The title of today's page is an example of how we name our archive folders in the document center. It seemed like a fitting way to count down the remaining weeks to its extinction.
So this weekend I got to catch up with my life a little bit. I really wanted to sleep late Saturday, but cousin Phil was insisting on taking me out for my birthday (it's "Tradition!" - which song he may have even sang at me) and I had already canceled on him last weekend, so I literally rose for the occasion, we ate and celebrated, after which I stopped off at the market (a hugely valiant effort), stuffed the food in the frig and finally fell back into bed. I would nap a couple hours, wake up depressed and fall back to sleep, or wake up refreshed and fall back in bed exhausted after only brushing my teeth or feeding the cat.
Oy, such a week I had. My manager couldn't even smile at me. The receptionist did smile at me, which was eerie because she never had before (not because she's unfriendly, just too frazzled to look up). A paralegal I had barely ever conversed with reduced me to tears in the lunchroom. She inquired about each of the doc center operators and I thanked her for her interest, because she was more inquisitive than anyone else had been. She exploded into a rampage of appreciation for me and the doc center that was so emphatic ("couldn't have done her job without us, and don't think we won't be missed") that she left me in the lunchroom a crying mess, where I thought I would have enough time to regain composure before anyone else entered, but I didn't. The hostess found me and became terribly concerned before I had a chance to run into the bathroom and clean up. All week long I have been hearing an earful about how things will be after we're gone. Entertainment won't send their work out (even the doc center never had access to their documents, much to their own constant annoyance). A paralegal gave me an extremely well thought out analysis of exactly what will happen without the document center. Two attorneys told me they would be a reference (against firm policy). The office was like a morgue. I'm wondering if it will continue to be this glum all the way to 11/11/11? It all made me want to run home and find my tin foil hat.
And, don't forget, this is all deja vu to me. I'm still reeling from the big life change of David dropping dead. I arranged my whole life around my job, so now my life is arranged around nothing. It is easy to say that I could find another job - in fact, I have easily said it, and our old manager already emailed and regaled us with stories of horrible operators he has suffered since leaving us, and let us know what he had available at his firm which was basically nothing. But, I can't enter that pressure cooker again. I have an anxiety attack just thinking about it. No, I've been rode too long and hard to do it any more. The decades of TOA tension is reason enough to run screaming from ever again getting another doc center job, but the last few years of schedule changes, no raises and refused vacations have finally caught up with me. I've been running on fumes pretty much since David died already. Whatever kept me pumped at work has died. I have no mind left.
G started taking a bag of stuff a day home, and I followed suit. So, now I reach for pen trays that are no longer there - something is rearranged every day. My old familiar cubicle had been like a private office because nobody could see me back here. It is up against the proofing tables that run along the back wall, so I had a lot of space for all my personal projects (the proofer was laid off years ago). It was heaven. I really had a dream job. I'm really glad I wasn't escorted from the premises by security and had time to say goodbye, apparently sometimes to people I hadn't even known were my friends.
But, it's sinking in. I'm REALLY retired. I really can do anything I want for the rest of my life. I'm finally free to become the crazy lady with 100 cats that never leaves her house. I can really do this. I can live the creative life I have always wanted to. I can read and draw and write and bead and cook or travel or do nothing all day. How long have I wanted to do that? Since high school. Now's my time! Yay. I'm so blissed out. I just wish I wasn't so depressed about it, and I wish it wasn't so hard to get through big life changes, and I wish I had a boyfriend.
Today I told all this to a guy that called me from a dating site, who is also a recluse. I asked him what he thought the odds were of one recluse meeting another recluse on a dating site? He didn't think the odds were that high. We have a date next Sunday night, which he's already calling "our first date."
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