Chicago was a much needed and very healthy trip. Ostensibly it was for work. And I did get some good work done. But half my job is wrangling code and the other half is managing spreadsheets, and even the best of that isn’t in any way personally fulfilling. I wouldn’t inflict even the best stories of that work on anybody unless I wanted them to feel pain. Why I was there is the important part.
But before I get to that, take it from me that business travel is an underappriciated present. Okay, if you’re on site working 16 hours to a deadline, that won’t be fun. But that means you (or probably somebody who can send you on the trip) fucked up. But normally it’s like a convention: about as good or bad as you make it out to be. Me, I can’t afford not to make the best of every situation I can.
Go on site for a few days and you’ll have your expenses comped and lodging provided. Work your job and then you have a nice evening with nothing to do. That only sounds boring until you just think of it as a 6 hour vacation, several days in a row. Don’t worry about the chores not getting done. You’re not around to do them anyway. Take your time eating dinner. There’s nothing you have to do afterwards. Watch TV until you fall asleep. Smell the flowers if you can. You will have time.
Time is one of the things that you can trade for if you’re willing to take a raw deal, but you’ll never get it back. Time to relax, time to think, time to surrender to yourself are in short supply these days. We’ve done it to ourselves, of course, needing the next thing or confirmation or attention or whatnot. That’s society’s currency now and you can either get yours or be a functional pauper.
But when you have to slow down, you can use that time you’ve been given on the old things like deep thoughts and resting. Get 12 hours of sleep for once! Sit in the shower and put a thought into each little drop, and just observe as each one that falls over your body disappears while countless new ones come to be. Learn to be with yourself, even if just a few hours.
So I got to thinking. I got to step away from life for a bit and let those spurious thoughts work themselves into shape. They’re not deep. They’re mundane. But they’re important to me. And now I’m going to jump to talking about work, not to create false suspense but just context.
If you hadn’t heard about my job situation, here’s what I’m calling the polite version (pretty much the drama- and judgment-free version). I was in charge of Software Development for a Business Unit after showing great improvements in my lab. When I put all the plans into action, enough people with pull all decided they wanted to make my decisions for me while holding me responsible. I fought that. And I lost. Any more of the story is for something more personal than a blog post.
So it was a painful time for me. All my efforts tossed aside, my career wrecked, a decade of my life dedicated to something I no longer had any control over. It really sucked even after I found a new position. But that position brought me to Chicago. And now I feel better.
The details are of no importance. It’s just regular business stuff, though a less demanding and stressful role than I held. And a chance to build a new team after losing my old one. I felt appreciated and valued again. It’s nice.
But what I needed to think about was what this meant for me. This was a chance to mentally sort it out. My former job gave me great opportunities, great pay, and great satisfaction that can’t be taken away no matter how badly things ended. But it also cost a lot. It sucked up a huge part of my life and energy. Certain things in life had to be sacrificed for it. I chose that path, the rewards are great, but nothing came for free.
As much as I wish things ended differently, this trip helped me see how things ending might be good in the long run. It’s brought forth new opportunities. Yes, opportunities for things I would have found and taken anyway. Probably. I think. But this soon? Maybe I would have wasted the time in doing it slowly. Maybe it would have slipped by while I wasn’t watching.
Frankly, for those of you readers who thought “too long; didn’t read,” I’m just not upset about my job situation anymore. Angry with people, yes. Frustrated at what happened, yes. But not upset anymore. Maybe I paid a heavy price, but to be free of chasing a career is perhaps for the best.
And with that out of the way, I had more thoughts to ponder as they dripped onto my head, rolled through me, and for the most part just vanished again as quickly.
When I thought this job would have me move to Chicago it was exciting! A bit of a new start but with so many of the hassles out of the way. I wasn’t exactly disappointed to be staying in Maryland after all, since that is the easy, quick way to pursue life goals. But I already then felt like I needed a bit of a shake up.
One of the thoughts that stuck with me was that maybe moving really wasn’t the right thing right now. That it might be, but later. That it was perhaps a weak middle ground between better options. Looking inward, I can pursue things without the excuse of a move, even if that’s the normal way to do things. (The normal way, I’m truly sad to say, never seems to work for me.) Looking outward, maybe Chicago would still just be too close and too familiar. I’ve entertained the idea of an extended stay in Japan for quite some time now. Maybe I need to think about that first and fit my job around that. Maybe it’s really time to fit my career into my life instead of the other way around.
What it means to me is that my life is about to get accelerated. It’s been retarded until now. (That story won’t come later; it’s one for a late night on a comfortable couch with the right combination of booze and whispers.) I’ve missed out on some things that I know about and probably scores more that I don’t. I’ve been aching for this change for a long time. Ready or not, here I come. Got some catching up to do.
But none of this really wouldn’t have happened on its own. As much as I wax and wane philosophical about using travel time as thinking time, I need my catalysts, too. The weekend was for seeing friends. Two years is painfully long even if “seeing” was only a few minutes every couple months before we all got our lives shackled down. We caught up, we talked, we comiserated. We shared stories and ideas and plans. We just lived again for once.
And that’s why it was healthy for me. I’ve neglected living life for too long. Not that I’m going to just abandon this great new career path (or the great pay). It’s what brought me here in the first place. But I’m feeling a bit more ready to let life wash me away to places unknown and unfamiliar. This inflection point was going to come at some point, and perhaps fate is just things happening at opportune times. But I’m on the other side now and it looks nice.