I seem to distinctly remember thinking, at the beginning of last year’s Lunar New Year celebrations, “This is it! MY year! Let’s go, baby!” If memory serves me right, not only is it my birth year, but “Rat” was the first nickname I was ever bestowed that wasn’t a derivation of my name. (It goes back to the way my first girlfriend and her cronies used animals as codenames when passing notes…who knew I’d be mixed up in issues of message transmission security over twenty years on?) In any event, I think I can really look back now that I’ve been on the job for three weeks.
I’m still lost. I think somebody said that the first ninety days of a new job are basically just an extension of your interview, and God knows I’m following the age-old rule of new jobs: never turn down a lunch invite, a drink invite, or the opportunity to follow somebody around. Sponge up everything, and accept that it may take two or three tries before you get it from memory, and ask questions for Godsakes, something I took way too long to do in my other California jobs. And above all, don’t assume that the day-to-day behavior of those around you is a reaction to or reflection on you – you don’t even know these people yet, not really, so wait a while before you pass judgement.
But the stuff around the job itself – the ability to get around solely by train or shuttle, the opportunity to play my podcasts out on the way there and back rather than all day while I wait for something to do, the FREE COFFEE, the water that doesn’t come with Superfund runoff, the array of dining opportunities (especially if I’m elsewhere on the job other than home base), the comfort of knowing that if I’m wiped out by a semi hauling hogs that my wife will bank more than $10,000 as compensation…but you know what really hits home? No overtime. No hourly timesheet. I have a job to do, no matter how long (or not!) it takes, and while that may bite me in the ass sooner rather than later, it’s nice to feel like a bloody grown-up instead of back in the produce cooler clocking in and out.
So yeah, the big day-to-day thing that eats up almost half my waking life? No longer a source of misery. When I don’t want to get out of bed in the morning now, it’s not because I’m dreading what lies ahead. It’s only me being exhausted and butt-lazy, which is fine. Come on, I’m from the South. You ever seen Hee Haw? When’s the last time you saw anyone in Kornfield Kounty bustin’ ass?
Add that to everything else that happened in 2008 – and let’s be honest, anything that turned the page on 2007 would have been great – and yeah, the year of Rat. Glad it worked out. Now the trick is…keep going.