Here I Am, Right Where I Left Myself

It is simply unacceptable that I've let myself go so long without writing--nearly two years! My typing skills have been deteriorating before my eyes, so some practice is long overdue.

And anyway, I could use the therapy.

As I'm writing this, I find myself in a situation similar to when I last wrote: the still somewhat raw phase of grieving the loss of a dear friend.

Just over three weeks ago, we lost Ryan's cat Perch...suddenly. She'd had very early signs of kidney disease, and we'd been treating her for a couple of months. Ryan was taking her to the vet three times a week for fluids, and she'd recently started a treatment that we hoped would correct her anemia, which was at the time our main concern. He appetite was back; she was her old self--friendly, affectionate and ever curious. Her last scheduled trip to the vet went well. She got another injection for her anemia, and blood tests showed her red blood cells were back in normal range!

The following evening, Ryan came home to find she couldn't lift her head. The doctor at the emergency clinic attributed it to a lack of potassium and started her on a slow drip overnight to correct it. She spent the following day with her regular veterinarian, who made phone calls and consulted with colleagues and basically searched high and low for an explanation for her sudden decline. I rushed to Oklahoma City early that afternoon to be with her and Ryan, and when I arrived we went straight to the clinic. All I wanted was to see her with my own eyes, and I felt a rush of hope when I saw her reach out a paw toward Ryan.

We didn't know it at the time, but this was the last we'd see of Perch as we knew her.

Having left her again in the vet's capable care, we were out having dinner that evening when Ryan got a call from the vet telling us to come right away. Within the hour, she had passed away peacefully, with the doctor petting her and monitoring her condition closely, and with Ryan and me at her side.

Just like that, our little angel was gone.

There are so many details, so many emotions and memories that are too sacred to share here. The pain was all the more unbearable because we weren't at all prepared to say goodbye. And I grieved not only for my loss, but for Ryan's too. She was his best buddy, his constant companion. When he sat at his desk, she would get in his lap and put her paws on the desk, occasionally batting at the keyboard. She followed him everywhere, happy just to be with him and to be in the middle of whatever he was doing.

When I would leave him after staying for the weekend, I never worried about Ryan getting sad or lonely; he had Perch to look after him.

There was another component to it as well, and I'm just realizing it now that some time has passed.

When I lost Sunshine, it was a long drawn out process: months of constant anxiety over her appetite, her medication, and her quality of life. There was the weight of deciding when to end her suffering. Would I make it too soon? Would I wait too long? How much more could she and I take?

When you're taking care of someone day in and day out, you don't necessarily have the "luxury" of falling apart. I had to be strong for her and make the best of the time we had left...and that's what I did. But when it was finally time to say goodbye, I didn't quite know how to stop being strong.

I felt lost without her, but I also felt relief...I was tired and just needed to rest, to recover physically, mentally and emotionally. Perhaps I had grieved little bits over a long period of time while she was sick; perhaps I didn't have much left when I finally let her go. All I know is that Ryan's cats Perch and Mary Hartman lifted me up during this time.

So did my boys. But they were so different from Sunshine...big and boisterous and loud. Sunshine and I understood each other on a deep level; we each knew instinctively what the other needed or wanted, and we  went with the ebb and flow of each day like it was a flawless dance. We were twin souls. 

I never have had and probably never will have the exact same kind of relationship with my boys, and that's okay. But I took comfort in spending time with Ryan's little ladies. I delighted in watching them move around in their dainty little bodies, flirtatious and coy. I enjoyed the nuances of their calmer dispositions, which seemed distinctively female in nature. I fell in love with them both, all over again.

I'm seeing now that Perch especially helped me during that time, and I'm realizing that I began to rely on her for something very important. What it was specifically, I can't quite pinpoint. Joy? Optimism? "Girl time?" Whatever it was, when I lost her the bottom dropped out.

Although I feel lost without her, I find comfort in believing she is still with us; she is our guardian angel. I always believed she truly was some sort of angel who had taken the form of a cat and was sent here especially for Ryan when he needed her most. Now, I'm more certain than ever that this is true, and that these days she's more free to move around and do her work. 

Perhaps some time I'll elaborate on that theory. But for now, I'm going to get my boys their dinner and give them kisses and start some of the house work I've been putting off. 

Thanks, Internet, for letting me share my thoughts. Thanks, Friends, for reading them.

A New Normal

I'm having a very lazy weekend--home alone with nothing to do except some much-needed cleaning. So naturally, I'm suddenly very interested in blogging.

Life has shifted into a different gear of late, I can't really say things are better or worse. Work is going fine, and I still feel I'm in a place I could happily stay for a while--though I have concluded I don't love being an administrative assistant and probably never will.

I am angling for another promotion that would be a solid step closer to the professional level. We had a couple of openings when one person left the department and another was promoted. The first opening was filled by a guy whose previous position was eliminated. I was quite relieved to learn that for him this was considered a lateral move and he did not get a raise, because I work circles around the guy on a daily basis. The other position is still open, and there seems to be some mysterious delay in filling it.

My supervisor's words were "I am facing a lot of complex staffing issues, so I can't make any promises, but I am definitely keeping you in mind." Not very encouraging, but I'm holding out hope.

We're undergoing several huge changes right now: our manager retired, and my former supervisor was promoted to replace him; our Denver office is being consolidated with Tulsa, so we have a few people relocating and several more needing to be replaced; we are in the middle of moving the entire department to a different floor; and our department is in early stages of spinning off into its own company. Any of these changes alone would be a big transition, and they're all happening at once. I must say everyone as a whole is handling the stress surprisingly well.

I must also say that I absolutely hate moving!

On to a sadder topic, I lost my old girl Sunshine about a month ago. She was wasting away, and the days she seemed to enjoy life were getting fewer and farther between. So the vet came to our house and put her to sleep peacefully while I held her in my arms. I try not to remember those last moments too often, but when I do remember, I'm stunned that I was able to do it.

I was strong for her, and when it was over I felt relief for her. But for me, there was just a big hole left behind. Sometimes it felt like there was a physical hole right in the middle of my chest. I'm getting past the shock now, but I still think of her every single day, and I never go to bed at night without noticing she's not next to me.

There is a lot of comfort in the fact that I'm able to focus more attention on my three boys now. I really felt like I was neglecting them over the last several months, but now they sleep with me every night and I don't have to divide my attention between different cats in different rooms. It's an adjustment, going from sharing a bed with a quiet, elderly female cat to sharing it with three big, rambunctious tabbies. But I'm so grateful to have them!

