“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
A dark hospital waiting room was not how I imagined spending my night.
I was about to start the second week of my internship and instead of getting a good night’s sleep, I was waiting for my boyfriend to get out of emergency surgery.
I thought my summer internship would be the pinnacle of business school—getting the perfect job, switching into the industry of my dreams, receiving a job offer at the end of 10 weeks. But in that moment, curled up on an uncomfortable sofa waiting for the surgeon, none of that mattered. What mattered was that when he woke up, I would be by his side.
“How was your summer? How was your internship?” With big hugs, sectionmate after sectionmate asked me these questions when I got back to school. Avoiding, I threw on a big smile, “It was great!” I didn’t want to tell my sob story.
But, really, my summer was not a sob story. It was a story of late nights at the hospital, two more surgeries, exhaustion, messing up at work, and giving myself permission to not be perfect. And most importantly, it was about spending time and caring for the person I love the most.
I hope to do many things in my life, but most importantly, I will always be there for my loved ones. I will accept the messiness of life and the imperfections. I will embrace my real story.
— Margaret Watson