Cafe Hitch-hike

2022-11-17

In the realm of things I never thought would happen

I guess I better face up to those fears, those echoes of past memories. This time I’m not talking about romantic or family matters.

I really haven’t had to. I just assumed they’d fade, but how wrong I am! I understand by far and large that I’m not the only one who wrestles with these things.

One of my colleagues in the recently finished project-from-hell has the same thing. They confessed many awful things that happened to them in the building. I was surprised they were more paranoid than I was on certain things; they have a lot more protection in some ways but that didn’t matter. People just want to be treated right and respectfully where they work despite whatever advantage or privilege they have. I wasn’t the only one who took various types of lickins (as my step-dad used to call them) on the job, and not at all.

My boss told me when they have a work dilemma, they invoke an alter ego for strength and guidance. They said they imagine themselves being Daniel Craig as James Bond. I said, “woo-wee! That’s a good one! He’s a badass!”.

I have more than one. Madame Marie Laveau (pillar of 1800s New Orleans and voodoo priestess), Mata Hari (exotic dancer with questionable roles as a spy that is still undetermineld) and Valentina Tereshkova (Soviet parachutist and first woman in space who still holds the record for number of times orbiting the earth). I couldn’t find a single female (and I wanted a female) to be my alter ego. They have the physical (for the record, I’d never jump out of a damn anything), spiritual/ community organizer, and um— feminine wiles to draw their strength.

It’s hard to say what’s happening at work, but it’s not terrible and it’s actually different than what I’ve pissed and moaned about on these pages. In most ways, it is positive.

It’s weird as fuck that others have confidence in me considering they sure dragged me through mud just over 5 years ago, or in the distant past thought my ideas and suggestions were bizarre (they turned out not to be). I’m almost afraid to speak up sometimes in conversations because the ghost of the mud dragging enters my head, or I wonder how I will get my hands smacked (a common things people in my building got from the Grand Pubahs).

It’s even more strange to be deputized for things, and that scares me. No one seemed to care what I did before, as long as I did something it was ok (and if I didn’t break anything, piss anyone off, and made the Grand Pubahs look bad). Now, uh…. the things I do actually affect others directly.

I feel so chickenshit right about now, I just do. Right when I thought things would be a certain way forever, I was proven dead wrong (hahahah).

While I’m in the realm of things I never thought would happen, why don’t I add happily married, stable prosperity, and I get to see my loved ones all the time and we get along all right. I’d throw in “Marley doesn’t grow old,’ but I can’t say that. That’s the law of nature; my 13 year and 6 month old puppy is slowing down though she seems happy.

I think I can do it, but I just have a lot to shake off. Maybe I need to do what my boss suggested, and invoke my alter egos to assist me. After all, a place like this was what I hoped for a very long time. I need to not wuss out now that it’s here.

And gee, maybe the whole concept of the glass cliff doesn’t apply quite yet.

downwind | upstream