You know the nauseous feeling you get when you have to hide a secret or just "avoid the truth"? Well I've been carrying it around with me at work since April when Chris accepted the State Dept offer. My work, though not my life's calling, has been a big part of my life for a long time. I take pride in a job well done and enjoy my co-workers also on a personal level. Though the company is larger, my office consists of 6 ladies, our male plant manager and a handful of yard guys and truck drivers in and out all the time. We all get along great and enjoy sharing in everyone's family life conversations at work. And though I don't wake up wishing to head out to work, I don't hate it when I arrive either.
I've only had to try to skirt questioning and embellish where needed since last month, when Chris moved to DC. So I've felt sick on more than one occasion and have tried to mentally keep track of which weekends I say Chris is working. I also have had to hide the fact that I'm a single parent at the moment, sending Ceiba to school everyday and pulling double duty at home. Some days I'm just plain tired or preoccupied.
Well, today I asked for a few minutes in private and spoke to the plant manager about our situation. I hope to leave on very good terms and feel obliged to assist in a smooth transition. Oh sure, I hope they'll miss me when I'm gone and praise my hard work and dedication, blah, blah, blah.
But they've also become good friends, and I don't want to leave anyone hanging. My resignation is not submitted, nor do I have a departure date, but work does know our situation. He was VERY understanding, happy for us and appreciative of the head's up. It'll be on the down low for a few days until they decide what to do, but I feel better already.
I wish sometimes I had an on/off switch for the emotional commitment to work, but fortunately or not, it's inherited. Hopefully it'll pay off in the long run career wise (and good karma). Who knows, I may be exporting cargo from Abidjan or Zanzibar in 10 years.
This is really neat that you are doing a blog! Beleive it or not...you get adjusted to doing the single parent/head of house thing and actually get nervous about having to learn how to do things as a team again. Granted, I was able to see Kyle on the weekends...it was still pretty rough. Hang in there and we look forward to visiting soon!
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