Work, life and things in between – Day 61 – My cake and eat it too!
I am always so happy to get home. This continues to be on my unsolved mystery list. How will I reconcile my life with most loved ones in Montreal and my home in Vancouver? So far, I am working at staying on track to prove that I can have my cake and eat it too. I want it all! Time will tell how this will unfold.
I dropped everything in the hallway, changed clothes and headed to my career transition class starting at 1 pm. No sooner had I left the condo that I was anxious to return. Always love the first day back at home. There is no one here but me and yet it feels like a warm welcoming just the same.
I should have stayed home after all. I struggled in class. I profoundly disliked the teacher’s attitude; her assumption that we would not work until the next year, that we would not earn more than a given amount of money which she determined (and I did not agree with it), that we would not need to seek to do this or that..
How the heck does she know that? How could she stand there and tell us what we will and will not do?
I was not a happy camper. I felt like walking up to her and saying “Let me tell you where you are going to be 5 years from now. You will be exactly where you are today. You ain’t going nowhere with that attitude!”
She made me feel like a loser among many and I did not like that one bit!
My walk home was invigorating, I can tell you that.
The only thing on my agenda for the rest of that day was Wings with Ed at 6 pm. I normally drive to Wings as this is one of the rare occasions I have to take the car. That day however I elected to take the sky train on account of the 10 centimeters of snow Vancouver had covered itself under. Vancouverites do not deal well with snow. Wings however is not something I am willing to forego on account of a few centimetres of snow, even though staying home and catching up would have made sense. I still have so much to do.
My days are still so full I don’t get around to doing everything I want to. Proof is; my piano is still collecting dust.
I do manage to reduce the load though. There is progress. A few things have improved. For one, my e-mail traffic is considerably reduced. So are my phone calls. In fact, some days, were it not for Brooks Brothers, Barnes & Nobles and Air Canada promotional e-mails, I would not receive any.
I say this and I feel funny. There is almost a sense of shame attached to that statement. As you know, in the work place, e-mail traffic has become akin to a popularity contest.
At the water cooler or in the elevator, people talk about relentless e-mail traffic, making sure to mention how many they receive, the way people used to talk about the weather. The worst the weather, the better the conversation, and so it goes with e-mails.
So, to admit that your e-mail traffic has died, is a statement requiring a good dose of self-confidence.
Being unemployed is a professional challenge. Being unemployed with low e-mail traffic is a social challenge. Not the same. To day 62.