Halcyon Days

Cultural Anthropology

I think the top of my boss's head is about to pop off. Either that or he lives in that state and always has; I haven't enough data points gathered to put my ass on the line with that sort of statement or belief but I do have a gut which is telling me to duck and roll Right. This. Second.

Well alrighty then.

A week ago or maybe it was a week and a half ago or maybe, oh hell it might as well have been day three, I actually asked my boss if my peer was OK or should I be worried if the top of HIS head was going to pop off and if so what could I do to make it better; please! What can I do to help? I was assured this was perfectly normal and Peer was going to have to work it out. This has been going on since June. When I asked about the top of Peer's head I didn't have enough data points gathered to know whether or not the stress factors were constant or even be able to define them.

You know, sometimes distress is so palatable as to cover the source entirely. I think that's called panic.

I remember saying something rather snarky and quite honestly it was mean spirited almost 12 years ago at an off-site meeting. I was in a group of people with one or two people I didn't know all that well and one in particular I didn't know at all but really needed to get to know him and the relationship was going to be important. I fouled it instantly with that one snarky mean spirited statement about somebody and in his directness he let me know. This isn't quite a direct quote but it went something like this:

'I don't know know you well enough to know if you're joking or just mean spirited.'

I said I was joking but you know, he'd already drawn a conclusion. Mean spirited or not, in the moment I was being mean spirited, and looking back on the time period and the circumstances I WAS mean spirited or BEING mean spirited enough that the conclusion was accurate. He was new. I was poison. I think the only people who wouldn't have experienced me or called me mean spirited would have been the people who knew or worked with me before the shit started really hitting the fan.

I even know I how got there. I got on board the mean bus. Choice. I don't know if I was panicked yet though. I do know I was within weeks of panic and within a year of outright terror. Anyway, this is just a look back in the mirror and it helps me, or at least it should be helping me step back and try to untangle what's occuring around me because it's either that or I'm going to get sucked into one really painful vortex.

Yesterday I used the word toxic in a sentence. With my out-loud voice. That's a pretty strong word and probably I should have chosen my words more carefully. Nope. Definitely I should have chosen my words more carefully because THAT word is incendiary and came out of anger and contempt and fed-up-ed-ness which caused more panic where panic or something like it is already in full swing.

Or maybe it's rage and paranoia. I'm still not sure.

The one thing I'm sure of, is this has nothing to do with me. Yet. I'd like to keep it that way for as long as possible. My boss is doing some very unbosslike things and my peer is as loyal as they come. The noise level is nearly deafening.

So it came down to this: The word 'hate' was being used in a sentence often enough to have become unbearable. It's one thing to 'hate' a process or 'hate' documentation or a tool or a set of circumstances (well, even that's not really OK. You can not like it, want to change it... blah blah blah, hate is rock bottom and hard to get past). It is another thing entirely to 'hate' a person, a group of people or an entire department. To be perpetually vocal about this IS toxic. To be perpetually vocal about this in public is dangerous.

Also, it's getting in the way of my objective which is to learn as much as I can about a very complex system and process as possible.

That's probably not supposed to be a priority.

Hell and damnation.

That means I'm going to have to learn this stuff on my own time and do my job on company time.

Oh well.

So my job.

What the hell is my job and why am I here?

This company worked REALLY hard to get me here. And I mean REALLY hard. Somebody wanted me badly enough to give me exactly what I asked for and then when the on boarding process got so ugly I actually cried at my desk they turned heaven and earth upside down to make sure I started smiling again. Somebody wants my warm body in the building right now. I just don't know why.

I do know that someone or something is on probation. By probation I mean that probationary period wherein someone (usually the company) determines whether or not a new employee is going to work out. In some cases medical coverage is withheld for 90 days (I think this is still legal) until the company decides the employee is acceptable. In some cases an employee comes in as a temp to hire for the first 90 days so that no benefits whatsoever are paid and most certainly, except under very special circumstances a recruiter is never paid until the employee passes the 90 day mark. These days sign-on bonuses are conditional. If you leave within a year you have to give it back. If you leave of your own accord or are fired you have to give it back. If your job is eliminated you do not have to give it back. This has become fairly common. A sign-on bonus that comes with an employment contract is a little different but I don't have one of those; I just have the almost standard variety. Mine is different in one small way.

Most offer letters read something like this:

"You will receive a one time sign-on bonus of $xxxxx (less lawful deductions), which will be provided to you on xx/xx/xxxx." xx/xx/xxxx = a specific date after the start date almost always.

My offer letter reads:

"You will receive a one time sign-on bonus of $xxxxx (less lawful deductions), which will be provided to you shortly after you join TheBigBank."

It's not like that didn't jump right out at me; it most assuredly did. It jumped right out at me in the middle of complete mayhem. I did question it. Once. I sent an email to the internal recruiter on the tail of about six other emails questioning the rest of the mayhem. Each of the other questions was addressed promptly.  

I factored that into my decision to sign and return or not sign and return. In the end I chose to sign and return anyway. It's in the letter; it's as legally binding as any of it and the word 'shortly' while subjective can only be pushed so far. It can probably be pushed as far as 90 days. And you know what? Right now if I thought I could get away with it and if I could figure out who is actually going to make the decision I'd ask that person to hold off on that payment for 90 days because all it's going to do is sit in the bank and collect interest. My initial concern was how I was going to give them back the 40% withholding but then I realized that until the end of the year the tax responsibility is on their head, not mine so they can pay it as they see fit and they will pay it.

So my question is not whether they're trying to work out if I'm viable (although that might be true). My question is whether they're trying to work out if whether I can hack it or if I'm going to cut and run.

I wonder if they've considered I might accidentally eviscerate someone?

Now we come to compassion.

And a reminder. Compassion does not necessarily involve sympathy or agreement. Compassion is a tool. Empathy is also useful and so is human kindness. And niceness counts too.

I'm lecturing myself in case nobody's picked that up yet.

It's all about the data points.

My boss has been tortured whether self inflicted or otherwise and this man has taken one hell of a beating. I have enough details to be utterly horrified while at the same time in a state of shock that he's managed to keep his head as well as he has this far. He's extraordinarily bright. He's as driven as anyone I've ever met. He reminds me of me, uh, let's see, four years ago, February 3. Four years ago Sunday, February 3 sometime in the morning was my breaking point. It's when I had to finally start saying no or die and I wasn't even being tortured. I'd been tortured, but not at my current job. At my current job it was entirely self inflicted although my job wasn't the entire story but the way we behave in one part of our life is pretty much the way we behave everywhere. We are who we are and we choose how we choose.

My peer. He found himself in the middle of a lake without a boat, a raft or a life jacket. The water he's swimming in is pretty cold. The two things I think I know are he wants to do well and he wants to make his boss happy and I actually think those are two separate things.

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So here's what I did yesterday.

Yesterday I stopped everything and told my boss and peer that our cube isle, the side we occupy was toxic because of our use of the word 'hate'. I said that it was one thing to hate a process, a situation, a tool, a product or a circumstance but that when I kept hearing, 'we hate her', 'we hate them', 'she's just awful', 'she did such a bad job' (she being the person who transitioned part of the job to peer and documented part of the process) it made me wonder what was being said about me when I wasn't there. I said that when I hear the words 'enemy territory', 'we don't talk to them', 'they're trying to kill us' I find it very hard to do the internal networking I'm supposed to be doing as a new employee because I have no idea who I can and cannot talk to. I said that some people are better than others at teaching, transitioning and documenting and while I was as frustrated as anyone about what we have to work with I hardly felt like I could hold it against her. I also felt like I wouldn't be allowed to ask her any questions even though she works no more than sixty yards away.

