This reminds me of my first unsuccessful job interview. I came away from it with totally unexpected lessons about writing and life.

I had just moved across the country after leaving my job at a newspaper. The job posting was for a copy editor at an in-house trade magazine at a Texas education nonprofit. They called me in for an interview, likely because I had copy editing experience on my resume.

Nothing unexpected happened. I talked to a few folks and the hiring manager, completed a copy editing exercise meant to test my competence at finding and addressing various spelling/grammar/AP style issues, and made my way back to the hiring manager before the final meeting with a few higher level executives.

The whole day went to shit when I found myself giving an honest answer to an off-hand question posed by the hiring manager. I heard myself talking about my fascination with writers, and especially those who made convincing and beautiful arguments while ignoring seemingly every rule and convention of the grammar and style books I had mastered in journalism school. As the words wound out of my brain through my mouth I knew there was no getting back to the promising path to a full-time copy editing job I had been on for the last few hours.

Based on our conversation thus far I knew this hiring manager was unlikely to be interested in my point of view, or in hiring me, now that the truth was out. A few minutes after we met she told me about how important the copy editor role was, especially since the educators who read the magazine tended to be sticklers when it came to matters of grammar and style. She knew this to be true because her first title at the company was, you guessed it, Copy Editor. It was as if I was running the final stages of a FAANG interview gauntlet, only to find myself loudly extolling the benefits of working for small startups.

She reacted as negatively as you would expect, and we moved on to the final portion of the day with the executives. By now I knew my job search would have to continue. The day wasn’t a total waste, however, because the CEO and founder of the nonprofit asked me the final question of the day.

“Is there anything else you want to know about me or the nonprofit I started before we wrap up?”

I knew there would be no job offer, so I decided to ask about something I was actually interested in knowing. I asked him if he had any regrets in his life, and told him I wanted to know because he was clearly successful and I rarely had the opportunity to ask about the pitfalls of success. He looked at me for a few moments and I wasn’t sure if I had managed to step in another pile of shit. When he finally responded it was to tell me slowly, then quickly, about the neglected relationships in his life, especially those with his children. We talked about the nature of family and friendships for a few minutes and I came away feeling much better about the whole situation.

I didn’t get the job (they gave it to a freshly minted English PhD) but I’ll never forget what I learned that day. Grammar and style don’t really matter, even when you’re interviewing for a job ostensibly concerned with nothing else. People and our connections absolutely do matter, and it’s those relationships by which we should judge our success in life.