Tugging at my suit and blowing my bangs out of my eyes, I sat down in a chair and stared across the imposing desk at my new boss. I expected the usual welcome speech or perhaps some probing inquiries regarding my subject knowledge or abilities. Instead, her words left me nearly speechless.

“Oh, well. I didn’t know you were coming. Nobody told us your status. I thought perhaps you didn’t receive your clearance,” she murmured, eyes drawn to her computer screen, where e-mails amassed without respect to our tete-a-tete. “Hmm, what will we do with you?”

It was my first day interning with the U.S. government in Washington, D.C., and I had entered my boss’s office with trepidation. It had been eight months since I had applied for the job, six since I had interviewed and four since my security paperwork was completed. This was our first meeting. No one cared that it was my first day. In fact, they were sighing at the extra burden of finding me a desk and a few ballpoint pens. So much for gratitude at my devoting a summer to unpaid labor in wool suits and button-down blouses.

This first-day experience appeared the rule, not the exception, among my fellow interns, who complained that their offices had been unprepared and their superiors minimally enthusiastic about the interns’ arrival. Apparently, the human resources juggernaut of federal service had not deemed it necessary to inform the other people in our offices of our impending arrival.

“What on earth is the human resources department doing with its time instead?” we wondered aloud at many intern-only happy hours.

Over the course of the summer, I wrote informational papers, memos, briefing points and meeting requests for everyone from my boss to the cabinet-level head of our entire agency. Rather than despair, I decided to seize the lack of both supervision and micromanagement to show some initiative in designing an internship curriculum that suited my own interests. I went to every meeting I could and bobbed my head in time until I figured out what was going on. I pored over internal Web sites and created a cheat sheet of acronyms. This was essential for decoding the slang-heavy parlance of federal hallway gossip and day-to-day job performance. My plan for maximizing my experience and mastering my new job was to volunteer for every assignment I could.

Although many federal interns are somewhat untrained and unsupervised, it would be wrong to insinuate that what we did was unimportant to our offices. Many agencies, congressional offices and those in the White House rely upon interns to function properly. Interns and entry-level staffers can make or break a lobbyist, constituent or non-governmental organization’s efforts to access the corridors of power. If unchecked, an intern’s mistake can be deeply detrimental to the integrity of national security and, as Monica Lewinsky proved, even to the office of the president.

Michael Benezra, a UW senior majoring in political science, learned this lesson while interning in the office of Representative Norm Dicks.

Benezra handled the phone, often fielding calls from voters in the congressman’s district wishing to speak directly with their representative. Owing to Dicks’ tightly crammed schedule, these requests were usually referred to staffers or interns to keep Dicks available for meetings and high-profile callers.

“It was confusing when the constituent would mention only their first name while asking to speak with the congressman,” Benezra explained. “It was difficult for me to interpret who was speaking and how important their call might be.”

It never ceased to scare me that my work made an impact. What I did directly affected U.S. policy and American citizens — it wasn’t just a thankless, rote task in some bureaucratic vacuum. Although my boss and colleagues were busy, they maintained quality control of everything our office produced. They provided specific feedback where needed and counted upon me to defend my position if I disagreed, but I was also expected to support the final decision of my bureau. It was an honor that they did not treat me like an “intern;” they expected me to pull my weight as a member of the office and to be as professional and hard-working as they were.

It was this fact that rallied me out of bed and into the office on many beautiful mornings when jogging around the Washington Monument or shopping in Chinatown would have been far more fun. I felt, finally, like it would matter if I didn’t show up.

Benezra had similar feelings, and cited an incident that occurred when he was answering phones while Dicks was away from his office.

“The caller said his name was Rahm, and, jotting it down, I followed protocol by informing him that I would tell the congressman he had called and seek to assist him however I could,” Benezra said. “I asked for his phone number and last name.”

The man on the other line responded, “No problem. This is Rahm Emanuel. Could you tell Norm that I called?” giving Benezra quite a surprise. Benezra had not previously realized he was communicating with President Barack Obama’s chief of staff.

A day later, Benezra and Emanuel met in a chance encounter near the staff entrance of the Capitol building. Because he had answered the phone, Benezra had the fortune of having something relevant to say to one of the most powerful men in Washington. It was a key highlight of his interning experience.

Once I finally understood how to do my job and what I believed was expected of me, my internship became fascinating. The tourist in me was thrilled that I could eat hot dogs in the shadow of the Vietnam War memorial on my lunch break and that I got to call the White House, other federal agencies and congressional staff and elected officials — and that they actually answered my calls.

But the best adventures in the D.C. jungle ultimately proved to be out-of-office activities with co-workers. In my final week of service, a fellow intern performed at an open-mic night. Present in the crowd were a collection of coworkers and interns from our federal agency. Stripped of stuffy office attire, our ragtag collection of public servants glowed a little. People had the freedom to express themselves, and, not surprisingly, I discovered the same passion and charisma they had for their jobs and public service in their approach to recreation.

Engaging with these people, I felt excited and a bit melancholy to be leaving. But above all, after 10 weeks in the context of the conservative nature of government service, I felt at home.

Reach reporter Elizabeth Brady at lifestyles@dailyuw.com.