I might have been whispering but I should have taken this into a conference room because it got loud. I can't make other people whisper.

Later my boss looked up at me from his desk as I leaned over his cube to ask him a question and said, you scare me. I asked why. He said, because. I said, not good enough. He said, OK, we'll talk later. I asked when. He said, I don't know. I said, how about now. He said, I'm about to get on a call. I said, sooner is better than later. I said, do you remember when so and so said you were intimidating right here in front of all of us and then wouldn't tell you why, not even later and how upset you got?

20 minutes later we were in a conference room hashing it out.

2 hours later we were in a conference room finishing the conversation. He needed to understand my objection to the difference between frustration with what was occurring and my experience of personal animosity.

I asked if we were OK. He said yes. For now. I asked him what 'for now' meant. I said I didn't like feeling like I was being tested. He said, my wife says that about me all the time. I said, then we aren't done here yet.

So we talked some more until I learned a few more things. And then I remembered to apologize for using the word Toxic outside a conference room. In the end I had to give him four very specific examples of the word hate being used in extremely public and inappropriate places. By my peer. I said I would deal with it directly the next time it happened and if it didn't stop I'd bring it back to his attention because it does have to stop because it's going to hurt him more than us and he can see that.

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Me? I just revealed one hell of a lot more than I meant to so early in the game. On the other hand there is this:

"There are two primary choices in life:
to accept conditions as they exist, or
accept the responsibility for changing them."

- Denis Waitely

A little more FINESSE, Alecto. Maybe.

And also, that's absolutely enough for now. Now what the hell did I do with my Golden Retriever puppy suit?

Fish

I SAID during my interview, same I as I said during my interview at The Factory that I am a hack and by hack I mean I surely do not claim to be any sort of bloody expert on any part of a system I haven't had call to use, but the minute I need it I'll find a way to work it out; generally the hard way, by beating my head against the wall until I get the result that's needed (emphasis on actually needed). I've also had ample opportunity in the last two weeks to drive home that particular point. I do not have the information in my head that you keep thinking I do or maybe ought to have. I've been very clear. I also think you know this. So what's your point? I think you have one, I just haven't worked it out yet.

Hey, one other thing that's different about me from a lot of geeks, not all, but a lot that I come in contact is this; I'm not a gamer. I don't play games; not computer, video, card, board or any other such thing unless my arm is twisted and it means something to somebody who means something to me. I just don't care about them. For the most part. I have very rarely been interested in knowing something for the sake of knowing it either. I guess I'm what you'd call an applied learner. I don't have an ego attached to how much of this or that I know for the sake of knowing it and how do we write code? We write it based on something somebody else has written and adjust accordingly BECAUSE THAT'S THE MOST EFFICIENT WAY TO GET THE JOB DONE AND THE FASTEST WAY TO LEARN. We also don't do it in production.

Meanwhile back at the ranch I'm dealing with change and keeping my mouth shut isn't going to fly. Neither is channeling Iago and being complacent. Oh well. Plan B.

Aren't we all fish of one sort or another (actually, no.) At some point a tree climber or somebody with a tree comes along and says, CLIMB THAT TREE, FISH! And haven't most of us been brought up believing if we can't climb the tree there's something very wrong here? Yep. Well, OK, that's worked well enough in the past because I'm stubborn and I'll nearly kill my fishy self getting up that tree but yesterday something snapped and I guess I just dug my fins in and said, hell no.

I should back up a bit because I don't think I would have said hell no if I hadn't been recently traumatized.

I was asked to write a report to extract some data from a database where in a lot of cases we're not trying to get data OUT, we just want to get data in and then we want to report on it. I'm really good at getting data in. Generally there's one native way to get all data out and then there are a bunch of third party tools to get it out differently. I know how to use those tools but TheBigBank doesn't have access to those tools or at least my department doesn't and even though I could hook it up pretty quick if they'd just give me access and half a day it's not going to happen. OK. So my boss points me to the one built in tool that hasn't been upgraded since about, oh, I don't know, 1993? And says, write it. Write the code that will extract the data like this and this and this and this and I say, um, OK, but I've never actually used that tool, just so ya know so it's going to take awhile and hopefully you've got some templates and the help files are still around and YOU know how to do this so you could give me a couple of pointers.

Him:    And you call yourself an Essbase geek?

Me:    Yeah. I do.

Him:    You don't write reports.

Me:    No. I don't. Don't know anyone who does either so there isn't going to be a lifeline to call on this one.

Him:    I do.

Me:    OK, good. And you want me to write reports too so I'm going to go back to my desk and work this out, OK? Do you have a template?

Him:    Yes.

Me:    Could you give me a brief tour of your db so I know where to start?

Him:    Yes. And then bring it back to me and we'll go over it. Do this as efficiently as possible (I just want to make it work, OK? We'll get to efficient after the fact).

Me:    OK.

So I went back to my desk. He asked if I didn't want to stand in his cube and do it with him. I said no, it would be better if I could do it at my desk so I could write and pull and write and pull until I got what I was looking for. I explained this is how I learn. He left me alone.

A couple hours later I was done except for a little tweaking because a renaming command wasn't working as expected. We called over the super consultant because my boss didn't know why not either and in the end we all made it work.

I played some more and finally got what I wanted.

There was shock in our cube row. My boss said, 'That was good a good thing (as if you would have thrown my ass out the door if I'd failed?).' My co-worker said, 'Wow. Can you show me how to do that later?' I said (with my inside voice, 'you bastards. was this really necessary?')

To shorten the story a bit I made the mistake of trusting him to have checked my work because I really do not know the data at this point, don't know the business model all that well and surely do not have a relationship with the rather massive db yet. We, my co-worker and I were about to implement the change into the db and he (my boss) said, maybe you should test that first, run it in backup and then test it. Alecto will build you a test report in Excel to validate data (and you, my peer, don't know how to build this yourself why?) and you'll run it tonight and if it's good you'll kick off the new build with the changes in the morning.

I think he knew I was going to fail.

I got a text message at 9 which read:

duffus.

I picked up the phone and called my peer and said:

Me:    What the hell happened?

Him:    The numbers don't tie.

Me:    Why not?

Him:    Because you fucked something up.

Me:    Exactly what, please?

Him:    I don't know.

Me:    OK, this is your data and your db. I don't know them well enough yet to make any sort of call on what doesn't tie and why not. What do you think is off.

Him:    I don't know. I only know the validation sheet isn't all zeros.

Me:    OK, so you know how to do a roll back and run the prior build, right?

Him:    Yes.

Me:    OK, I'll see you in the morning.

In the morning I arrived in an absolute state and started drilling into the extract and the db and trying to figure out why the data I extracted didn't equal the data in the db from which I pulled. (boss wasn't in yet) In the mean time Peer kept telling me it wasn't my fault. I gave Peer a look and said, 'listen, buddy, it isn't about fault, it's about accountability and I am accountable for any system change I make and call good. Period. I should have said, 'I made a change and I'm comfortable with the change but I'm not comfortable with the change in production'.

He didn't get it.

In the end it was a very simple error. On my part. My boss knew what it was before he even saw the files.

