By: Caitlin Connelly

Every week, Emerge Magazine will feature the experiences, stories and lessons learned from our writers as they work to complete their internships at media outlets across Toronto, the GTA and abroad.

Six months ago, I thought that looking for an internship was going to be extremely stressful. I envisioned myself sending out my resume to countless publications and having to resort to a place in which I had absolutely no interest—or worse, having no internship at all.

Unlike many of my friends and classmates, however, my internship search was quick and relatively stress-free. Last October, I received an email about a potential internship at Canadian Family magazine.

Though the magazine (and website — which is what the internship was for) are not something I read nor visit, this was exactly the kind of magazine I saw myself working for one day. Crafts? I rocked every art project in elementary school. Recipes? Um, I love food. And don’t even get me started on cute little babies and their cute little clothes. This was right up my ally.

I submitted my resume and two pieces of writing. Two days later, I was asked to come in for an interview.

On the big day, I made sure I got an early bus downtown and quickly found the building. I was to go to the third floor and ask for my soon-to-be-supervisor. I even had 30 minutes to spare. So it was typical that something had to go wrong.

I went in what I thought was the front entrance of the building and made my way up to third floor. I got off the elevator, turned left, and quickly came to halt. There was a door with two long windows on either side of it.

I peered in and saw a lot of desks with people typing at their computers. I tried turning the handle of the door but it was locked. That’s when I noticed that I needed a swipe card to get in.

I started to panic. What the hell was I going to do? How would I get in? Knocking the door was out of the question (as the sign on the door read). My stomach was in knots at the thought of being late for the interview.

The elevator door opened and a woman stepped out.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

I told her who I was looking for and explained that I was there for an interview for an internship.

“Great!” she said. “I know her. She’s my supervisor.”

‘Of COURSE she is,’ I thought.

The woman introduced herself and assured me people go in through the wrong door all the time. She told me she used to be an intern and gave me a brief tour of the office as she escorted me to the reception desk and told me her supervisor would be with me shortly.

After a short wait a young, hip-looking woman greeted me and introduced herself. She took me into a private office where we made conversation and joked about my going in the wrong door. I breathed a sigh of relief.

That is, until she pulled out my resume. I looked at the page in front of her and felt my heart drop.

“Is that my resume?” I asked out loud. “It’s not supposed to look like that!”

When I had sent my resume, I had obviously forgotten to change the fancy font I had used for my name — a font that St. Joseph Media obviously did not have on its computers. The result? The font had changed to size 48 and my name took up half the page of my resume.

My interviewer laughed and assured me it wasn’t a big deal, but I was mortified.

All things come in threes. The interview (which went really well, despite my resume mishap) came to an end. My interviewer led me to the lobby, where I proceeded to walk into the big, glass door that would take me out to the main elevator, prompting laughter. Even the receptionist got in on it. I kissed the internship goodbye and went on my way.

Much to my surprise, I found out three days later that I had won the position. As the semester comes to an end, I’ll be sad to say goodbye to CanadianFamily.ca. I’ve gained experience with fact-checking, building content from the magazine to the website, and written blog posts.

The online team has gone out for a group lunch I have received neat freebies and I celebrated with champagne and cupcakes when CanadianFamily.ca had its best week, ever!

I have enjoyed my internship experience and while I can’t appreciate all of the content I deal with on a daily basis (there are only so many parenting articles a girl can read without being turned off kids forever), I will one day be able to put the things I learned to good use.