The Week of "Put Up or Shut Up" / Out of Gas
I hate myself for waiting so long to write these journal entries. I've been off work since Sunday morning and now, here I am, with two hours to go before my next work week begins and I'm finally sitting down to write an entry about last week. Hopefully in the future I'll do what I mean to and jot out entries closer to the times I'm talking about.
Last week, my fourth week at my new job, saw some really valuable progress. It was a long week (Four 12-hour shifts over four evenings) but for some reason the time seemed to pass by. More and more, my trainer is allowing me to take the reigns of our section and make decisions about what we do and the priorities we give to work that needs to be done. As I've said before, it also really helps when all the machines are working. The Saturday night shift was probably my best day so far working at Maxim. Under constant supervision, I pretty much single-handedly ran our entire section the whole twelve hours. The day seemed to fly by and all too quickly it felt like I was finally arriving at that place where the stress of ignorance turns to the relief of understanding. I was catching on and I even began to learn how if the people around us don't do their jobs, we can't do ours. I was moving so fast, the stations ahead of us couldn't keep up (Although that could have been because they seemed strangely vacant the whole day).
The reassurance I feel from getting better at this insanely confusing job is tempered by the reality that I don't see myself working there a year from now. Anything can happen so I'm not making a prediction, but now that I can grasp what's expected of me I can see myself coming to resent this job. I feel out of place and it shows sometimes. Like when people ask me what I did before this and my answer (Fixing things to sell on eBay) suddenly seems so boring and pedestrian. And as well, I feel old there. A good deal of the employees are just entering their 20's and although the majority of people there are older than me, it bothers me on some level that hypothetically I could have gotten this job fresh out of high school with zero college. I still want a job that will put my college degree to work so the job search continues ever on.
On the other hand, piles of cash are rolling in. So much money, in fact, that I'm now hunting for health insurance (Since I'd have to wait upwards of six months to get it through Maxim) and beginning to plan for seeing doctors for the first time in a couple years. It's gong to be great to get all checked up and finally fix my blasted teeth. So I'm very thankful I have this job because even if I only have it for one or two years, it'll allow me to accomplish all these things that I couldn't have done otherwise. It's also funny to note that if I save every cent I get from this job, I'd be able to completely pay off my college student loans by March. And that's a big deal when you think about it. 2011 will be the year I finish paying off those loans as well as a million other little victories and I couldn't have done it without this job. So although I may secretly long for something slightly better (As I'm sure everyone does), this will do for now.
Earlier this week, my dad was driving home from work at 3 in the morning. My family apparently has some love affair with working graveyard shifts but who would turn down a shift differential that equals thousands of dollars a month? Not us! So anyway, he's on his way home and he's following a coworkers broken directions for a scenic route home. As if there's anything you can see or take in about a 3 AM drive in the dark. Anyway, he gets within a stone's throw of him when wouldn't you know it he runs out of gas and his car stalls. It also happened to die on him right on a blind curve where no one behind him could see he was stopped until they were right on top of him.
It could have been bad. At three in the morning people speed on that road and it must have been terrifying. Thankfully, he had a charged cell phone on him and was able to call me. Also thankfully, we had a half-full gas can in the shed. I sped on out there in my car and delivered the gas just as an ambulance happened by. That curtailed traffic and besides the embarrassment, everything was fine. It was a very lucky evening for my father. Had I not been home or had there not been gas in the shed or had he not had his cell phone, it would most certainly have been a different night. Although this should be a lesson for him: We chastised him for passing several gas stations along the way even though he knew the car was on empty. He's got these habits with his vehicles and hopefully close calls like this -- though no one wants them to happen in the first place -- will remind us all to take better care of these things. Had he just stopped at that gas station and put $5 in, I wouldn't be writing about it. What a night.
Last week, my fourth week at my new job, saw some really valuable progress. It was a long week (Four 12-hour shifts over four evenings) but for some reason the time seemed to pass by. More and more, my trainer is allowing me to take the reigns of our section and make decisions about what we do and the priorities we give to work that needs to be done. As I've said before, it also really helps when all the machines are working. The Saturday night shift was probably my best day so far working at Maxim. Under constant supervision, I pretty much single-handedly ran our entire section the whole twelve hours. The day seemed to fly by and all too quickly it felt like I was finally arriving at that place where the stress of ignorance turns to the relief of understanding. I was catching on and I even began to learn how if the people around us don't do their jobs, we can't do ours. I was moving so fast, the stations ahead of us couldn't keep up (Although that could have been because they seemed strangely vacant the whole day).
The reassurance I feel from getting better at this insanely confusing job is tempered by the reality that I don't see myself working there a year from now. Anything can happen so I'm not making a prediction, but now that I can grasp what's expected of me I can see myself coming to resent this job. I feel out of place and it shows sometimes. Like when people ask me what I did before this and my answer (Fixing things to sell on eBay) suddenly seems so boring and pedestrian. And as well, I feel old there. A good deal of the employees are just entering their 20's and although the majority of people there are older than me, it bothers me on some level that hypothetically I could have gotten this job fresh out of high school with zero college. I still want a job that will put my college degree to work so the job search continues ever on.
On the other hand, piles of cash are rolling in. So much money, in fact, that I'm now hunting for health insurance (Since I'd have to wait upwards of six months to get it through Maxim) and beginning to plan for seeing doctors for the first time in a couple years. It's gong to be great to get all checked up and finally fix my blasted teeth. So I'm very thankful I have this job because even if I only have it for one or two years, it'll allow me to accomplish all these things that I couldn't have done otherwise. It's also funny to note that if I save every cent I get from this job, I'd be able to completely pay off my college student loans by March. And that's a big deal when you think about it. 2011 will be the year I finish paying off those loans as well as a million other little victories and I couldn't have done it without this job. So although I may secretly long for something slightly better (As I'm sure everyone does), this will do for now.
Earlier this week, my dad was driving home from work at 3 in the morning. My family apparently has some love affair with working graveyard shifts but who would turn down a shift differential that equals thousands of dollars a month? Not us! So anyway, he's on his way home and he's following a coworkers broken directions for a scenic route home. As if there's anything you can see or take in about a 3 AM drive in the dark. Anyway, he gets within a stone's throw of him when wouldn't you know it he runs out of gas and his car stalls. It also happened to die on him right on a blind curve where no one behind him could see he was stopped until they were right on top of him.
It could have been bad. At three in the morning people speed on that road and it must have been terrifying. Thankfully, he had a charged cell phone on him and was able to call me. Also thankfully, we had a half-full gas can in the shed. I sped on out there in my car and delivered the gas just as an ambulance happened by. That curtailed traffic and besides the embarrassment, everything was fine. It was a very lucky evening for my father. Had I not been home or had there not been gas in the shed or had he not had his cell phone, it would most certainly have been a different night. Although this should be a lesson for him: We chastised him for passing several gas stations along the way even though he knew the car was on empty. He's got these habits with his vehicles and hopefully close calls like this -- though no one wants them to happen in the first place -- will remind us all to take better care of these things. Had he just stopped at that gas station and put $5 in, I wouldn't be writing about it. What a night.