So. Not a big deal. I learned two things. First, this is his teaching style and he never would have let it go to production without a test. Second, I really do own any change I make soup to nuts whether I'm ready for it or not. But I was traumatized.

Later he came by my cube after he realized Peer had contacted me the night before (because I TOLD him to) and said he was glad I'd come in. I gave him a horrified look and asked him why on earth I wouldn't have come in. He said I could have been the type to refuse to get out of bed or the type to get into bed with a bottle of vodka or the type to come in and pretend it didn't happen or the type to come in and figure out what the hell happened. He said it was good what I did. I was as horrified as when he said it was a good thing I wrote the report.

Maybe I shouldn't take so much of this to heart but the way I see it is this; you hired me for a reason. I figure you hired me because I said I was all of these things and now you want me to prove these things as opposed to just accepting I am who I am unless I suddenly start not being those things. Maybe that's the culture. Maybe that's just who you are but quite honestly I'm astonished. I can pass your tests, I don't doubt that at all, but I think we'd be a lot more productive if you actually gave me something to work on that wasn't such a panic and I maybe learned what was going on around here from, oh, let's say, the baseline? Just a thought. I'd love to spend some time getting to know your database as opposed to spending literally hours sitting behind Peer watching him add users to the system as if he's teaching me rocket science (maybe security IS rocket science to him but this sure isn't showing me much of the db) and then periodically throwing tests from the other side of the spectrum at me.

I rant.

Anyway, it's mid-afternoon on Friday and I've finally gotten my heart rate below 120 and I have a new assignment only this time it's on a db where there is no way, apparently to test it. I'm to learn in theory entirely. My boss will be the machine. I will go to my desk and write the code without benefit of any sort of test. I will come back to him and tell him why I think this will work and he will tell me what will happen. I will have ample opportunity to look like a complete ass and he will have ample opportunity to judge my baseline today. I don't think so, buddy. Also, I don't learn that way.

Me:    So you want me to learn by the theory model?

Him:    That's all we have.

Me:    (beet red in the face probably) OK. I'll do that for you if that's what you really want but I don't learn that way (we've been talking a lot about identifying the way I learn so that I can learn the way I need to learn). I am applied learner. I need a test environment. It can even be a very small subset. I'll build it.

(data point - Unless I'm really missing something, someone is lacking in imagination. Any subset of code can be tested in a subset of data and any subset of data can be stored in a subset of db and I can build, in this paricular model a subset of this db so why are we doing this?!)

Him:    That won't work, it needs to be the whole thing.

Me:    (I must have looked like hell) OK.

Him:    I know you're going to want me to give you the answers but I'm not going to do that.

Me:    (I'm guessing you can imagine what I was thinking and I want props for not saying it) If you're testing me and I think you are, I don't ever want you to give me the answers.

Him:    What makes you think I'm testing you?

Me:    If you were only trying to teach me something we'd both be better off with you giving me the tools that work for me, telling me the what and the why and setting me loose with it.

And then I went back to my desk.

Ten minutes later we were building a test database in a new environment.

I don't think he's even aware of what he's doing.

And I don't think it's even relevant. It's a data-point. For both of us.

Spending my time mad and panicked isn't going to help. 

And if a fish judges a tree frog on his ability to swim in a pond or even understand a fish without explanation we're going to have a few problems, Houston.

It is reasonable and responsible to reverse that metaphor.

gods grant me the serenity to avoid eating the Tree Frog's eyeballs for he is really a very sensitive Tree Frog and once when somebody told him he was intimidating and wouldn't tell him why (that was a very mean and passive agressive thing to do to him) he got all red in the face (and not in the mad way either) and stayed that way for a very long time.

Nobody here but us chickens

OK, now I remember. It's just been awhile. Whew. Soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.... here's how this works. Every time. I swearz to it.

Alecto and Abrupt Change. Not so good. A little bit of Aspberger's perhaps; not to belabor the point but well, yeah, kind of. And if that's offensive because you don't like labels or maybe you're attached to that one, too bad. I've co-opted it for the time being given it's become as broad scope as schizophrenia in the late eighties as to become applicable for... you name it. Anyway, I figured if it's good enough for New Jersey, it's good enough for me. Have I pissed anybody off yet? Probably have to work harder than that around here but good lord, I'm on a rip. Bear with me, I'm trying to make a point AND get this out of my system. I have to go back to work this morning and

THERE'S NOBODY HERE BUT US CHICKENS!

Nope, that wasn't it. Try again.

THERE'S NOBODY HERE TO WIPE ME OFF WHEN I DROOL ALL OVER MYSELF!

Yep, that's about the truth of it.

Whoo boy.

Dammit.

So what I totally forgot was that I'm supposed to shut my mouth and tell myself I'm temporarily insane for as long as it takes to acclimate. Every single time. Yep. Always. Each and every move. Totally forgot that. There is to be no inflicting Alecto into the environment until Alecto has acclimated. Alecto is to be kept in an isolation chamber until acclimated. Anybody can make an isolation chamber, it's...

Sort of like introducing a fish into a new tank. You leave the fish in the bag of water it came home in and float it (THE FISH!!!) in the tank. In it's bag of water. For as long as it takes. Before you release it into the tank. It's also a DYI project. By the way.

In the mean time what I'm supposed to be doing is channeling the most insipidly agreeable person I know.

Iago.

Works every time.

TOE TAL LY 4-got.

Can somebody pass the drool cup?

Pliz and thenk you,

The Lizard Queen

Snippets

"Contribute will not validate the HTML code snippet for logical accuracy." heh.

Disaster Planning 101 - how to pay the mortgage with a debit card - check. Oh wait. There's other stuff. Never mind, I think that's resolved too. This is all assuming I'll work out the missing January 15 pay period in time to cover the mortgage but will not have worked out the kinks in the system in time for a direct deposit by January 31. Done done and done. Or done enough.

Elizabeth made the microwave get warm. She was irritated with it and me and so turned it on with nothing in it and then made me put my hand on the warm carousel. We haven't tried food yet but there's definitely something going on with the women in this household. You can only find this funny and I don't mean funny in terms of 'it's funny they *can* do that sort of battle with small household appliances' but it's funny 'they *will* go to the trouble to do battle with small household appliances'. In an offhand sort of way. Nobody got very excited about this and I also noticed nobody bothered trying it with actual food. Now THAT was interesting. Let's not push the envelope, right? Mom wants the damn thing dead and maybe it's better to just leave it that way, or at least quasi dead because she'll probably just kill it again anyway. It is entirely possible that Elizabeth is saving it from me for herself. After school snacks and all that because after Disaster Planning 101 it became painfully obvious that no matter what sort of sale Best Buy might be advertising, Mom was ONLY going to Best Buy for a power strip. Oh wait. Not going to Best Buy. Going to Wally World for a power strip and dog food and charcoal biscuits for that dog's breath and some anti-bacterial soap because she's got a bald spot... ack.

Snippets from the household.

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I neglected to send the farewell email at The Factory. I blamed this on running out of time and then justified it by telling myself I'd spoken directly to my nearest and dearest or sent a few emails or been called on my treacherous departure directly. After that I went for the 'there are just too many of them and somebody will feel left out' and after that the 'I'd need separate lists because I have separate things to say to separate groups' and that turned into 'how can I send one giant generic note that doesn't look like I've sent one massive list to the entire company which just is not done?' And in the end I did nothing. So now they've come looking for me because the rumors have started that I've been escorted out of the Ivory Tower and instead of saying good-bye after the fact I'm defusing the rumors via LinkedIn email. And I'm probably disclosing more information than I should. Filter, please.