Back to Sunshine, I am proud to say that she put up a hell of a fight against that nasty cancer. And she still had some fight left in her at the end. The vet had to give her a sedative before the sedative so they could put in an IV, and I held her, wrapped in a towel, while the first sedative took effect. My feisty girl growled quietly until she couldn't growl anymore, making me laugh through my tears.

I am still searching for just the right tribute to her...nothing seems quite fitting. I certainly don't have it in me yet to put into writing everything she means to me. But for now I keep a picture of her by my bed, right next to where she used to sleep.

And I will always carry a little bit of Sunshine--especially her stormy side--in my heart.

This and That

Yeah, I know--it's been forever since I blogged. Don't think I haven't missed it. But when things are going well, it seems that urge to write has a lot less fire behind it.

Things have been going well in a lot of ways, and as of December I have a new job with the same company where I started working as a file room temp last summer. I'm now an Administrative Assistant, which is something I never saw myself doing; I've always felt it has an element of baby-sitting grown-ups to it. And it does, but only in small quantities. 

I'm on a different team in the same department, so I already knew the people I would be working with before I moved. They're a very hard-working group, and generally just damn nice, likable people. I hear some of them are a bit gossipy, but as long as no one tries to drag me into that, I don't care. My boss is great...she's nothing close to being a micro-manager, and in fact she's really good about trusting people with their responsibilities. But at the same time, she knows what's going on!

Getting hired on permanently couldn't have come at a better time, because I got paid for all the days off we had over the holidays. And when life happens, I have paid time off immediately available to me. It's so weird!

Life has been happening, for sure. Last November Sunshine started acting strange, like she was hurt. Fearing another abscessed anal gland and an ensuing week of pure hell, I got her right to the vet. But this time she had a bite wound--A BITE WOUND!--on her butt that had gotten infected. I don't know who did it, but George is the most likely suspect. Poor Sunshine has been in complete and blissful seclusion ever since, and I think sometimes she forgets she's not an only cat. She's definitely much happier with the boys out of her life.

She bounced back pretty quickly from the bite, but that was only the beginning of the story. While she was sedated to have the bite looked at, one of the vet techs noticed a red lump on her belly that looked very suspicious. We decided that after she recovered from her bite and felt better, she needed to have it looked at more closely. First they did a cytology, probably sometime in December. They ended up not sending it off to the lab because they couldn't tell much from it and they felt I should instead spend the money on a full biopsy.

By the time I'd gathered the money to have the lump removed, things had apparently gotten much worse--or the first vet hadn't been sufficiently alarmed in the first place. The new vet did some chest x-rays and found the growth had spread to Sunshine's lungs, which explained the terrible cough she'd suddenly developed. The vet was almost certain it was mammary cancer, which in cats can be extremely aggressive and almost impossible to cure--especially at the stage she had reached.

We went ahead with the surgery just after the new year, and the vet removed as much abnormal tissue as she could find. The biopsy didn't tell us much, but it did confirm our fears: cancer. The vet (who has been absolutely wonderful through everything) advised me there was no way to tell when the cancer would come back, but it almost certainly would. It could be a matter of days, weeks or months, she said.

Of course I was devastated, but in the time since this began, I've coped by keeping my focus on doing everything I can to make Sunshine as comfortable and happy as possible. She's taking water pills to keep fluid out of her lungs, and that helps her coughing. She's lost a lot of weight, and the meds seem to make her feel pretty sick at times. She has completely stopped eating a couple of times--the last episode lasted five days. But as soon as I stopped giving her all the meds (by then she was also taking an appetite stimulant and something for nausea) she suddenly became ravenous again.

Back on the water pills now, she seems to be losing her appetite again. I'm going to have to talk to the vet about whether it's really worth it to keep giving her this stuff. The good news is that in all of this I've finally found a way to medicate my little banshee.

This pill shooter is THA BOMB. It's a godsend. The ones I found at Petco and PetSmart were too big for tiny cat pills, but my vet recommended this one, which she was selling much cheaper than any others I've found. This thing has saved my relationship with Sunshine.

We are enjoying each other's company every minute we can, and on the days she's feeling well she is very happy and affectionate. There are days when I'm so depressed I can barely move, and they seem to coincide with the days she seems sickest. She is my best friend, and I can't imagine my life without her. But I'm so thankful we have this time together. There's no telling how long it will last, but I'm going to make the best of it.

I haven't been to Oklahoma City with Ryan since the New Year, and that truly sucks. But he's been very supportive and completely understands why I can't leave my cat to go out of town these days. Unfortunately, with a snowpocalypse preceded by two terrible colds, he hasn't been able to get here either for several weeks. I'm definitely looking forward to next weekend, when By God nothing better stop my man from getting to me! It will have been a month since we've seen each other, and that's the longest we've ever been apart since we met.

I'm looking forward to returning to work tomorrow...I haven't been in almost a week because of a very unusual blizzard and our mayor's complete lack of competence to handle the situation. Dude declared a state of emergency before the first snowflake even fell, and yet a week later people are still snowed in and the roads are a mess. I just know people who live up North are laughing at us...

Uphill Both Ways

My, how the last month has flown by!  I got in lots of great time with my nephews, planted an herb garden, spent some long weekends with Ryan, and got a sunburn that won't quit...and then I started a new job, just three weeks after my previous employer kicked me out of the loony bin.

The new job is just a filing job, but it's with a company that has a great reputation in Tulsa and is known for hiring on temps pretty quickly, with good pay and superb benefits.  Even as a temp, I'm getting the same hourly pay as my last job, and this new job is easier by far.  Everyone I've met is friendly and helpful, and I haven't heard a single person say (or even hint at) anything unfavorable about anyone else in the office.  The only down side is that it can get boring, but I offer to help with anything and everything whenever I get the chance.  The boss has already given me a couple of projects, and hopefully she'll keep them coming.

The whole experience has been quite a shock to my system, in the best possible way.  Sometimes while I'm sitting at my desk alone, listening to music as I put stickers on file folders, I wonder why no one has come along to tell me I'm doing it wrong and that I should do it his or her way because he or she knows all about the most efficient way to put stickers on file folders...

...and then I remember where I am.

