So I’m trying to write a curriculum vitae as an assignment for one of my classes…a task that shouldn’t be difficult because I haven’t done anything. Then I notice that people are including unpublished papers, so I thought, well, I’ll go back and see if there’s anything I’ve written that’s worthy to go on a CV, and I delve into my folder of undergraduate papers. What do I find? A book report I did my first semester in college on Howards End. Wow. I knew I had read it before, but I had completely forgotten that I had actually written about it before! Even on the mundane level of a book report. Huh. I disagree with myself-of-seven-years-ago. Imagine that. I wonder how much of what I’m writing now I’ll still agree with in ten years?

So far I like CVs more than resumes. More “here’s what I’ve done, you figure it out” than selling yourself. I dislike selling myself. It feels dirty. But that doesn’t solve the fact that I have nothing of real value to put on it.