Good Lord.

And it's finally cold out there. Really and truly cold which I realize is subjective because it was only three years ago that I drove to the train station and watched the thermometer on the dash slowly move into the negative and then bundled up for the just under one mile walk from the station to the office in high winds which would have brought the temps with windchill WELL below zero. That was a God Awful winter anyway. Shawn Colvin would call it a Nuclear Winter and I would have to agree. I was numb anyway. So this morning the temps have dropped to 13 F (although Google offers a high of 29 F but doesn't say when exactly that might occur) and I'm feeling it in the house which is no colder and no warmer than it is on any other day but somehow my body KNOWS this (absurd, dammit) and does NOT want to go outside. Actually, I have an overwhelming need, not desire, need to hibernate. Now. Right this second. Until spring.

The walls that should have been thin in November are finally thin in January which is almost February which, if I recall is the hardest month for those of us who tend to bump up against those walls on a regular basis.

Television commercials. I have a hard time working out what they're actually advertising these days and I don't know if it's me or maybe the whole thing has become so subliminal as to become ridiculously effective. Anyway, one of them has stolen (borrowed?) Newton's law of motion and there are at least two versions of this, one for each easily identifiable gender. A man or a woman is sitting and not likely to get up any time soon (Although both of them look relatively healthy so maybe they're depressed? they don't look sad. Are they uncomfortable? Maybe that's it.). But then they get up and start moving slowly. The man is walking with his dog and walks a little faster until he's playing with the dog, thus saving the dog and maybe himself. The woman gets on a bike and rides off with her husband, thus saving the relationship and maybe herself.

I'd rather hibernate, personally but I wouldn't care for the results. The alternative is to get myself moving and keep moving. Period. I have a shit list today and it looks like this:

1. Write Cletus's quarterly tax checks (she has eAccounts which so far have precluded checks but I think we can fix that for 2012 so she can complete the entire process by herself).
2. Find the paperwork for Cletus's quarter filing (I buried it).
3. Get the Christmas tree out of the house. Really, Alecto? That thing is STILL here?! Yep. Really. I was busy and then I wasn't moving.
4. Buy groceries, a power strip and dog food. Charcoal biscuits and anti-bacterial soap are good too.
5. Find the missing failed emissions paperwork. Damn. The problem is fixed but the paperwork has gone poof.
6. Laundry - do some. Clean clothes are a good thing.
7. Remove the last of the wreckage from the house - almost there.
8. Wash the balding puppy.
9. .....
10. .......

I have no idea what 9 and 10 are. I just happen to know that once I start moving I tend to keep moving and then other things happen. I've also noticed that sometimes, not all the times, but some of the times, the movement pushes the thin walls outward. That's kind of cool.

The Projectionist

I am bothered and fraught with bad bothersome fraughtful dreams from which I wake periodically and consider rolling myself out of bed. Nope. Too early. It's Sunday after a dance and I want to heal my body more than I want to avoid the bothersome fraughtness. Eventually my body is uncomfortable from laying in bed and I get up but not before I've had several discussions with the dream projectionist about the current selection.

Speaking of which, who or what is the dream projectionist anyway? Never thought of that before but the image that popped right up is a little old man behind a dusty old projector in a dusty old theater smelling of slightly rancid buttered popcorn (the real stuff, not today's grease) and spilled soda and gum stuck to the bottom of stuffy plush seats some of which have been turned into mouse condos; none of which is unpleasant, by the way. The little old man is not making the selections; he's feeding the reels into the projector as the reels are fed into the room. This sounds about right and now that I've written it I don't think I need to question the gender anymore. I'm OK with that. I do wish he'd turn around and pass back my request for A LITTLE LESS NOISE, PLEASE though. Maybe he did. I slept a long time.

Last night a funny thing happened. I was hungry at about 1:30 in the morning because I didn't eat before dancing and then wasn't hungry until I'd been still for awhile and wandered into the kitchen looking for leftovers. Found a bit of pasta and sauce in a jar and put them together and put the plate in the six year old microwave and before I pushed the buttons I had two thoughts:

1. This particular microwave has at least another two years of life left in it; maybe even three.
2. I wish it would break right this second so I could get one of the few remaining pieces of him out of my house. (he bought the damn thing the same way he bought the television on a whim when we'd agreed not to for the time being and therefore the 'himness' of the damn thing still hung around in my kitchen)

I put the plate in the microwave and closed the door. I touched the one minute button and heard an odd electronic pop and then the fan started up and the carousel went around and the microwave continued to do its thing until the minute was up and I felt up the rotini to test. Still cold. OK, one more minute. Same thing but no pop at the beginning this time. Sauce still cold. Try another 30 seconds. Damn. This thing is dead as a doornail. Pulled the plate out of the box, dumped the contents into a small saucepan and heated it up on the stove top in under a minute (because that induction stove means business).

I killed the microwave. Used to be just streetlamps. I'd be driving on the highway or a side street and suddenly an entire string of the damn things would go out one after another as I drove under them. It was absolutely unnerving for my passengers if they experienced it more than once; I'd gotten used to it. This only happened in times of bothered fraughtness. I have no idea why it stopped. Maybe it didn't. Maybe I just don't notice anymore and there aren't any passengers to be bothered.

I am fraught about the Contra Dance with its diminishing rate of return, internal strife and dependencies that threaten to sink it into oblivion (just my home dance). I am fraught about the finality of the last things I'll be taking back in terms of control of my life and my finances. I am fraught over the uncertainty of my new job; that small bit of administrative surety that ought to exist like company bedrock supporting the business so that it can do it's job or so the new employee can focus on something, anything other than wondering if she is actually an employee at all. How much of this have I caused out of my own panic and fear of absolute change? Possibly quite a bit if you consider the microwave.

I am disaster planning as my first husband used to accuse me on a regular basis. What if this happens? What will we do? We will do this and then this and then this is how we will be alright. Here are all the ways we can fall through the ice and here is how we will survive if we do fall at all these break points. I never understood why he was so upset about all that. He never understood why I insisted on pointing my car toward oncoming traffic when I kept yelling IF I DON'T KEEP AN EYE ON THINGS WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!!!!!!!!!

So much so much is not the same as too much too much but there it all is anyway. Who the hell do *I* think is feeding the projectionist? He's just taking what comes in the door I suppose. The Lizard is in the basement hyperventilating. For those of you with Lizards that are periodically out of hand it's really very helpful if you just get YOUR heart rate up higher than the Lizard for an extended period of time. You win, the Lizard looses and sits down for a sulk. Endorphins: Your best friend.

This occurs to me:

If I don't settle down and breathe pretty soon I'm going to be blowing up a lot more than small appliances. That would be bad.

Lake Michigan

yep. firefox did it. typepad isn't prepared to cope with i.e. 9 at this point although they did suggest I join a beta team (no comment). bank of america online banking (I live there), on the other hand is a disaster with both i.e. 9 and firefox. this should not be a surprise to anyone.

