So I started Tuesday morning early, with an alarm set for 6:30 a.m., a cold shower, and a cup of coffee to do away with any lingering sleepiness. Having never actually scouted out my office building – only looking online for my metro route –, I luckily set out for the Department of Education an hour early. Little did I know that the metro station I was to get off at had more than one entrance/exit. Needless to say, despite the fact that all the numbered streets and lettered streets create a grid, I was lost for well over a half hour, on a hot, 90 degree day. Eventually, I found my way and was able to sit down, catch my breath, and air out for a few minutes before I started.
The department I work with is filled with fun, energetic people. Jackye, my supervisor, has been with ED for years. She is the head of the Editorial Policy and Publishing Department, a part of the Office for Communications and Outreach (OCO). She oversees all of the edits on ED publications.
Whatever my expectations had been for working in a federal office, I certainly wasn’t expecting what came next. In order to introduce me to the people in the department, we went first to John’s office. He’s got a loud booming voice, which he uses often, so one can hear him long before getting to his office. He was wearing jeans, an unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, and a t-shirt that read “In dog beers, I’ve only had one.” He’s a great guy and was greatly welcoming to me on my first day, but nothing near what I expected.
Everyone else in the office was fantastic as well. One guy knows Spanish and offered to bring in a Columbian newspaper, El tiempo, that he got on vacation there. I had a few more introductions, but then was assigned my first assignment.
Boy was I about to dive into editing 101. I was working on the schedule and description of a conference going on in June and I had to fact check, edit the layout, and look for mistakes according to the Associated Press editing guidebook. Little did I know that the appropriate way to abbreviate Minnesota is Minn., not MN. And that there are seven states that aren’t abbreviated at all – these are the Hawaii and Alaska plus the continental states whose names are five letters or less. I spent the next two days editing these three pages, absorbing tons of editing practices.
Later on, Jackye introduced me to David Hoff, the head of our department. We got to talk for a few minutes about schools, Iowa, and football. On our way back to Jackye’s office, I offhandedly said that I was sure learning a lot of editing now. Her response, to which I could only laugh, was “Well what editing style do you use for your college publication?”
After a long day of learning how to edit properly, I left the office and set off for home, hoping that my sense of direction would be better now than it had been in the morning. Luckily, I hopped on the elevator and met Todd, who would be my guide through the metro that night.
We got off the elevator and apparently turned the wrong way. The security guard that I was introduced to earlier, told me to go the other way. Since I had been making wrong turns all day long, I figured I was, again, the only person who didn’t know where I was going. But I saw that Todd had made the mistake as well when he came around the corner, having backtracked just as I had. To my comfort, he said that even after two weeks he couldn’t find his way around – I wasn’t the only one. We walked onto the metro, talking about what he was doing at the department, where we went to or graduated from school, and pro sports. He gave me a few much-needed pointers about finding my way around the metro and downtown. It was a great way to end the day.
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