It's been a bit of a pain in the ass getting to and from the largest office building downtown, right in the middle of everything.  But I kind of like the fact that it's right in the middle of everything - downtown Tulsa actually has its own special kind of charm!  I'm looking forward to getting out for some walks to explore it more once this inferno of a summer lets up a little.

I've never worked in a place that didn't have its own (free) parking lot before, so it took me a while to figure out my options.  But I've found a really cheap place to park just a couple of blocks away.  The walk is literally uphill both ways, as it involves crossing a bridge that arches over some train tracks.  Given my history of being never-quite-on-time, it's probably going to be quite a brisk walk most mornings!

It's not terribly strenuous, but--combined with a couple of pretty good treks to the cafeteria (seriously, the building is huge)--it's notably more activity than I'm used to.  Hopefully this will have a positive impact on my beer gut.

In other exciting news, last weekend I finally attended a volunteer orientation at the SPCA here in Tulsa...only a short five months after I first filled out my application.  It's going to be a little difficult finding time to get out there, because they're not open in the evenings or on Sunday.  And of course I'm out of town at least half the time on Saturdays.

But I'm really going to make the effort, because I know it'll be worth it.  I was grinning like a fool after the orientation, so the animal time is clearly something my soul craves.

Getting some cat time in won't be too hard.  I can just put on my SPCA t-shirt and go play with the cats whenever I have time.  To work with the dogs, though, I'll have to schedule some additional required training first. And I'm really eager to do that, because I've been wanting to learn how to handle dogs for a long time.  And it's not like you can just go sign up for a class at PetSmart if you don't actually have a dog...

In all, things really seem to be looking up.  I feel renewed and refreshed and all that great stuff, and I'm pretty sure it's all because I got out of the most hostile work environment I've ever seen.  It was kind of like an abusive relationship...I'd gotten so used to being treated like shit that I got in the habit of keeping my head down and avoiding conflict until it actually started to seem normal. 

It wasn't until I got away and came to my senses that I looked back with horror at how much abuse I had learned to put up with.

Never again, my friends.  Never again.

Vacation

Apparently the side effects of a highly toxic job are beginning to dissipate.  I made it past the shocked and depressed stage and have been remarkably relaxed all week.  I had lunch with my former co-worker (who's now my fellow deadbeat), spent some time at the pool, did some gardening and scoped out the thrift stores.  It's been a good week.

I'm feeling pretty restless again today, probably because I need to do some house work and wish there was something more pressing to keep me from it.

Tonight I'm going out for drinks with my former coworker and an attorney who also got laid off recently. But if I don't do some laundry, I'm not going to have anything to wear!

My mom is keeping my nephews during the day all summer...this week their mom is on vacation, but next week they'll be back and things will pick up tremendously.  Charlie is still the bubbly kid who can't sit still and requires a constant audience.  Talon, on the other hand, has become a sullen 11-year-old who hides behind long blonde locks and doesn't want to play or talk or do anything but sleep and watch TV.  He's too cool for Grandma's house, apparently!

It'll be nice to have some quality time with them...with their splitting time between divorced parents and my splitting time between Tulsa and OKC, I haven't been able to see them nearly enough lately.

What You Wish For

It appears that--for the time being, at least--I'm through writing blog entries about how much I hate my job. That's the good news.

The bad news is I'm back to writing endless posts about the angst of job searching.

I was laid off last Wednesday.  I saw this coming, and I was hoping for it...hoping very hard, in fact.  So I can't explain why it threw me for such a loop or why I've spent the last few days in a state of depression, confusion and shock.

We'd already been told we'd have to start taking two furlough days a month, and everyone was pretty discouraged by that.  It took over a week for someone to find time to speak to us face to face about the furlough days and other cuts, and by then I was thoroughly disgusted.  Summer vacations combined with everyone's furlough days made big cuts in our staffing on a daily basis, and the boss was managing it all terribly, as usual.

Then a couple of attorneys suddenly vanished.  And two days before the bomb dropped, I learned one of my coworkers was training some CSRs to do my job.  I thought that was poor timing and pretty tacky, but I chalked it up to one of my boss's crazy ideas on how to manage the staffing shortages caused by furlough days.  I was past caring at this point, and way past anger, so I didn't think much more about it.

The next day my closest coworker and I couldn't log in to the system and therefore couldn't do much of anything.  Our boss told us someone in the corporate office had accidentally deleted our login IDs, and that the only person who could fix it was out of the office for the day.  She proceeded to print off a bunch of intakes for us to work from, a ridiculous solution as our system is used to track every step of the process, note every phone call and record every change of status.  A slogan we often heard was "If it's not noted in the intake, it didn't happen."

So I guess a lot of work didn't happen that day, and it was beyond frustrating, as the other two people who could do our job were off that day.  The boss, of course, was nowhere to be found, although her ass should have been helping us deal with the mess. 

Around 4pm, my coworker appeared with a pale face and said she'd been called into the boss's office.  At that point, I just gave up trying to work and waited with my stomach in knots.  Sure enough, she eventually reappeared with a tear in her eye and nodded...and I knew they were letting her go.

I was completely stunned, and all I could do was stand next to her desk thinking "NO!!!  It was supposed to be me!"

Then the boss came for me, and I felt an enormous relief.  I'm told the boss cried while breaking the news to my coworker, but I saw no tears when it was my turn and I certainly didn't shed any.  It was all a blur after that...we both quickly cleaned out our desks, said goodbye to everyone and went out for a beer.

I've spent the last few days moping, staring into space, and wondering why me?  But I'm getting past that phase now and starting to enjoy the prospect of waking up in the morning and NOT going back to a job that was slowly killing me.

I still don't quite know what to do with myself, but I guess now I have plenty of time to figure it out.

Career Development

It's been a while since I've written about work, and an update is overdue.  Mind you, nothing has changed much except my outlook. But, having finally adjusted my expectations, I'm able to enjoy the humor a bit more than I did before.

In the first week I was back from vacation, I essentially had to relearn my job, not once but twice.  The overall objective didn't change at all...just the specific steps and details to get it done.  On my first day back, I was handed new instructions and a new flow chart (the boss loves her flow charts). I spent a few days learning exactly what to put in subject fields of emails and in what order, when to forward vs. when to reply, and how to get things back on track when the attorneys didn't follow the precise instructions.