So here's my lizard. Last weekend I think. I took the picture last weekend? Anyway, this was where and how I left her when I left the house on Monday morning. This is not the where and how of my lizard today but we don't need to get into that. OK, maybe we do. Maybe what I'm not going to do is post any photographs. That would be a horrible breech of trust; she'd never forgive me. I'm not even going to photograph the wreckage but I will tell you the tiara is in multiple pieces and I'm going to be scrubbing the lip gloss off the walls for a long time. Oh wait. All I have to do is let the dogs keep licking it off and that's only going to take a few more days. I needed to paint anyway. I have no idea what happened to the mirror but I do know there was duct tape involved by Thursday. Purple duct tape. Half a roll of it. Thank you, Butters.

So. Week One.

I'm still sort of afraid to talk about this for the same reason I didn't want to talk about it all that much during the getting there process; it was all just too weird to the point of me wondering if this was really going to happen since it all seemed to be happening in a backasswards sort of way. Or improbable or something like that. And also I didn't want to jinx it. I still don't want to jinx it because for a lot of reasons I do want to be there. My Facebook status changed at least once this week (and probably only once because by the time I dragged my sorry self in the door each night I surely was NOT logging onto anything remotely resembling a computer) to Alecto Learned Something Yesterday.

I was going to add (and it was really cool!) but decided to leave it as that because there was a lot more going on than learning a bit of unknown script, syntax and context in an archaic tool to prove a point while underfire and probably being tested and some of that wasn't the least bit cool. And that's OK too. Falls into the Good To Know bucket.

Anyway. The rest of what I want to talk about is going to be kind of dicey because part of one of the many things I've already signed is a non-disclosure form specifically relating to blogs, Facebook and other social networking sites. It's OK to talk about the company but you'd better be very, very careful. Those weren't the exact words but the point was made and the reasons are perfectly obvious the first of which is keyword search. The rest will become readily apparent.

The company produces absolutely nothing BUT is in a business that is absolutely counter to the way I live my life with a few exceptions. The first thing that jumped out at me during orientation was the internal mission to do away with cash in the world. As I began to process this little bit of internal kool-aid I reached into my virtual backpack and did two things simultaneously: I laid a large flat piece of kryptonite on top of the lizard umbilicus (AS IF, but desperate times call for desperate measures) and pulled out a handful of filters and strapped them on all at once. Unfortunately a filter only covers the mouth; it does nothing about facial expression above the mouth. I've been told I have the most incredibly expressive eyes and even through six or seven layers of filter a few squeaks got out on Monday.

In any case, once filtered I started looking for ways to get around The Borg problem because I'm a user of the WRONG BRAND because my bank is a user of the WRONG BRAND and if I want to buy lunch at the cafeteria I'm going to get away with using cash for awhile (at a 5% surcharge - let me explain - you get a discount for using the CORRECT BRAND OF DEBIT OR CREDIT CARD but tell me, what does that really mean?) but eventually it's going to become patently obvious that I've failed to assimilate. I will call my bank and attempt to get them to issue the correct flavor debit card but I don't know that they're franchised correctly. The rest of the explanation is irrelevant; let's just say I walked face first into a war on cash I'm not going to win. The way out is to find the way around, under or over it. I'm sure I'll work it out one way or another without having to bring my lunch every single day no matter what.

That was minor; just a bit of culture shock. Sort of funny from 500 feet back.

Getting lost in the system is not so funny. Notice the present tense. I'm still lost in the system. There is no electronic verifiable record of employment. I am not technically insured. Yes. I have a printout of my insurance paperwork which proves that I made the proper elections within the 30 day period and I did this online and then printed the document after submission. When I went back to the portal everything but my two dependents had vanished. Everything. My name and address exist but my payroll information does not. At no point have I been asked for my beneficiary information. I am automatically enrolled in a 401k at 6% and the only way to change that is to find the enrollment option online. It's not there. Well, that's not really a problem if I'm not getting paid because I don't exist.

Ah. And then there's the issue of actually getting paid. Let's say they find me but my direct deposit information is lost. The alternative is not a live check. That's not done. The alternative is a front loaded debit card mailed to my house. A pin number? That would be created online. Except I'd have to be able to find myself first. None of this is even remotely funny.

It gets worse. People care. There is a woman checking on me almost daily. She's panicked because if I'm not smiling my boss isn't smiling or somebody isn't smiling because I think they're afraid I'll just leave and go back to my old job or something. I haven't unpacked a single personal item (and it's not because I'm thinking about not staying, it's because I haven't had time). There are plenty of people trying to make this work but nobody doing anything I can see about fixing it the old fashioned way; through the back door with paper forms, fax machines and phone calls. And I've asked, I really have.

I have no doubt that all of this will eventually work itself out. The real battle I'm fighting is with myself.

I'm going to have to continue to intercede because nobody else is going to do it, at least not until it becomes painfully obvious. The battle is continuing to intercede without losing my shit. That part of the battle is understanding this is not all about me; this isn't about me at all actually. This is about me learning to navigate in a world so different from anything I've ever been in other than in a consulting capacity that I could very well drown myself if I can't keep from thrashing.

And there's more. The politics. OF COURSE THERE ARE POLITICS YOU RIDICULOUS WOMAN! Pass the filters, please!

So here's the bottom line. None of this is a real surprise. Not even the disappearing into the murk of the system or the slowness to resolve the problem because I had a good heads up on that when my background check got way out of hand. The fact that my boss may or may not be testing me shouldn't be a surprise either; at least not really. I could see that coming too. And I passed, by the way, sort of shocking the shit out of both of us although neither of us really should have been shocked.

None of this is a surprise. My point is (and clearly I'm going to have to keep dragging myself back to this) I made a clear and conscious choice to take this job for a number of reasons. In theory I understood the lake which turned out to be a Great Lake (but at least it's not an ocean). In practice is another thing entirely.

In theory I know perfectly well I can swim. In practice the question is whether or not I will actually do it. Or will I thrash and drown?

I don't think I'll thrash and drown but I do need to make a little less noise, please...

That poor lizard...

Oh. And you do understand what I've described above is just the tip of the iceburg, yes? Just the tip. There is oh so much more... :-) and a good bit of it IS indeed, very, very funny from 500 feet back.

And. Oh crap. See, this is part of the problem. I have entirely failed to mention the part where I'm entirely fascinated with the technical part of what I've walked into. This means I'm mostly not focused on it. It doesn't mean I'm not focusing on it when I'm in the building because I am. It means what I'm bringing home are my fears and my worries and my insecurities.

And my...

WTF have I gotten myself into?

Lake Michigan. That's what. So start swimming. Roll over on your back and rest. Do that dead man's float business if you must. Dog paddle periodically. Tread water. Breast stroke (it's your best). Learn new stuff in private mostly and suck it up when you have to learn new stuff with your boss over your shoulder. Be patient with your co-worker; he can't help it and besides, he's an awfully nice guy. Shut your mouth for the first 30 days. Smile at everybody. Be grateful.

OK. That's better.

Filter Firmly in Place

 

Well *I* don't know if you can see this or not. I think I can post now but I sure can't insert a picture. I.E. 9 on a 64 bit machine; friends just don't let friends do this sort of thing. Best Buy can bite my sweet 47 year old post Bikram ass.

OK. I lied about the filter. No. I didn't lie. I have a gross of fresh filters ready to be slammed into place at a moment's notice but like a wet nappy the old one has to come off first... you get the picture.

I've spent the last two days with my jaw on the ground and that's all I got to say about that. Culture shock; I'm dog paddling. I'm probably going to have to roll over on my back now and then and work out how to just sort of float because at one point I had to resort to a sort of dead man's float and that didn't go over so well but let me tell you...

it beat the hell out of

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!!!

