My First Landscape Architecture Internship

After a year in grad school I finally got my lucky break with a joke of a landscape architect in downtown Miami. I won’t say any names in case he is still in business, because after all he was a nice guy and he did (sometimes) pay me to be his intern.

I can hardly call this an internship but I did learn a lot. I practically forced this guy to hire me, and by that I mean I was extremely persistent. He didn’t think I had the AutoCAD skills that he needed from an intern, but I knew I was a quick learner and I could see that his business needed a lot more than AutoCAD skills at this very moment.

I could tell right away this guy was a mess. We met for the first time at a coffee shop across the street from his office, because his “assistant” (why didn’t he just say his wife?) had the key to the office. He was in greenish pants, I was in a greenish blazer. He showed up at least a half hour late, but at least he paid the bill. He came over to the table in a rush, ran his hand through his slick black hair, slung his computer bag onto the table, “I need help!” he stammers, and I respond, “I’m here to help!”

I’m here to help and of course I’m also here to learn. I listen and even take notes as he shows me some of his current projects as well as some CAD tricks. He mentions his disorganized whiteboard full of incomplete tasks. I reassure him that I’m great at organizing and getting things done, and that I’ll have those CAD skills down in no time.

Over the next few weeks we’re back and forth — I might not have the AutoCAD skillset he needs, but oh wait, I can learn and plus I can help you with that growing to-do list!

December 9, 2016 was my first day on the job. He showed up late, explained a few things to me, and left shortly thereafter. This was the nature of our working relationship — some days he showed up late, other days he didn’t show up at all. I become frustrated. If he can’t help me help him then why am I here and why is he trying to run a business?

Jenna started a week later, and we became good friends. Usually it was just the two of us in the office, attempting to decipher the boss man’s cryptic text messages so we could assist him in completing his projects. Often it was futile. We spent a lot of time in the Whole Foods two blocks away, because there was no point in sitting in the office, confused about what the boss man wants done, and unsure whether he would show up at all. Besides, the checks would bounce more often than not so we were essentially performing volunteer work much of the time.

Sometimes he would take us on “field trips” or site visits where I would play photographer and Jenna would play note-taker, or vice-versa. Usually the two of us would find something to giggle about while sitting in Miami traffic in the back seat of his Range Rover, and often times he would stop at the juice bar to grab us a treat. So it wasn’t all bad, you see.

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One day the boss man wanted me to call around and get quotes from various landscaping crews, since his current guys turned out to be unreliable. I decided this would be more fun and more effectively done on my bicycle, so I informed him that I would be working from home that day. I did just that — I lived in Pinecrest at the time where there are handfuls of landscaping crews out in the neighborhood on any given day. Spanish is harder for me to navigate on the phone so communication was an added benefit of performing this task in person. Plus they’re overall more willing to talk to a lady on her bicycle than to a phone caller.

The boss showed up less and less. Jenna and I speculated as to what could be going on in his personal life – though we got to no specific conclusion. The wifi stopped working for a while and he asked us to go to the men’s clothing store downstairs, inquire about something random, and oh by the way, can we get your wifi code as well? We were successful in acquiring the password but unfortunately the signal did not reach around the corner to the fourth floor. When he asked us to go try the same sketchy tactic at another locale we instead took a lunch break and I don’t believe I returned to the office that day.

We became known as the girls with the backpacks. We would (usually) show up to work at the agreed-upon time, discover that there was yet again no internet, and then scout around downtown Miami for a place with cheap enough food and reliable enough wifi. Sometimes we went to happy hour when the sun began to set. We were the girls with the backpacks during the workday, as well as in the evenings, in the streets of downtown Miami.

The months went on and this got old. I started this internship so I could learn and help this guy grow. I began to understand why he had been through so many interns and was now down to barely two. On a positive note, you learn a LOT when you’re trying to help someone run their business, with no direction. In the end, I phased myself out of this position, left on good terms, thanked him for what I did learn, and returned to Orlando to begin what would be a new internship and another chapter in my life.