Jennifer Romolini | Weird in a World That’s Not | Harper Business | June 2017 | 10 minutes (2,475 words)

Long before author Jennifer Romolini’s name appeared high up on the mastheads of publications such as Time Out NY, Tina Brown’s Talk Magazine, and Lucky, and websites like Yahoo Shine, Hello Giggles and Shondaland, she struggled to find herself. She spent her early 20s waitressing in restaurants and hotels, and was soon rushed by a pregnancy that ultimately wouldn’t last into marriage that wouldn’t, either, with a summer fling who should probably have been no more than that. She felt lost and stuck. She felt limited by her working class upbringing with weird parents who fashioned themselves after the oddball parents in Bowie’s “Kooks,” and by her academic failures — mostly for lack of trying — first in high school, then in college, which she didn’t finish. A perennial misfit where ever life took her, she assumed doors would always be closed to her. But a few years later, after leaving her first husband, she committed to figuring out what she wanted, getting her life together, and finding a place for herself in a career she liked, without compromising who she was.

When she was struggling, none of the career books on the market quite spoke to her, or offered solutions for someone who’d never been on a traditional career track. Now, after years building her career as an editor, she’s decided to fill that void for younger women who find themselves in her old shoes. Weird in a World That’s Not: A Career Guide for Misfits, F*ckups, and Failures, out today, is the book she wished she’d had — an interesting addition to the growing category of Misfit Lit, a hybrid of memoir and self-help. What follows is an excerpt, recommended by Longreads Essays Editor Sari Botton.

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