Meanwhile, I was starting to see signs the boss's recent calm streak was coming to an end as her lucidity began to deteriorate. She chewed out one of my coworkers about a box I put on the floor in my cubicle, asserting that someone could trip over it and get hurt, that she had asked her to put it in some other cubicle (which she didn't specify), and that when she asks someone to do something she expects it to be done.

Then one morning she arrived at my desk, breathless, her hair (which she recently chopped off close to her scalp) sticking up wildly, and told me to hold off doing anything until she took another look at her new instructions and then sent them to me.  Next we went from doing everything by email to eliminating the need for emails (but not really) altogether.

As I was learning the newest new process, she stopped by and informed me that her new way of doing things was going to save me so much time that she was going to be able to utilize me more, adding that she wanted me to help edit and update some training material.

"You're the obvious choice for it," she declared.

I didn't get excited, because by now I've learned that even if I was allowed to use any creativity or individual thought, she'd immediately squash it and I'd eventually go insane trying to do every little detail her way even though I could probably do it better on my own.  And I wasn't about to drag my beloved writing skills into this morbid cycle.

Fortunately, it turned out there was no writing or real editing involved at all.  Instead, I am going through her precious manifesto, editing the background colors and font sizes.  Some pages have blue backgrounds, some white.  Some have frighteningly huge fonts, and others look fairly normal.  All of them are wildly indented, capitalized and underlined in random places.  None of them remain coherent from beginning to end.

Apparently this project is going to open a whole new world for me.

Still Here...

I'm trying to decide on a new design for my blog, so what you're seeing now may or not be permanent.  Nothing seems to fit just right...

Just got back last week from a drive to and from Philly to attend the wedding of Eric & Sara.  We spent more time driving than we spent in Philly, but it was a really nice getaway.  The wedding was lovely, and though I didn't have a lot of time with Eric and Sara, I did get to see enough of them to hold me over until next time...and I got to catch up with lots of friends and former coworkers.

I think it's been long enough--enough time has passed--that it's not entirely crazy for me to say I kind of wish I could go back to work at TV Guide.  Only it's not TV Guide anymore.  But I ran into three or four people who left (some by choice, some not) and have now gone back...that's in addition to several others I already knew about, not to mention many others who've been a part of the same pattern for long as I've worked there. And no one is complaining.

I'd probably have to move back to PA, which isn't entirely out of the question on a long term basis...although it's presently not a real possibility.

Anyway, I had a great trip with Ryan, and before we even finished the grueling drive we were exitedly discussing another road trip to Ohio in the Fall.  And maybe a weekend in Chicago this summer.  Because there's just not much going on here.

Even though I've been back in Tulsa for over two years now, I've never really started a life here.  I've been too busy running around elsewhere, mainly to Oklahoma City, on weekends.  When I do have a weekend at home, it's nice to just be home.  So I'm sort of in a constant state of limbo.

Ryan and I remedy the situation by daydreaming about fun road trips or about running away to start new lives in Pennsylvania...or West Virginia...or who knows where. Truth be told, I'm not sure I'd care a whole lot where I ended up as long as we were together!

It's Something, At Least

I'm feeling especially disgruntled this week. I have that feeling, more than usual, that I should be doing something different...making some sort of change...anything to get out of the rut I'm in.

I've had that feeling so long I don't remember what it's like to feel any other way.

Most of the time I don't think about what a fucking idiot my boss is or how much I hate her. I just keep my head down and try not to take too much initiative or do anything else to bring on her wrath. For the most part it works; we rarely speak to each other. But every now and then something reminds me what a bitch she is, and I get really sulky.

If I ask her a question, instead of using an opportunity to teach me something she just takes the responsibility away and talks behind my back about how I don't know what I'm doing. If I ask someone else, she hears the conversation from her office and assails the person I spoke with, wanting to know what I asked about and what they told me. It's all so absurd!

I've been looking for another job, usually somewhat passively. It seems the recession is just now really taking a toll on the economy here in Oklahoma. Tulsa can't afford to pay all their police officers and firemen, business are closing left and right, and interesting opportunities are few and far between.

So I always come back around to feeling lucky to have my job.

I keep thinking I should get a second job to bring in some extra money, so maybe I can eventually afford to change jobs and move to Oklahoma City. At least then I'd be able to see Ryan more often.

But I don't want to do anything that involves standing up all the time...I have plantar fasciitus and my feet hurt too much. And no call centers...I don't have the patience to deal with stupid people. And not too many weekend shifts, or I'd never get to see Ryan.

This is where I lose my ambition and start looking for other ideas.

Volunteering...I really miss volunteering. In fact, it's utterly ridiculous that I've been back in Tulsa nearly two years and have never found myself a new cat-wrangling gig.

So I've filled out a volunteer application for the Tulsa SPCA, and I'm going to take it in to one of the next volunteer orientation meetings. Now we're talking!

I interviewed for a job there last Spring, but I opted for the veterinary job in Oklahoma City instead...and we know how that turned out. I probably couldn't have survived on the pay at the SPCA anyway, and there were no health benefits. But I think I can afford to volunteer there.

In fact, maybe I can't afford not to.

Complacent and Not Hating It

What a bad blogger I am! I guess you could say my recent hiatus has been due to nothing but more (and more) of the same--more hating the same job, more loving the same terrific guy, more wallowing in cat fur, and lots of "Lost" marathons in preparation for the final season.

I told myself I'd start job hunting for real after Christmas, which marked my six-month anniversary at the law firm. But it appears I'm getting a little complacent. Health benefits are nice, and I got a Christmas bonus for the first time in ten years.

My boss changed things around on us again a few months ago, and now I'm doing very little of the work I was hired for. She assured me this would be a great opportunity for me, and we had an excited conversation about some of my skills we could put to use--recruiting attorneys, writing coherent polices and procedures, organizing and such. She even gave us free reign for a few days to work out some of the details on our own.

Of course, she eventually accused us of changing policies without her permission and conveniently forgot some of the changes she'd agreed to. And the recruiting project went to just about everyone but me (not that I really regret that). I do a lot of filing these days, which apparently makes me seem like less of a threat to her. She leaves me alone most of the time, and she seems to have stumbled onto a division of work that fits everyone's skills quite well. Our numbers are in the excellent range, she gets the credit, and everyone seems a little less miserable.

Don't get me wrong...she's still bat shit crazy and I hate her with all I have in me.

But today she approved a week off in Spring to attend Eric-and-Sara's wedding in PA, and I'm feeling exceptionally positive at the moment.

