Stuff to See!

What You Leave Behind

Still unemployed, and still loving it.
I was in a bad situation at my old stomping grounds, a square peg trying feverishly to jam itself into a round hole. I wasn't able to reorient myself to find a suitably shaped slot, nor was I able to reshape myself to properly fit where I had to be. I would dread going to work each day, knowing in my heart that I was striving to do something outside my capabilities. Not beyond them, just outside. For the first time in my life, I felt like a failure. It wasn't pretty.
Getting to work made things a little easier. As Thufir Hawat would say, leaving friends is a sadness, but a place is just a place. Most people I've known who were unhappy with their jobs felt that way because of their coworkers, although there were almost as many people who hated their actual work. I've been lucky in that I've managed to find myself in situations where I genuinely liked most of the people around me.
Usually the feeling was mutual. It was certainly mutual in this case.
People were sad to hear I was leaving, coworkers, friends, customers. They seemed to genuinely appreciate what I did for them, and that makes a person feel good. Indeed, if I wasn't mired in the career path I'd chosen, I'd happily still be working today, instead of happily being unemployed. Leaving was a very personal decision, quite possibly the most selfish thing I have ever done. In the end, I had no choice. Misery and I, old friends, perhaps, do not coexist very well. If there was some other overwhelming force of happiness in my life from whatever quarter, perhaps I could have endured and even overcome my feelings of abject failure, even if other people thought well of me.
I've always been good, usually the best, at whatever I've done, at least among my immediate peers. In order to be the best at what I used to do, I had to be able to leave with the sure knowledge that everything I should have done was indeed done. Instead, I wasn't able to overcome the personal feelings of inadequacy that came with having so many things undone floating over my head. Part of that was the nature of the job, but things cropped up whenever I wasn't on hand to deal with them immediately. Others had to follow in my footsteps, and anyone who knows me knows full well that I've always walked on my own path.
In this case, I wasn't able to guide my path between the lines that the company would have me walk. Although this maverick approach yielded some unlooked for good results, it also got me into trouble. Again, for better or for worse, I wasn't able to adapt myself to the rigid constraints demanded of my job. In a sense, my job was to get results, and the way I approached it didn't quite produce the results that were desired, at least as far as I was concerned. The only way to be of service within the company was to go backward to find a fork in the road and choose another path, to find the square hole, so to speak.
I was never good at going backward.
The choice before me was to face failure and retrace my steps, or to leave entirely and admit defeat. Ugly choice. I chose the latter. After all, tomorrow is another day.
Whether that turns out to be the correct choice or not will be borne out by events yet to occur. I think it was correct, but I've been wrong before. At any rate, it's the way I've decided to go.
Four years is a long time while you're living it, but after they've passed, one wonders where all the days went, where all the hours snuck off to. Time may be absolute, but perception is anything but.
In four years even in a restricted setting, the average human will meet a lot of people. Chance intersections can produce unlikely results. If nothing else, you become part of the fabric of life in your setting, a thread in the tapestry. Pull out that thread, and who knows what will happen to the rest of them. Apparently, in my case, you can remove the thread without destroying the tapestry, but in being removed the thread can touch, dislodge, abrade against many others. The deeper in the fabric, the harder to remove. I was in pretty deep.
And I touched a lot of other threads.
Against my wishes, people decided to hold a luncheon on my last day, and while I was hoping that it was in honor of a coworker's fiftieth birthday, it turned out to be for me. Although I like to interact with others, I don't really like to be the center of attention. As I told Dawn long ago, I wanted to feel like the paint on the walls: present, but not conspicuous. By chance or design, I've never been able to remain inconspicuous for long. Only in social settings can I blend into the background, observing and not being observed, standing on the fine line between wanting to part of the group and wanting no part of it.
Goodbyes have never been easy for me, even when they're necessary (just ask my ex-girlfriends). Normally I choose to linger three or four moments past the point when I should just pack up and leave, or I go out like a thief in the night. I stayed too long, months too long, although it was important to get 2004 behind me. The additional damage to soul and company was slight at worst.
Nonetheless, I was prepared to say goodbye this time, on my terms. People will do what they want if they feel a need, and in this case, they needed to make a fuss over me. I love them for it, even if I didn't want to go through such a thing. I knew it was coming, so I prepared a speech.
The moment came as I was inviting a young female coworker to a postmortem at the bar across the street. Ironically enough, the birthday lady who was 50 told me that everyone was waiting for me, that the party had started without me. Knowing I had to show up, I went over and saw these people, these men and women who became family to me, with whom I spent more time than my own kin. One of them gave me a shirt for use on my next interview. The rest of them gave me this.
I was stunned by their generosity and by the craftsmanship that went into what they gave me. Butterflies long unfelt starting careening through my insides and my prepared speech went the way of the dodo. It was hard to put into words what I was feeling, and what I'd be leaving behind, but in the end I think they got the point. I miss them already, but this had to be.
It takes a long time to say goodbye to hundreds of people, one by one. Four hours, at least, it took for me. I saved my departments for last, last as they were first to me. I thanked them for all they had done to make my time special. I even told a few of them where to meet me after work. I turned in my badge and strolled out into the sunset, or at least I strolled to the west. After a brief stop by my mother's place of business (I asked her to take care of my gifts until I could retrieve them), I went to the bar to reacquaint myself with the taste of good beer.
Two of my dearest coworkers showed up, as well as a friend from back in the day. Eventually only one was left, and by that time I knew I'd had too much to drink. We kept talking and eventually left. Naturally I decided it would be a good idea to throw up in front of this truly beautiful person. She stood by me and we talked for a little longer, as all the tears I'd held back that day came out to play. Never had I let myself go in front of anyone from that place, although I couldn't have picked a better person to have around to watch me be weak. Even considering the nausea, I wasn't embarrassed, although I was uncomfortable to break down so completely in front of her. Even so, I still kept some shred of dignity, maybe, although it probably disappeared into the age-old concrete I had so recently blessed with my discomfort. It wasn't a total loss, though, since I did keep her from making a wrong turn in the neighborhood.
If you're reading this...thank you. Maybe another day I'll tell you what I refused to say in the bitter cold of my truck. It's bad enough that I've left you the unresolved crumbs of my old job, although I did what I could to sweep them up before you took over. I meant it when I said you were like my little sister...when a big brother feels he failed, he falls hard. I guess in return you can call me by names I'd forbid others to use. You earned that right a long time ago.
Few others can claim that.
So here I sit, typing away at the old iMac, wondering exactly what the hell I'm going to do. Oddly enough, it snowed rather heavily the very next day. Luckily I was able to pick up a battery for my truck before the original finally died. The old battery got me home, and promptly died. Strange timing, but coincidence nonetheless.