Nothing is wrong with these people; nothing at all, actually. I've just never been here before other than in the backdoor as a consultant so at least I recognize it.

A lot of deep breaths and Cielo, thank you for the Lizard distractions. I'm off now. There's an all hands meeting in the auditorium and I have SO MUCH TO SAY.

(not in the meeting. seriously. I realize how that just sounded up there. I have so much to say HERE. I'll be back)

I sure do hope this thing posts.

grin.

Last Day at the Factory - Update 01-10-12

Update 01-10-12: Well this sort of piggy back posting works for the time being. I guess. :-) Yesterday was just short of bizarre. Big company. Wait. Let me be clear. BIGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG company. Did I mention big? Yes. Very, very, very big. Not biggish, not middlin' big, or pretty close to big or might be getting to big one of these days but all the way big as in Globally Super Sized Big. Gulp. I like my team. They need a girl. I don't know if they know they need a girl but I'm pretty sure they need a girl. I'm going to need to brush off my girl skills for sure. I also need to be on time. I'm also not allowed to touch anything at the moment. This is very distressing. I'll get over it. Okbai.

Update: I would tell you all about my last day... I would love to tell you all about my last day but for some reason typepad is deeply unhappy with me and I can't create a new post. Hell, I can't even add a new photograph to an existing post. So sad. I can, however, add a bit to an existing post. :-) Yes, I'm ready for tomorrow. More of less. Probably should do some laundry.

I don't know why it's never occurred to me to call it the factory before; after all, we're a giant manufacturing conglomerate. I feel like I'm in high school and I'm about to graduate and I've earned the right after four years (except in my case it's almost been six) to include the fabled statement as part of my 300 character max personal statement below my senior photo:

Four Years and Never Been Scoped

Which roughly translated means (meant), 'I've been here for four years and you guys haven't caught me doing ANYTHING (now fill in the blanks, i.e., getting stoned on school property, sneaking off school property during school hours, blah blah blah)'

Except I haven't been naughty I've just managed to be employed (or under contract) for just under

SIX YEARS AND NEVER VISITED AN ACTUAL PLANT

of any sort. There are many sorts. We're incredibly diversified.

And yet I know all about them. I know what we make, how we make it, how we sell it, how we cross sell, who works where, on what shop floors, what our safety records look like and what we do to make sure we stay safe (and OH we've gotten so much better in the last five years since that database was implemented and I could watch - and I watch because I'm an analyst and I can't help myself and also because I just happen to think those calcs are really cool and part of me is sort of disappointed we're not tracking the actual OSHA stuff in that db anymore and I can't see lost body parts specifically and go ahead and say it, good LORD but that woman is morbid - hey! specific body parts are important. I won't go into it other than to tell you that a thumb is a lot more of a problem than let's say, a pinky and we don't want anybody to be losing any body parts but you see where I'm going here...I like to know HOW an in which ways we're doing better I'll shut up now).

I'm not saying I'm proud of the fact that I've never been on a shop floor. I just find it interesting in an abstract sort of way. I don't travel and a good many employees are simply shipped out so they do see the business for the sake of seeing the business and I just never did. I wonder if I'll be sorry about this at some point. Personally? I'm pretty sure I'm avoiding the real issue.

I've been tearing at my skin for sure.

It isn't that I don't want to leave the company; it hasn't been about that in years. I don't want to leave the team I'm so attached to, the comfort, the safety and the being loved and needed part which is really interesting because I don't have or really seem to want that in a relationship but here it is in a work environment. There is promise of exactly that at the new job AND at the current position, specifically because we are (and I don't get to say or write that again) a triage company I am utterly expendable anyway. People will deal with it if they have too. We will not come to a screeching halt. It's happened before. Anyway, I don't think I really saw this until I started going nuts about the documentation.

And it wasn't just a series of bulleted lists.

It was formal documentation.

With screen shots and call outs and step by step instructions.

And tables of contents.

And headers and footers.

And chapters and section breaks.

REALLY?!!!

Yep. Really.

It's legacy stuff. This is more about who I am and what I choose to leave behind.

I did this last time too. I made a technical and user operation guide of the sort they'd never seen before. And the time before that I made two types of online training for sale that had the potential to be extremely lucrative if marketed correctly and based on the fact that the website is still up they may still be running and making money eight years later. And the time before that at The Castle I left an awful lot behind when I could see what was coming instead of sitting back and letting it happen.

I don't really know what this is all about. The easy answer is ego. The more complex answer is, please don't forget about me because I surely will not be forgetting about you. I never do. I have memories of people that go so far back I can't even remember their names but their faces are carved into the woodwork of my past as far back as I can recall through every childhood move and then through every job change. Sometimes I miss them terribly and wonder where they are. I hope they miss me sometimes too.

I was 21 already married and pregnant with Numbah One Son in 1985 when The Breakfast Club showed up in theaters and I have to admit that damn movie blew me away. I was almost Ally Sheedy, or at least that's about as close as I can get to identifying with that particular cast (truly, it was NOT that bad, but close in terms of being a social misfit). Might explain why I made a family as fast as I possibly could. That's another post though.

So I'm sad, sad, sad and it's time to go.

The work upfront - a personal documentary

This public posting business on Typepad started five years ago (anything posted prior to Jan 2, 2007 was pre-dated and added after the fact) today with a post titled  The work upfront  and I was struggling with the bare minimum of creating something beautiful or even functional that didn't come right out of the box. I was struggling with identifying myself. I was struggling with navigation. I had JUST become aware that I had an audience or the possibility of an audience or that I could be found online at all. I was clearly aware on some level that I wanted to think or speak out loud without fear of censor (being fired). In re-reading the post I am stunned at where I held myself in the world; inferior, named or identified by others or my past without a great deal of conscious thought. There are two things that strike me though and they are right at the beginning:

"For a fairly creative person I find setup for things like this site remarkably tedious. I almost quit and went back to my msn space because I had to come up with a new name right off the bat."

I identified myself as creative AND, despite the fact that I wanted to quit, I did not.

That's kinda cool. It isn't really new information but five years of documented evidence is five years of documented evidence and this is probably the first time I looked back and laughed about it.

Anyway. Every year I do something around this time. Sometimes it's a look back, sometimes it's a look forward and I suspect (I haven't checked the posts) it's generally in bulleted list format but I didn't get out of bed this morning feeling like a bulleted list. I woke up with my heart pounding in my chest and my stomach somewhere between knots and nausea. I'm pretty sure I'm not sick but I am a little freaked out. I did NOT want to get up. I was having the sort of dreams that didn't seem to have a lot to do with me or my life directly and that was just fine, nothing to worry about but the dogs clearly wanted out and the thought of Leafy possibly sneaking off to have a pee on the other side of the bed was enough for a peak at the crackberry which informed me that it was 9:41 and her bladder wasn't going to hold out much longer AND I was clearly avoiding. Knots and heart palpitations. I stuck my head back under the covers and Leafy did not settle back down.

Damn. Ok Fine.

OK. So. The life of this particular blog encompasses a couple of things almost completely and if I throw in the msn blog which wasn't all that personal yet (reflective stories from the past; I was working on my writing) I cover nearly six years and THAT encompasses an entire chapter in my life. I started blogging right before I started my current job (as in weeks, maybe even days) and about 4 months into my last marriage. I'd call that an entire chapter.

