I stood in a dark and dingy bar, dressed to kill-I was wearing my pointy black leather "I want this job" stilettos, a black oxford shirt and my journalist glasses, and I was ready to impress the hell out of anyone who wanted me to write for them. I was joined by three other girls who, apparently, were also responding to the mysterious e-mail I had received the day before. "Boston Live Magazine will be interviewing on Tuesday at 6 p.m. in the Milky Way basement. Bring rsum," it had read. Unfortunately, there was no one there to impress (unless you count the nice man on a motorcycle who shouted "Looking good!" at me as on my way there, or the pleasant looking fellow who yelled from his porch, "I like your shoes"). The four of us chatted for a few minutes about how sketchy the whole thing was, and then, no interviewer in sight, we gave up, grabbed a table and ordered some beers.

What followed was an interesting, and frightening, conversation.

Chantel, 23, was a history major from the University of Pennsylvania who graduated last year. Since then she had been working as a waitress in the North End, trying to make up her mind what to do with her degree. She was a Brazilian ex-pat, vivacious and assertive, and quick to laugh whenever anyone said anything mildly amusing.

Lisa, 32, was an art major from Brown. She graduated 10 years ago and picked up a teaching job at a charter school, determined to prove to her militaristic father that she could survive on an art degree. After realizing that she hated teaching art to middle-schoolers who expected her to clean up after them, she was hired to maintain a Web site at a publishing company, which she hated. She was very amiable, but there was something jaded in her outlook on the world, and it made her seem aggressively competitive.

Maria was somewhere in her forties. Come to think of it, no one asked where she had studied, as it didn't seem to matter any more. She had tried teaching and said it almost killed her, and now she did odd jobs here and there. Everything about her spoke of weariness and exhaustion.

I enjoyed talking to all three of them, but as I sat in the lounge, laughing with them over their experiences and now and then interjecting, "Wow, I'm so glad I'm still in college"-there was a part of the conversation that left an uncomfortable feeling in my stomach.

The four of us, thrown together by this bizarre event, were connected by the fact that we were smart, educated and had no idea what we wanted to do with our lives. Actually, that's incorrect; I know exactly what I want to do-I want to be a journalist-but I'm beginning to think it might be a whole lot harder than it seemed at first.

I suppose what I learned from this is that to be smart and confident and to go to a good school only gets you so far. I'm not sure what the other ingredient is-it may be drive or passion or something along those lines-but I realized that the outside world can be brutal even to those of us who generally consider ourselves successful. As a sophomore, I feel hopelessly unqualified to prescribe to graduating seniors a solution to this problem-but I guess it's worth keeping it mind.

The waitress came with our drinks. "I don't know what I'm doing with my life!" Lisa exclaimed, taking her glass and raising it towards us. "I'll drink to that," said Chantel; "Cheers!" sighed Maria and she took a sip of her beer. I clinked my glass of ice water to theirs, and looked at my watch uncomfortably.

"Well, it's been lovely to meet you all, but I've got to make my train," I said, smiling apologetically. "Bye, nice to meet you! Good luck!" they collectively waved me goodbye. I left the dingy club and drew a deep breath of fresh air, glad to be on my way back to Brandeis.