Ryan and I are super excited to start planning our trip. We've both been terribly homesick for that part of the country, and we're thinking about making a road trip of it. A quick road trip, mind you, and a lot of ground to cover...but it'll be lots of fun.

I feel like my writing skills are fading fast. My job and the correspondence involved certainly don't seem to require mastery of the English language; even the attorneys are a testament to that. But lately I've been thinking more and more about dusting off my creativity and putting it to work, and I have a few projects in mind...so maybe this post will mark my official return to the world of blogging.

This is my therapy.

antics and semantics

Last week was better than the week before, as far as work goes, but we still had our bumps.

On Wednesday, one of the attorneys asked for copies of some old letters, and I volunteered to send them. This is what I do all the time, after all, and I thought it would take about a minute of my time. However, it turned out the letters had never been scanned into our electronic files, and the attorney who wrote them was long gone.

As I was realizing this, the boss walked by and facetiously asked if I'd found the letters. Then she laughed and said, "I knew you wouldn't, but you you just had to reply to that email so quickly, I thought I'd let you try." I asked her what next, and she suggested asking the admins if any of them could find the letters.

One of them found the missing documents pretty quickly, and I thought that was the end of it until I learned one of the letters--the most important one, of course--was not in the packet. So the next day I asked one of the admins for more help, and he said he didn't know what else to suggest except looking in the file room.

So I had to ask my boss for a key to the file room, and she seemed a little perturbed (though still amused) that I was still on the hunt. About 24 hours had passed by this time, and apparently she thought I'd been searching high and low for that damn letter the whole time. She shook her head and said I could try looking in the file room but I probably wouldn't find it.

After searching through piles and piles of paper in the black hole that is the file room, I took the key back and admitted defeat. She chastised me for wasting time on something that wasn't my job, and then she said she'd take care of it.

Question: Why didn't she offer to take care of it from the beginning and tell me not to worry about it, since it wasn't my responsibility???

Answer: To teach me a lesson, apparently.

Sure enough, after the admins found the letter, she forwarded one of their emails to me and wrote, "A lesson learned...know your team!"

I know my fucking team, bitch. But I did learn a lesson: on this job, being proactive can only lead to ridicule and shame.

As unbearable as this condescending bullshit was, I continued working relentlessly and tried to get past it.

Friday afternoon, she called me into her office to tell me she still wanted to "realign some things," because the stats weren't quite where they needed to be. She went on for a bit about how I needed to focus on Day One referrals and nothing else. I was a little puzzled as to why she was telling me this again, because I'd been doing exactly that with a vengeance for the last couple of weeks. So I respectfully tried to clarify.

Me: What am I doing that I shouldn't be doing?

Boss (viciously): Did you not hear what I just said two sentences ago? I said nobody's doing anything wrong, and it really bothers me when people act like they're being attacked just because I'm trying to do my job...

Me: I guess what I meant to ask was what you would like me to do differently, since the stats aren't where you want them to be.

Boss: You just don't worry about the stats. You let me worry about that.

Me (in my head): Wait, what is this conversation even about?

She went on for a while about how she knows what she's talking about, and how the bosses are riding her all the time, and how "someone" insisted they knew how to do things better than she did, and she gave that a chance but it just wasn't working. She talked about how it was her job improve the stats and try to keep people happy.

"...and I even let you change your hours, and you didn't have ask me to, I just suggested it."

Exactly. I didn't ask her to, and I certainly don't consider it a favor.

She kept going on and on, and I wish I could recount the conversation better, but she seriously says the most nonsensical, incoherent things.

"...and I know you're capable," she said several times, sounding puzzled. WTF?

She finally managed to articulate that we're all doing well, but that she's trying to figure out what's making us fall just short of our goal.

Aha! After all the bullshit, we finally got to the real point. Then she told me she's heard lots of good things about me, I'm very personable, and she hears me on the phone and thinks I'm doing a good job. We agreed that I'd continue doing what I've been doing, and I went back to my desk.

She got in one more dig as I left, saying, "and no more chasing down letters for you!"

Does any of the above make any sense?

All I know is that I'm getting a funny feeling in my chest just writing about it. I'm still working on my own attitude, but I'm feeling the pressure big time and something is going to have to give eventually. I don't know if I can learn to tolerate this kind of malicious, divisive management.

I've been reading a book Ryan got me called "Do What You Are," and I picked it up again this weekend after letting it sit for a while. It discusses the Myers-Briggs personality types and several related theories, and it has given me a little fresh insight into why the boss and I clash so violently.

I'm primarily a feeler, so harmony and teamwork are extremely important to me. I also love to look at things from new perspectives, constantly using my creativity to seek new and better ways of doing things. I think these qualities, especially the second one, have been a major factor in the successes I've had so far.

But my current employer doesn't seem to place much value on these qualities at all. And since I'm a passionate person who makes decisions based on my own deeply held values, this drives me crazy!

Maybe I'm onto something. Maybe this book will help me use the whole disgusting, disheartening experience to develop specific standards for my next job. I certainly hope it'll prepare me to answer interview questions about why I want to leave this job without saying "My boss is bat shit crazy."

blog that bitch right out of my hair

Things got pretty awful at work last week...not "you're fired" or "I quit" awful...not throwing office equipment or stabbing people with scissors awful...just sick-feeling-in-the-stomach every morning, tossing-and-turning every night awful. I don't remember when my boss really went psychotic on us, but I do remember that my irritation turned to rage last Monday after a sequence of repeated proverbial slaps in the face.

We recently had a "customer service week" during which the bosses had to pretend to be nice, and they placated us with food, games and hollow praise. One of the games involved picking up pieces of paper from the floor, and some of them had notes granting one free hour off. I didn't get one, but the boss asked if everyone had found one and indicated she wanted everyone to get an hour off.

I answered her email in the simplest language I could, indicating that I did not get one of the special pieces of paper, and a few minutes later I heard her say "Yep, everybody got one."

Well, I thought it would be nice to take off an hour early the Friday before my one year anniversary with Ryan, so I emailed her a few days later to ask if I was supposed to get an hour off and, if so, could I use it on that date. No reply.

I emailed her again a couple of days later with the same questions. No reply.

I finally went to her office to ask about it, because I also needed a long lunch for a doctor visit and she hadn't responded to that request either.

"I don't care if you leave early," she said grudgingly, "but my referrals have to be in good shape."

