Employment
Sep/080
It’s blog time again… or to put it in a slightly more accurate way, I have things swirling around in my head which I would dearly like to sort out.
The question on the table is whether or not I want to keep working at Accenture. On the plus side is money and experience, on the minus side is time and sanity. The money is currently insufficient for my (large) ego. The experience is a mixed bag. If it was full time, I’d be learning quite a lot. The disjointed two days a week thing isn’t really working for me… yet I really don’t want to work more than probably three days. I’m just lazy like that.
On the flipside, I have an absurdly low amount of free time. I can’t believe that I’m even considering working. It comes back to the ego thing. There’s a part of me that craves adulation as some sort of semi-legendary figure – working, doing YAA, doing an extra subject, doing SDP, all with a grin and always with time for a beer. It’s ludicrous… and pretty tied in to the title of this blog. I have insecurities about my place in the world, and sometimes I do feel invisible. Sometimes I like it, sometimes I don’t.
The second point against working was ’sanity’: reading what I’ve just written makes me question how much is left. It’s pretty linked in to the no free time/stress thing.
There is another factor that I didn’t realise was in play until I’d been at work for a few hours. In the office it’s all too easy to find a reminder of something distracting. It’s inescapable at university too. Even bloody John McCain is in on the act. My reactions each time would be pretty interesting to chart, I think. It started with a truly warm smile of hopefulness that sort of petered out over time into a wry grin that was an acceptance of the state of play. Since discovering that it wasn’t a two-player game, the gradient actually went up a bit. It’s been a sort of reflective smile, looking back on what’s been a pretty interesting time since about April.
It wasn’t coming as easily today. I hadn’t been at work since the revelation, and it just sort of struck me that I’d need to get used to the fact that I was there and she wasn’t.
It kind of feels like not working there any more would be admitting defeat.
At the moment, I’m leaning towards accepting what was offered today – more money (well, they apparently can’t increase the pay rate… but there are other benefits) and a slightly more flexible arrangement, with the understanding that I can stop until the end of the semester if I need to.
I’m not sure if this comes out as a coherent post, but I think it’s helped clear my head a little.
Awesome week
Sep/080
I have had an awesome week.
I’d like to think that comment might surprise anyone familiar with the contents of said week. It’s all in how you tell the story. One version would be this:
I had been engaged in an extended game of chess (WARNING: HERE BE METAPHORS) since about April. At the start of July I thought I’d found a winning move. I went for it, even though it was a risky gambit. My opponent slipped out of my hands deftly, but my unsuccessful attempt didn’t really weaken any resolve or resources I had. I sat back, scheming and plotting, waiting for the next moment of opportunity.
On Sunday, I discovered that not only had I lost the game, I’d apparently been sitting at the table blissfully ignorant of the fact that the board was gone, the stadium (hey, a ex-chess nerd can dream…) was empty, and my opponent was playing with someone else… and that all of these things had been true for some time.
The rest of the week involved ever mounting pressures from university and there barely seemed enough hours in the day to do half the things I needed to do.
See, now that’s a completely accurate version of my week. Or at least, it’s accurate when you translate the metaphor. But here’s a second story:
I needed some support on Sunday. I got that support from some truly excellent people, and by the end of the night I’d levelled up several friendships. (Now I’m making RPG references. It’s obvious that I’m in the right faculty…)
After my gambit failed, I’d taken a step back and evaluated my position. One tremendously happy thought that I’d had was that even if the relationship I was working towards with one person didn’t ever occur, I could name four people with whom I now had a deeper friendship. I’d had things on my mind, I shared them, I opened up, and I was supported.
The magic number was five by midnight Sunday, and six less than twenty-four hours later. A fuss about someone I’d known for barely nineteen weeks had strengthened four friendships I’d had for nineteen months, and one that I’d had for nineteen years.
(Eagle-eyed fans will note that only adds up to five… but I just couldn’t quantify that person in terms of nineteen. The closest I got was sixteen semesters. That friendship was strengthened too, and it was with someone who would definitely forgive the omission in favour of the mathematically neat style of my point )
As for the rest of the week… that was busy. I had to deal with uni deadlines as well as the pressure of being a famous model. But the week is over (admittedly, the pressures are not) and I’m still here. I posted a month ago about pushing myself, and finding my limits. I’m definitely doing that … and I’m loving it. It’s not always fun at the time, but at the end of the day (even when that day, like yesterday, is 40 hours long) I can sit down (or collapse) and know that I have achieved.