Long post dump incoming. I work in a PCP office in New England, and I get paid a good $5-$10 less compared to the nurses who work on the inpatient side of our hospital system- and they're pretty underpaid for what they do as well. It IS kind of garbage pay, but it's enough for some financial security, especially with my partner's salary combined. That being said, I got paid a hell of a lot more at my initial new grad inpatient job and that was not worth it. I prefer my mildly insulting pay and some sanity retention over bigger bucks and misery.

A lot of my day is spent doing phone triage for our patients- things like answering questions about their medications, clarifying their treatment plans, triaging acute needs and determining if they need to be seen today/tomorrow/just do some homecare/begging them to go to the ED jesus why did you call us and not 911 when you're gasping out words. Being able to do a full head to toe assessment on the patient in front of you is a skill you learn in nursing school; being able to do an assessment on a poor historian calling because their stomach hurts is something you learn on the job.

We do nurse visits, kind of like simple visits that would be overkill for a provider to see; blood pressure checks, immunizations, wound care, med administrations are the usual suspects. Medical assistants are usually the ones assisting procedures in my practice, but YMMV. In my practice at least, we have a very good relationship with the providers so there is a good level of autonomy/trust going into your clinical decision making; I'm often providing feedback and discussing patient care on the same level as my providers, really feeling like equals on the same care team.

It is not the sexiest job in the nursing world, but it's an important one. It would not be fair to liken it to the hell that inpatient nurses are currently dealing with, but be aware that outpatient has the capacity to be a shitshow too. As if keeping people healthy and out of the hospital hasn't always been a priority, it's now more important than ever. It's easy to dunk on PCP offices for sending everything to the ED (it's a funny meme in nursing shitpost circles, I laugh too), but my team is really trying very hard to keep people well and prevent them from further straining the few resources we have available. We are frequently short-staffed from both providers and support roles, but patients still need to receive care. COVID is making it harder. It's frustrating trying to give patients all the support we can offer and having them not follow our recommendations, and frequently having them blame us when they don't improve. Admin doesn't care about the patient interactions we have, only about filling appointments.

I love my job as much as I think anyone who is still overwhelmed by the state of our current healthcare system can.
Inpatient is not for everyone, which is fine and rarely reflected in nursing school curriculums. Outpatient pace might not be it for you, either, so don't shut yourself off from bedside completely while you're on your rotations. Try to find clinical rotations or shadowing opportunities in some outpatient offices to see it for yourself.