That Friday was a slow day, and things were in pretty good shape when I left about 40 minutes early. She was out of the office for a conference, as were several of our attorneys, and a lot of people blatantly took advantage of the lack of supervision.

But who do you think she went after first thing Monday morning? She went to my coworker and said "I hope Katy didn't leave early Friday because I told her not to if the numbers aren't low. And the numbers aren't low." I don't even know what that means, but one of my coworkers came in several hours late and the other one snuck out early without permission, and we still managed to get things under control to a point that I felt comfortable leaving "with permission."

With the boss and all the attorneys back that Monday and working furiously to catch up, we got absolutely slammed. Of course, our boss had changed some of our procedures again, so in addition to being extremely busy we were also floundering a little with the new work flow.

And I was mad as balls that one little hour off had turned out to be such a hassle.

She's been hounding us like crazy since then, micromanaging us obsessively and trying to figure out how to get better "numbers" out of us. She sent several of her obnoxious, tyrannical emails on Tuesday, reminding us of this and that and basically complaining about what we hadn't been able to finish the day before, and that was when I reached my limit.

I replied to one of her emails and, very reasonably and professionally, explained that I'd been working my ass off, that we were behind due to an epic number of incoming referrals the day before, not because we were slacking off. And then I added, also very professionally, that her changing the rules on us slowed us down as well, that I didn't disagree with her decision, but that she has to understand that every time there's a change it's going to take some time for us to adjust and get back to our maximum efficiency.

It was all out war for the rest of the week.

She sent emails saying she's the boss and she knows what she's talking about, and we are to expect emails from her regarding our work and shouldn't take them personally. She started checking up on my work and sending me emails questioning minute details. She cornered me by the printer and asked if I was following the new guidelines, then said "Huh..." and shook her head like she didn't believe me when I said yes.

She nagged me for information that she no doubt thought I was refusing to send out of spite, when in fact there was just a lag in the email system. She called me into her office, furious, and informed me that "if we're going to start getting defensive out there, we're going to have a problem."

And then, Friday afternoon, she called me into her office to sit down and have an actual conversation about what her bosses look for, how she measures it, and what she wants from me...all shit she should have done BEFORE she started stalking me like a rabid dog!

She was still racking her brain for reasons my "numbers" aren't as good as my coworkers', and I tried to explain that the numbers don't reflect all the work I do, especially when I follow her guidelines. I walked her through this three times, and she still didn't understand. But she offered to change my work hours, something I've been wanting to ask for but figured she'd refuse just because it was my idea.

I really, really tried to adjust my attitude over the weekend. I put work completely out of my mind until Sunday, when I returned to dwelling on the things that piss me off. For example:

• The bitch refuses to listen to or consider any input from me, and she probably never even looked at my resume long enough to see that I'm actually pretty good at developing more efficient ways of getting things done.
• The bitch swears that she knows what works and that no one else knows better than her, and she completely disregards the fact that what works for her doesn't necessarily work for everyone.
• The bitch behaves like she doesn't trust me or have any confidence in me, and she constantly implies that I'm slacking off or don't know what I'm doing, when in fact I'm at least as focused and conscientious as my coworkers...if not more so.
• The bitch seems to actually think nagging us constantly is an appropriate way to motivate us, when in fact she's just bullying us into to meeting a very narrow set of standards that don't actually have much at all to do with the quality of our work.

I eventually did some meditation/hypnosis with Ryan in hopes of taking a Serenity Prayer approach to the whole mess. And that was when I got to the core the matter. It's not that I don't think I'm good enough, or that I'm as self righteous and arrogant as I probably sound, or that I give a damn what she thinks of me.

It's simply that I'm angry, and frustrated, and I have good reasons to be.

However, I shouldn't be letting this anger bleed into every area of my life to the point where I'm glaring at other Wal-Mart shoppers, flipping people off in traffic, lying awake at night and feeling generally mad at the world. And I shouldn't ever hang too much hope on seeing things change for the better there--outside of my own attitude, of course.

I think I just need to acknowledge my anger, give it a place and then use it.

So I'm not sure if the attitude adjustment actually worked, but things were a little better today. I worked frantically and relentlessly, and I wrote down every damn thing I worked on so I could defend myself if the boss asked why I wasn't getting enough done. And I only referred to her as "that bitch" two or three times--at least, before I sat down and started blogging!

Part of the whole accepting my anger thing is what led to this horridly long blog post. I have been avoiding the blog, and therefore depriving myself of a great way to vent frustrations, because I'm afraid of being that girl who complains about her job all the time.

But I think I just need to be that girl in my blog so I can work through things and maybe even track my progress. Yeah, some day I'll go back and read it and say "Wow, I was one bitter, sarcastic bitch back then!" But it won't be the first time...

Should I be worried...

...about the fact that I've found myself behind this car twice in the last week?

Small Victories - I'll Take 'Em

This was one of those rainy Fall days...the kind with a constant cold drizzle that eventually seeps into your bones and makes the urge to stay in bed so strong that you end up having to go to work with unwashed hair and wrinkled slacks...and even then you can't make it on time unless you're willing to give up stopping for coffee.

I opted for the coffee stop this morning, and I don't regret it.

This afternoon our supervising attorney thanked me for following up on something and being so thorough, and she said I was a pleasure to work with. I had emailed both her and my boss with a question, and she had given me a direct and simple, helpful answer. She copied my boss when she sent this bit of praise, and it made me very happy as she is the boss's boss.

A bit later I emailed both of them again with a question about something the supervising attorney had written in one of our intakes. This time, my boss replied--only to me--with "these questions come to me."

Mind you, she didn't answer the question...nor did she even pretend to talk around it. She just flat out disregarded it. But she damn sure asserted her authority!

Also today, the supervising attorney (who is officially my hero) emailed us to say she'd called the guy who chewed me out yesterday (and who subsequently chewed out my boss) and told him our firm will no longer be assisting him, as he has been abusive to our staff members.

In all, it was a pretty good day in spite of the boss's antics. I do feel trouble brewing, though. Even though I'm thorough and a pleasure to work with, our numbers aren't good enough and the boss is trying to figure out what needs to change. I made a couple of suggestions, which she pretty much dismissed, saying "I know what works."

But she mainly attributed our less-than-excellent scores to "absences" with a pointed look at my coworker....my coworker who has three kids--one with a rare neurological disease and another who's three months old and spent the first week of her life in ICU--and who missed work Friday for two of the kids' doctor appointments.

