Covid happened

After all of the conscious effort to do whatever I could to NOT get Covid, it happened. My mother was invited and instrumental in a celebration for a sixty year retirement. When she got home that evening she was already not feeling well. A few days went by before I caught what she thought was a cold that she was experiencing. I had a headache, literally 'body' music which is an absolute aching feeling all over. It made me also feel a little nausuous, and I developed a cold where the mucus was suddenly in my throat every time I coughed. A few days have passed, and every day I feel a bit better. I really got upset knowing that this happened. I wanted to have been able to say that I never got it. However, I began to consider all of the people I know who have experienced it and when I think that even the late Queen Elizabeth the II got it, it tells me that perspective is everything. An airborn contagious disease is no regarder of amnyone period.

would I know

The way that circumstances insued this evening, I saw an aspect of myself that I am now musing on and also working on in myself. I come from parents who always seemed confident,all knowing and until adulthood,never seemed to me to make mistakes. This afternoon I mis-interpreted what was said in a meeting for today and thought that I did not have to show up. I was called and I was able to explain my understanding of what was said at the meeting. I was mortified that I had come to my conclusion and had no other thought about it being possibly different. I get really triggered when I make an error. I think that I can find myself melting down, embarassed. I get right back to childhood wondering who thinks I am stupid.So naturally I spent some time just feeling all of those icky, stomach flipping emotions. It took a few minutes for me to talk myself off of the ledge. I had erred, but not so pathetically that anythings could not be fixed by it. I wasn't an idiot, addled brained, hopeless...I told myself. As I graadually shifted my focus and my emotions, I thought about my mood. Prior to the phone call, I had been feeling so happy about having today off, as next week I felt that I would be taking up the usual ruitine and figuring out how I was managing everything I would have to do. So when the call came that I did not expect I was ready to act , to solve the issue. Yet, I felt such a disappointment in myself. I was divided. On the one hand, I was flled with a sense of absolute let down to others on the one hand and a distinct need to get my mind right about how much I would punish myself for the misunderstanding. I wa taken aback by how much I swiftly slipped into feeling bad. However, it was the very fact that was telling and helpful in the end, as I saw that I was going over the top with my actions. The truth as is proverbially stated, is always in the middle. I had the chance to experience opposing emotions and to act on them and most of all, to come out of it on the other side, secure in the knowledge that these things happen, yes, I can believe the worst and the worst can and does happen...but ultimately, it is the fight within and the desire to persevere that matters most.

Every year I consider leaving my job. I think about it because of the salary. However this year I did some research and further thinking about it. I have great flexibility there. I have the time to do other things, and it is that fact that makes it clear that all I need do is to have some other paying consistant work. My other jobs are too sporadic after all. So from here on out I shall be posting about these 'other' 'consistant' forms of salary.

A colleague called me two weeks ago. She delivered some news to me where she was stunned that I had not received the new title that someone else we know now has. Over the next few days I heard from the person themselves that she had been with the department for eighteen years, four years longer than I, and seniority is many times the reason for such advancement. My friend and colleague is someone I like immensely. Yet, more and more I am a little alarmed by the way she imparts opinions about our experiences at the job. For such a young, bright person, she is extremely negative and bitter. She makes some leaps of judgement about peoples' successes. So much so that although I may feel the same way about why someone may 'get' ahead as opposed to my efforts, I equally know when I unpeel the layers, that I would not choose their actions to achieve their results. I have told my friend this. We live in a tiny country. We are all horrifically over qualified for most of the jobs we can get, and no one leaves their job just like that. The more academic, the more education....oddly, the more challenges appear. The compitition to succeed at all cost is aparant. The need to foil others success or to step over others to receive your own is very high. All of this is perfectly normal and not condusive only to geographic location. It just happens with people at work. I suppose I observe this because I pick up a sense of helplessness from my friend and that gets me wary. She is capable, she can mind her own business and get whatever it is that she is seeking. But instead she prefers to lay blame on others, and that I find unfortunate.