Once a complete stranger read this blog (um, OK, everybody starts out as a complete stranger) after a search on Lizard Brain and after following the link back I found she'd quoted an entire paragraph and then linked back to the post. I believe she said I was one of the most emotionally honest people (bloggers? writers?) she'd read and also used the term gonzo which I had to look up because I only thought Muppets and had forgotten Mr. Thompson entirely.

You know, I really am wondering about my stomach right about now.

In less than a week I'm going to step into a lake with no known bottom, some sort of place I've absolutely never been and I'm going without a safety net real or perceived. I feel like I'm standing in front of whatever you call one of those heavy steel garage doors they use at police stations in really unsafe areas; they're called Maria Somethings or Something Marias and I learned about them in Belfast. I've never been inside one of these things but I remember being told about them and driving past the outside of one and I think there are a series of doors you drive through with prisoners if you're a bit worried about things and I imagined a series of heavy steal doors that would slam down from the top and no amount of gunfire or bombs or what have you would even make a dent and there wouldn't be any getting out either. Anyway, I sort of feel like I'm standing on the thresh hold of the last of these doors and come Friday evening when I turn in my badge that door is going to slam shut behind me and that's going to be that. I'm going to leave Stamford and C_Corp and the illusion of the male safety net (however frayed that net's become because God knows I've been chewing like a hoard or rats at that netting myself but let's face it, as long as I'm in Stamford it's there one way or another).

Well no wonder I'm having heart palpitations and my stomach is in knots and I'm feeling a bit on the barfy side. I'm OK with that, by the way. I know how to swim. And do you know I'm not exactly sure what I'm going to be doing at TheBigBank (which is not, by the way a bank at all)? I'm not really clear at all. I'm so unclear as to be willing to bet I don't have a freaking clue. And do you know I'm OK with that? You know how people like to have five year and ten year plans and they get all funny about their career paths and all that and they have bulleted lists of what they must accomplish by when and apparently (and I JUST found this out) they also have bulleted lists which are often far more substantial than the accomplishment lists of things they will not do?! And these lists often include places they aren't willing to live. Who knew? Anyway, I have never had a list like that or a plan or really much of anything and for a long time I used to feel like there was something really wrong with me. I'm looking backwards though and I'm seeing a few places where this has worked out really well.

1. I have never been bored.
2. I have had multiple career changes that have been effortless (effortless is subjective, OK? I had to work my ASS off at every. single. change. in order to succeed and apparently that's just not done because it falls into the category of 'not my problem' or 'not in my job description' or 'somebody needs to spoon feed me this shit until I get it'.).
3. I have always had a boatload of fun EVEN when the shit was hitting the fan right up until I wasn't having any sort of fun anymore and then, looking back, I wasn't there much longer.
4. I have been all the way up (all the way up is also subjective. I've been as all the way up as I care to go. I think?) and all the way back down the ladder and I've got to tell you, THAT takes some doing to shake off the 'up' when you're intentionally on the way back down and it isn't an ego thing so much as a needing to shift your perspective thing and also if you don't do it carefully you can get a near fatal case of the bends.
5. I have always been successful (successful also being subjective BUT they were my goals) AND I have had some signicant failures getting to those successes.
   1. Not afraid of scrapes and bruises?
   2. No idea I'm not immortal?
   3. Is this almost the same thing?

Once when Florkow and I still lived at The Castle and really hadn't been there all that long there was a merger and it looked like there was going to be a big Game Over and instead of experiencing fear I was upset there might be a big Game Over because I WASN'T DONE PLAYING THE GAME. Dammit. We were sitting at a bar, me, Sparky, Florkow and probably our forth and I was literally seeing a combination of the old Space Invaders game and a pinball machine. Seriously. And I remember sitting there thinking I could play this one of two ways; I could go all out, hell bent or I could play it safe. Playing it safe would suck beyond belief. I remember thinking if I went for it, played with everything I had, risked it all I might get a great big Game Over stamped on my forehead pretty damn quick but if I chose to sit back and be safe the game would be over right then and there. I might still have a job but I'd be one of the walking dead.

I had two young children to support, an ex-husband who still needed money from me to buy heating oil on occasion and my soon to be second husband made enough money to cover his half of the rent. Yep, that falls into the category of 'I was pretty sure I was immortal' even though I knew I could die (refer to 'I might get a great big Game Over stamped on my forehead').

Has that changed? Was I scared when I went to The Castle? I think so (I was REALLY excited). I don't think I was AS scared. I was sure as shit NOT leaving behind anything safe, real or perceived. I was different then. I dreamed differently. I experienced an abundance of energy, time, love and youth.

There was no chapter like this last one. I hadn't come out of ANYTHING I would have really experienced as staggering (although I might have said differently). Ever. I don't think I'd ever even been brought to my knees and there'd been some bad shit in my life and there was definitely some serious lunacy, no doubt. I was just a long way from burning through my reserves but I was burning through them at an alarming rate and with absolutely no level of consciousness. I'd put that into the category of 'I was pretty sure I was immortal'.

1996:    I had to work really hard to get the job at The Castle

2010:    The job at TheBigBank came after me

So. OK. I think we've covered that. This doesn't make me immortal; it just means a career path has occurred that built up a particular set of cross functional skills in an industry that still happens to need this talent set which I happen to have BECAUSE I don't care to be boxed with bullets. HR Generalists HATE me.

So. OK. Fluidity and Surrender. You know, I've been accused of refusing to surrender my entire life one way or another. And I think I just got really mad (at myself too, so smile because I am). The accusations of refusing to surrender were always angry and often spiteful and hateful and incredibly hurtful and now I think about it came out of frustration with me because my resistance to being controlled is epic and I guarantee you isn't because I'm a pain in the ass. It's because I experience it as having my head held under water and I honest to God think I'm going to die. Hell, I'm not even conscious of it when it's happening (which is probably why the thrashing is epic). I *have* consciously tried very hard to be a good girl in the past. I tried VERY hard to be a good girl in my last marriage. Jesus Christ, you have no idea how hard I tried. It's positively shameful in retrospect. I don't think I have an issue with surrender; I think I'm obstinate and I think there's a world of difference. So to all the people in my life who presented the opportunity for me to feel really freaking bad about myself for refusing and finally for believing I was incapable of surrender (and that this was bad):

Buzz off.

Where was I? Fluidity and Surrender and this blog. I've been a lot of places in the last five years and like my career path I've wandered about, picked up and turned over stones and been presented with a lot of unique opportunities along the way. I've judged myself very harshly. Up until this morning I was fairly certain I'd spent the last three years in a state of non-surrender but I'm having trouble with that right now and the trouble started when I posted the Facebook profile photos in the last entry.

In all of those photos I am smiling and every single memory is intense and good. When I look at those photos the memories are the first thing that come to mind. I have to think about the context that was playing in the background. That's telling because the underlying context was Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (I just like the title but since I TOTALLY stole it, it has to be noted but I'm not drawing any other parallels) and so much of the time felt like a broken record that I kept asking myself when the hell it was going to stop in a state of absolute disgust.