Never mind that lately there's simply more work coming in...more than we can easily handle within a restricted number of hours. We can make it work, but my boss's instructions to start "showing her everything before I send it" won't help any.*

Anyway, the complement seems to have lit a spark in me, and I really feel like fighting the boss's nonsense. She'll win...but I'll be right and we'll all know it. And one day, maybe my coworker and I will be given the respect we work so hard for.

*Yeah, I know that's poor use of quotation marks. I just don't care.

The Adventures of a Lukewarm Blogger

I've been waiting to write my 100th post until I could think of something special to do, but that eventually became just one of the many things I was putting off. So I've decided to just get it over with and start working on the next 100 posts.

Effective this Friday I'm getting hired "permanently" at my job. Part of me thinks my boss is only doing this because she can't be bothered to keep approving my time card every week for the temp agency. I have, you see, had to remind her every single fucking Monday since the week she forgot to pay me, and that's usually after two other courtesy reminders on Friday!

Maybe it's the weather...the recent cooling-off and the unusual amount of rain for this time of year...maybe it's the chaotic work environment with a boss who openly avoids having to talk to us whenever she can get away with it and talks gibberish when she does bother to communicate...maybe it's the fact that I'm making just enough money to tread water but can't ever quite get my head above the surface and keep it there. Whatever it is, I'm more stressed out than ever, and I'm feeling pretty down about it.

Work today felt like what I imagine it's like to be buried alive. I started out in a hole, and every time I tried to climb out, someone threw another shovel full of dirt on me. And before I could dig my way out of that dirt, another load fell in on me. By the end of the day, somehow I had more stuff piled up than when I started, even though I'd been working nonstop all day. I hate that feeling.

Eh...it's just a gloomy day. And I'm coming down off a "customer service week" high, during which my boss had to pretend she appreciated us but ended up using all the "fun" activities as an excuse to avoid communicating with us. And I had a client chew me out today for something that was totally not my fault. I wasn't expecting that, so I had my guard down. Hell, I always have my guard down when it comes to being yelled at for things I can't control, because I just don't understand that mentality.

I absolutely hate people who think the only way to get what they want is by bullying others. And that is why customer service is NOT the field for me!

So there's a little slice of what my life's been like lately: I don't like my job, and I detest my boss. I'm bitter and cynical and pissed off, and recently I've had to edit myself because more and more I find I'm becoming that negative person in the office who makes everyone else feel hopeless. I usually catch it and try to come up with something positive in its place, but it's totally empty. I don't believe a damn word I'm saying.

I guess that's why, paragraph after paragraph, I keep telling myself pretty soon this post will take on a positive tone. And I just keep bitching. I'm an endless fountain of bitching.

Well, there are some things to be happy about...for example, I'm halfway through Season 1 of "Lost," and I'm enjoying the early episodes more than ever this time around. My goal is to watch all of the first five seasons before Season 6 starts in early 2010.

Lying around watching TV for hours on end and then more hours on end? It won't be easy, but I think I'm up for the challenge.

And, now that Post #100 is done, I can come back for #101 very soon to daydream, tell a funny story, or just bitch and moan some more...whatever the hell I feel like doing!

please pass the Valium

I've been thinking about my job a lot this weekend...some of the time intentionally, but most of the time not. And my thoughts keep circling back to the same two contradicting conclusions:

1. I cannot thrive in that environment. I need to work for someone who wants to see me develop, in a general career path or at the very least in the job I'm doing. I need a boss who will let me earn respect and trust, who will use my mistakes as opportunities to help me get better at my job, and who will make time to talk when I have important questions or concerns. These things aren't going to happen as long as I'm working for this woman.

2. I need to stick with this job for the benefits and the experience and the steady paycheck....for now. I can look for something better, but I can't quit until that something comes along. In other words, I'm sort of stuck. Just like I didn't want to be.

Time for a TV Guide check: nope, still not sorry I left. But that job set expectations for management and teamwork that I'm afraid no one will ever meet again. And that kinda frightens me.

Now that I'm in this for the long(er) term, I should start digging in and doing what comes naturally to me...organizing things, getting stuff done and generally kicking ass. I was getting there, but last week's setbacks completely zapped my motivation, and I need some sort of attitude adjustment. I think I need to remove my focus from criticizing my boss's management skills and concentrate on proving myself. Duh.

I don't have to bend over backwards or perform miracles; I just need to be myself and do it well. And quit letting this shit follow me home.

And keep looking for better opportunities...


p.s. That woman didn't approve my time card Friday afternoon, as she insisted she'd be doing from now on. She didn't even stick to her plan for one week. So I have to remind her to do it in the morning, when she supposedly won't have time.

...and still chaos reigns

When my boss fired the Crazy Bitch, I decided to wipe the slate clean and give the whole place a fresh start. And it went really well for a while...but I think we all knew it wouldn't last forever.

Because my boss is still bat shit crazy.

Things started to deteriorate last week when she forgot to approve my time card. She wasn't nearly apologetic enough, and then she decided to "crack down" on us temps as if it was our fault. She's moved up our deadline for submitting time cards, because if she doesn't do them on Fridays she just won't have time to go back and do them Monday mornings. Reasonable request, but shitty timing and lousy delivery.

And then this week she just went and lost her mind. Things have been great with my coworkers and me, and she even noticed we look happier and commended us for great teamwork. But then she started back up with the passive-aggressive emails, sending out commands but not wanting to answer follow-up questions or discuss things any further.

Yesterday, out of the blue, she decided my coworker and I should switch responsibilities...even though we've worked out a great system and are super comfortable with our roles. I tried to find out if I'd made some sort of mistake, but she insisted I was doing fine and she just wanted to put us back in "familiar territory" for a while. We tried to explain that it wasn't familiar or comfortable and that we were much happier the way things were. I expressed again that I'd be happy to revisit my notes and correct anything I might be doing wrong, but she wouldn't budge.

All this happened in the midst of the busiest day EVER...absurdly busy. Of course, we weren't as efficient as we could have been if she'd just left us alone, and the work was piling up three times faster than we could get it done.

Then she decided we needed to start doing certain tasks differently. This involved new procedures we weren't quite sure about, so I asked her to spend a few minutes with us to make sure we knew how to properly do things the way she wanted.

