Thanks everyone!!!
The letter was neutral- they needed copies of some documents. Actually, I would say this is a little better than neutral because I could assume it means they are interested in me. If they were not interested, why bother requesting the extra info…
Anyway, I had nothing but negative thoughts all the way to my parents’ that by the time I opened it and so it was neutral, all I thought was, “Oh… well the next one will be a denial anyway.” I completely ruined the moment for myself by getting in that negative mindset.
This whole thing was really just a false alarm. I was just shocked to get a letter at all from them- especially so soon. And I just panicked! As a rule of thumb, phone calls= good, letters= bad. But this department has not been like any of the others at all. So it would not suprise me that they would send a ‘good’ letter. In fact, after my interview, I immediately received a letter asking me to sign something so they could conduct a background check. This one is technically a neutral letter, but I was soooo excited when I read it. Anything that is not a “Piss off” letter really excites me.
Want to know what the hell I’m talking about?? Sorry about being so vague, but this is the kinda thing where explaining one thing, leads to more questions and the need for more explanation. I will try to give you a little more insight:
Falcon is correct. Except it’s not really a job “switch”. Law Enforcement has always been my goal. All I’ve been doing is killing time until I can get hired. Since I graduated the academy in December of 1998, I really thought I would be hired by now.
This particular letter came from the Gulfport Police Department. Gulfport is a tiny little rich beach city surrounded by St. Petersburg, FL. I recently had an interview with them that went unbelievably!! I’ve never had such a great interview before. These guys asked me questions about my knowledge and understanding of laws, gave me some “what would you do scenarios”, and asked several ethical type questions like, “You pull over a vehicle for running a stop sign and it turns out to be the Chief’s daughter- what do you do?”
I completely kicked ass in this interview!! I have had several interviews in the past for other departments, but none of them had ever asked decent, relative questions. None had ever cared about my knowledge or abilities or anything like that. (isn’t that nuts??!? maybe this would explain why so many incompetent fucks get hired)
The other interviews always seemed to be focused on my shitty job history and other crap that makes me a less-than-desirable candidate.
I have applied with over a dozen departments. I have taken and passed many written and physical test, and polygraph examinations. I have made it to various stages of the hiring process with different departments. Just when it seems to be looking good, I get the letter.
A denial from Gulfport would be exceptionally bad since I did so well in the interview.
My ultimate goal has always been to work for the Tampa Police Department. Since they have already turned me down, I need to put in a few years at another department and then I could re-apply there. But, who knows, I might like Gulfport so much that I’ll stay.
Thanks for the support everyone!!
Oh, and I didn’t drink too much yesterday. But it wasn’t because of the letter, it was because there was a kick ass annual parade here last night!!! Had a lot of fun!!