The event at which the very first photograph after the baseline is taken was contrived. OK, maybe contrived isn't the right word for it. I called two old friends from before my marriage but not my courtship and told them what had happened. This was taken in February of 2009 and we met at a restaurant in Grand Central Station (same restaurant, by the way where Cielo and I are photographed together near the bottom in October of 2010). I needed to not be alone on a particular date and so managed to get myself out. So I look back on that photograph and I remember the night out, including when I inhaled a mouthful of wine and ended up coughing it all over the table and how gracefully one woman handled the situation and how cared for I felt; the beginnings of feeling not alone (I don't have a photograph of me and Florkow the morning after the abandonment when she showed up at my doorstep). The photograph that follows immediately was my cousin's wedding in April and I did not want to fly to Jamaica without my husband and I did anyway and I had to renew my passport and I was just finishing the process of changing my last name and in a fit of belief changed it to his last name and flew off with Cletus and this photograph is taken at the reception and when I look at the photograph I see me and Cletus at what became known as 'Alecto and Cletus Have a Romantic Getaway (together) at a Couples Resort in Jamaica' and was one of the most hilarious vacations I've ever taken. The photograph directly below that is the same four days and I'm sitting with my family at the beach which was a very different experience than any other beach vacation we'd taken together for a lot of reasons and quite honestly I'd have to say it topped them all. I believe we were as close right there in that very moment than we'd been in a very long time. So it was because we felt attacked a as a group. Sometimes a slap in the collective face is what it takes to experience your family a little differently.

As you scroll through the photographs it isn't readily obvious what is changing in my life unless you were there but what you're seeing is the time lapse photography of a shift so dramatic that the greatest changes in my life occured in a three year period. If I had a bulleted list of things I would not or could not do ever in my wildest dreams they are on that page. If you'd asked me three years ago to bullet out the things (if I could even have imagined them) that would not happen in my life they are right there in that post. They begin with me reaching out to people I hadn't talked to in years - the first I was pretty sure was still mad at me and the other possessing a personality that by and large scared the shit out of me and getting on a train and sitting upright looking and feeling like a human being just after believing my world ended, and end with me at a contra dance (dancing) with a group of perfect strangers (they weren't strangers by the time the photograph was taken).

If that isn't surrender I don't know how else to define it. Persistent is what got me here. If you're frustrated with me you're going to call it stubborn and obstinate although stubborn and obstinate is what it takes sometimes.

I don't have any photographs of me camping by myself in the Blue Ridge Mountains. It didn't occur to me to ask a stranger to take my picture. I wish it had. I have this last thing though. It counts. I haven't been out on New Years Eve since 1998. I gave up on that sort of celebration a very long time ago. I told myself it was because I didn't like being on the road but little by little the celebration or even acknowledgement of the passing of the old year and beginning of the new stopped entirely until I was asleep by 10. There was a New Year's Day tradition that existed for a couple of years but by and large I simply did way with it because I'd become so incredibly disconnected and what I'd wanted it to mean was no longer a possibility. I wanted a kiss. A kiss of the sort that means, I love you and I'm happy to be with you and in this moment I see you and there is nothing between you and me.

My News Year's Eve was spent with approximately 140 people if you throw in the band when all was said and done and when the second hand hit midnight and the toast of sparkling cider was made and people hugged and kissed (sometimes the people they came with and sometimes complete strangers) Auld Lang Syne was sung and hell, I haven't heard that in years and ALL the words too (I don't even KNOW all the words but somebody told me it was all the words) and I was with MY DAUGHTER and I put my arms around her from behind and kissed the top of her head and it was that sort of kiss that means, I love you and I'm happy to be with you and in this moment I see you and there is nothing between you and me.

And then she looked up at me and she said:

"Mom, I have to tell you this. You know how sometimes you say you can't sing? You're right." 

I love that kid.

Elizabeth took almost the only photos I've got so far with an iTouch so while this might be a little blurry, it's full of people I haven't known for all that long but I suppose if you make enough eye contact you get to know folks pretty well and well, I love an awful lot of who you see dancing down there.

And then there's this. I sure do wish the camera had a zoom because there's a red sticker on my chest that reads 'special'; the sort you see on meats about to expire except it didn't mean about to expire in this context. Clearly. There was a man wearing it on his pink t-shirt and when I danced a set with him I laughed so hard I messed up about everything and insisted that he turn over the sticker immediately because I'd definitely earned it. Next dance he was wearing another.

And lastly, I really love this version. Happy Brave New Year and Brave New Life which, by the way is always either expanding or contracting. Based on the personal documentary of this blog; contractions hurt one hell of a lot more than expansions. I'm just sayin'.

 

Testing... testing... is this thing on?

I was looking at my Facebook profile photos the other day; not intentionally, I just clicked on the most recent to make it bigger and that takes you to your profile photo gallery and there they are, all of them and I was struck by something. I looked happy. Well, of course I looked happy. We all look happy in our profile photos on Facebook if we're inclined to post that sort of photograph and I do fall into that category. I just didn't realize there were so many of them.

Actually, when I scrolled back over the last couple of years, like more than three, I found that pre 2009 I tended to post a very specific type of profile photo and happy didn't have as much to do with it as 'perfect' in one form or another. I don't suppose that's much of a surprise if you've been around long enough.

What shocked the shit out of me was a combination of the contextual quantity and quality of the photographs taken and posted in the last three years. If I made a montage of the sample 30 photographs I pulled off Facebook this morning I would call it

How to Pull Yourself Out of a Swamp By the Scruff of Your Neck

Who knew? Not me. OK maybe a little, but not so much as all that. I'm not going to narrate any of this I'm just going to post them in the order in which they were taken, not necessarily posted (although they were generally posted fairly quickly). I'm going to start with the profile picture that was up shortly before all hell broke loose at the end of 2008. It's a very nice picture. I look perfectly lovely. I really do. The photograph was taken right before we went to dinner at my favorite restaurant. It would have been a Friday evening and it probably ended in tears. The second photograph was taken at the end of February, 2009 and the rest just roll on out from there.

You get to decide what your life means. You get to place the value on the events and circumstances. You get to look back and decide what counts. You get to make up the story of your life. You are the narrator even if you sit back and let life happen to you, you're still the narrator.

There are A LOT of photographs on my Facebook account; Facebook is my primary method of sharing my life with my friends and family. You want to see my kids, family vacations, what's really going on in the backyard, what I did to my knee last week (I didn't do anything to my knee last week)? Get a Facebook account or know somebody who has one and friend me. This is how I do it. What I choose to use as my profile pic is something else entirely. A profile pic is a statement and generally a pretty strong statement. This is what we tell the world at large about ourselves and it's often the only thing we get to tell a lot of people; well, that and our status updates which are limited but NOT to 140 characters.

By accident of a click here and there yesterday I told myself a lot more about the last three years than I'd really taken the time to think about. And I'll tell you this, the fact that a family member left the household three years ago isn't particularly relevant anymore. It's an event, a catalyst, one of many, actually. Period.

The real question?

Who the hell IS that woman?

(I didn't ask 'was', I'm not interested in 'was', I'm interested in 'is')

Hey. Happy New Year!

Elizabeth and I have a fabulously large Contra Dance to help organize this evening. We'll be here doing this:

I like irony. I really do. This photograph was taken New Years Eve 2008. BECAUSE they haven't had anyone who actually stopped dancing long enough to go to the balcony and take pictures since then. I like to think the gap is because the dance has been waiting for me ever since. BECAUSE this is the 13th year this dance has been in existence AND there are photographs of ALMOST every dance starting from 2000 - 2008 and then NOTHING and then, well, here I am. I make up the most amazing shit, don't I?

Narrate at will, peoples... you have the floor.