Her response was an email that said she's too busy to come over and teach us anything new, and that we're just going to have to keep on doing what we know until she has some time to work with us. She pointed out that she's already told both of us this. In other words, she just wants to make uninformed and poorly thought-out decisions, but she doesn't want us to bother her about the details.

This shit went on for two days before I learned the real reason for the upheaval. It was all because I asked her a fucking question. She felt I should know better by now and told my coworker so, but she didn't discuss anything with me. Thankfully, my coworker set her straight and pointed out that she didn't know the answer either, which was why I had to ask the boss in the first place.

In the end, she spent an hour going over new procedures with my coworker (not me) and then turned her loose with three pages of incoherent notes. She came by later to show me how to do something the new way, but she didn't teach me one damn thing I didn't already know!

She finally relented and gave us back our old roles, but with her new poorly-thought out procedures, things take twice as long as before and I'm more confused than ever because she just doesn't have the time or the patience to work with me.

So my boss apparently still thinks I'm an idiot, even after all my efforts to prove otherwise in light of Crazy Bitch's lies. And apparently when I make mistakes, there's no correcting and learning from them--she just stops talking to me and takes away responsibilities and generally acts like she's quit taking her Ritalin.

If I were reading this and I didn't know me, I'd surely think the problem was with the author. I'd think I had a bad attitude and blamed everyone else for my own problems. But I swear to you, it's NOT ME. That woman is impossible.

Don't even get me started on how she assumed I'd love to keep working there as a permanent employee without her even going through the formality of offering me a job...or how she just never bothered to answer my email asking her what the starting pay would be when I was no longer a temp. And again, who fucking forgets to pay her employees and then somehow acts like it's their fault instead of apologizing profusely?

I'm not saying the Crazy Bitch wasn't the problem before...just that apparently she wasn't the only problem.

p.s. I miss you more than ever, Jefe.

My Luck (if that's what you call it)

I think this week might make history as one of the three most traumatic weeks of my life.

Yesterday (my weekly pay day), my boss nonchalantly informed me in an email that she forgot to approve my time card and I wasn't going to get paid. Fortunately, the temp agency fronted a percentage of my pay in advance, so I got something today.

However, the advance was a normal paper check, and my check is normally direct deposited. So I spent my lunch hour driving across town to the credit union to try and head off the charges that were already coming in to my empty bank account.

I was a little late getting back, and I guess that's why I rear-ended someone a few blocks away from the office. It was a horrible, smarmy couple and their son from Michigan. They were driving a rental car, but by the way the son reacted, you'd think it was a brand new car he'd just bought with his life savings. Asshole.

They insisted on calling the police, so I waited on the sidewalk, trying not to cry while my Arby's sandwich got lukewarm and my Hershey bar melted in its wrapper. At one point my temper almost got away from me, and I found myself on the verge of telling that fucking kid what an inconsiderate, hateful little prick I thought he was. Fortunately I didn't, and I think Karma might have rewarded me.

The policeman was very nice and even apologized when he gave me a ticket. Then he helped me jump start my car, which had gone dead just sitting with the hazard lights on. While his partner connected the jumper cables, I finally got up the nerve to drop my dad's name. In a surprising turn of luck, the police officer called up my dad and then took my ticket away apologetically. What a nice fella!

That saved me the trouble of having to beg for mercy from one of the attorneys at work, which was convenient because the afternoon was chaotic as all hell. The rest of the day flew by, and then I came home and crawled right into bed. I woke up a couple of hours later with a yucky headache.

Did I mention I've been sick for nearly a week with some gross bug that's going around? Whenever I laugh, my lungs actually rattle. Were it not for the similar rattles heard around the office, I'd have to wonder if I'd contracted some sort of grave illness.

Anyway, my insurance premium will probably go up, but I didn't get a ticket and my car didn't get enough damage to speak of. Hopefully I can get through the rest of this week without having a nervous breakdown.

Now, I'm sure at least one of you three readers is wondering about the other two most traumatic weeks of my life. This one falls in at number three, and second place would go to the week back in college when I broke my pinky toe.

Actually, it started when I was bitten on the neck by a brown recluse (also known as a fiddleback) spider. I went to bed with an itchy neck and woke the next morning with a sore whelp as big in diameter as a baseball.

I don't know if it was the spider bite, the Dial body wash my doctor recommended, or the stress of house-sitting with an itchy, highly annoying dog that week...but something caused me to break out in hives. Terrible, terrible hives.

After three doctor visits and a round of steroids, I did what I should have done first and took some benadryl. Then I went to my closet to put on my shoes and go feed that damn dog one last time. That was when, dopey from the medicine, I ran into the door frame of the closet and broke my pinky toe.

You know, I never even noticed that little toe until I broke it. Apparently it's just as important as the other toes for walking, and there's really no good way to put a splint on the pudgy little thing.

But that was nothing compared to the week after my darling cat Sunshine had emergency butt surgery...and then another butt surgery to fix the previous one. It wasn't just that I had to clean her butt stitches morning and night...it was the way she screamed at me every time, like I was trying to kill her...and the way she started foaming at the mouth every time I tried to give her the antibiotics, and the way the slobber collected inside that stupid e-collar...

I hated everyone that week, passionately and without exception.

When the weekend came, I had to board Sunshine at the vet for a few days, as I was going home for Christmas and she still needed medication twice a day. When they took her back to the treatment room and I could hear her screaming all the way up front (as per the usual), for once I didn't cringe and cover my ears.

No, I leaned back in my chair and laughed, thinking "she's their problem now."

And then I got the hell out of town...which sounds like a pretty good idea now, actually. I haven't seen Ryan in nearly two weeks, and after the week I've had, nothing can cheer me up like heading to OKC for a quiet weekend with my awesome boyfriend and his little orange tabbies.

Not Your Year

Scattered shadows on a wall, you watch the long light fall
Some impressions stay and some will fade
Tattered shoes outside your door, clothes all on the floor
Your life feels like the morning after all year long.

Every day it starts again
You cannot say if you’re happy
You keep trying to be
Try harder, maybe this is not your year.

Movies, TV screens reflect just what you expected
There’s a world of shiny people somewhere else
Out there following their bliss
living easy, getting kissed
while you wonder what else you’re doing wrong

Breathe through it, write a list of desires
Make a toast, make a wish, slash some tires
Paint a heart repeating, beating “don’t give up, don’t give up, don’t give up.”

©2006 Deb Talan & Steve Tannen (ASCAP/BMI). All rights reserved