now and that I want to stay in Lexington if at all possible. After spending a week "researching" all the talent we have on the US teams in addition to the up-and-comers, I am truly excited for the future of equestrian sports and want to stay at the national level where I can really be a part of it all. And if I can do my part to bring retired racers into a second career here as well (in addition to possibly investing myself into one of these disciplines), then all the better.
So yes, this first week may have been challenging for much different reasons than I expected, but it was definitely a learning experience and probably a good break before the chaos starts. Hopefully next week will bring a little more work and a new lesson that only working at an organization like this can teach me.
Until next time,
Mel
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