How are Things?

Tag: life

  • Thursday 17th July 2025

    Things that happened today:

    So I made it into work, determined to ignore any and all calls for intervention, assistance or emotional support. Only to receive a WhatsApp message: The horrible abuser had been cast off! Really and truly! The relief was huge, and it was amplified when a third party told me that horrible abuser had been told to stay away from exactly the type of environment we all work in. As in, part of his probation was to stay away. And he’d been here! Several times!

    Honestly, I throw up my hands at this. In no way was ANY of this a good idea; going out with horrible person or my getting involved in the whole nasty thing. Colleague is blind to a dangerous degree to firstly allow this and then to lie about it. He is immature and dangerously so.

    Strange behavior from a colleague, this time from another unit. She claimed there was construction work going on so could she us e an adjunct office. Yes she could but she is disingenuous, and I wonder at all of this.

    And finally, I and Young man spend the evening together with my niece. She has broken up with her partner and I can see their influence decreasing on her heartbreak.

    Enough drama. So to sleep.

  • Wednesday 16th July 2025

    One part of my role is to help junior staff. And some of those junior staff share an open plan office space. Today one of them called into me with a problem. A second staff member has been speaking about a very unpleasant situation with their boyfriend. There was signs of real problems, possible physical abuse, and certainly financial cohersion.

    I spoke to the second staff member, and it is sooo much worse than I realised. Firstly, the boyfriend is in fact getting a lot of money off them, nearly four figures. They forget birthdays and important days. They openly speak of other people in an effort to make junior staff member jealous. And the icing on this unpleasant cake?

    He is on the sex registrar list, but he swears he didn’t do it!!

    I could if I wanted to show you a press briefing of the criminal case. He recorded men and women in bathrooms and showers, and kept it up. When the case was reported on social media, folks came out to say they knew him in school and he was nasty then, too.

    Oh jeepers.

    We talked and talked. Junior staff member swore up and down that they would break up, that they would block their number, and that all would be well. There were tears, there were promises, there were guarantees.

    Aaaand they have done none of them. Apparently they left my office and told someone immediately that they were not going to break up with Mr Sex Register. The news article is just a conspiracy, it seems and the rest is just a joke. Relax!!

    For goodness’s sake. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them cop the fuck on.

  • Tuesday 15th July 2025

    Yesterday, for all the briefness in my entry, was an important day. I gathered as many people as possible to decide the best way to deal with the coming year. It was a collective group action, about building consensus and about sharing information as a group. It was work, diligence and about being as professional as possible in a public forum. The skill attached to it was gathering the reigns of those in the room, and moving their opinions towards my vision for the future. And I did, for at least the majority of the event. My agenda items were carried out and I’m in charge of doing so.

    Not surprisingly, today I was tired. I was up, but not functioning for quite some time. I did all the things I usually do, but slowly, and most likely with little flair. However, today moved from the external, to the internal. The company I work with provides a coaching service, where you can reach out to a more senior member of staff in a different unit. Today was the first day I was to meet him.

    The movement towards his office was far too cinematic, in that I moved from my office, down to the concourse, towards his building, up in the elevator to the top floor, and then into the winding corridors that led to his office. When I knocked, he opened it after a moment and said my name with a question mark. I smiled, nodded, and met his eyes, and he held the gaze a little longer than normal. I felt that he used the tactic to gain space over his visitors, and moved my own gaze away.

    The plan is that the first session lasts at least an hour. The discussion is not to be a counselling session, but it is very often like that in terms of topic. It is not meant to be about technical skills, but rather the psychology behind the work, behind the person.

    His office is busy, with many mementoes and souvenirs of a busy life. I see such things as the birthright of the smart and the rich, and look upon them as privilege. Those not credited with intelligence are not given such rights, but have to be happy with impersonal space – a bitter thought, probably not my only one. He himself is a short, neat man, with wiry strength, and an ethnicity going back millennia.

    The conversation would have deserved a setting to Philip Glass; there was harmony, but not sentimentality. We quickly found ourselves discussing profound matters, and the conversation reached a depth I had not really emotionally prepared for. In short-

    I believe I am not a good person and I have no right to work there.

    And in that vulnerability is all my wasted potential and fear, making me blind and leading to defenses rather than merely working, and working well.

    We both acknowledged that the conversation had uncovered a lot rather quickly. Myself, my stomach was one tight bundle. We wrapped it up after an hour, and I took a lunchbreak to think, to breathe.

    The afternoon saw me have a cup of tea with a person who is heading away from our unit. She is heading to another country where she can rent an apartment for a fraction of what she can get here. I wish her well, and admire her for seeking a good life for herself. We all want that, of course we do.

  • Sunday 13th July 2025

    This morning, I awoke. In more ways than one.

    I was married for 13 years, and the divorce took four years to work its way out. That was June 2024, in a ritual in a court that was an anti-marriage. Do you not take this man? I do not. Is the marriage retrievable? Like a precious passenger that fell off a raft on a fast-moving river, with no chance to grab or collect it, or even mourn it being gone- No, it was not. Then it was over and I was travelling home on public transport, my voice and face as mute as other passengers, both sad and free and happy and released all at the same time.

    Then other things came that summer. No chance to rest or retrieve, just keep moving.

    It is really not until the return of Spring that I felt I could breathe out. Music and art, the record of others’ joy, no longer disgusted me. My fears lessened. My panic lessened. My heart became to calm. And now, I find my own music grows at times. My rhythm can contain more than one beat, and my soul isn’t so icy.

    The hot night begat a hot morning. Various thumps and whimpers from neighbors spoke of their desires being met, and I found myself actually understanding, even identifying, for the first time for years.

    And yes, I mean years.

    I’m no one’s idea of attractiveness. And I certainly am deeply uninterested in inviting anyone into my life. But this is another sign of healing quietly making itself known to me, when I feared it was not possible to ever return.

    I’ve just ensured that this blog will always be anonymous, it seems. I hope to write again tomorrow.

  • Saturday 12th July 2025

    The cat woke me, bless the little darling. It was actually no harm, as I needed to get up at 7am anyway. I was at my laptop at 8.30am, and started the long and arduous process of getting through work emails. You see, as schools are closed and I’m still expected to work full time, I have to enroll my son in summer camps. However, no camp will cover the full time hours I need to work, so weekends see me working in an effort to catch up.

    I really did underestimate how long it would take because those emails did take me all day. I finished at 1806, and I left 15 emails that were all about finance. Our brand new finance system is maddening in its new layout. It is so wonderful, that it has removed all traces of previous financial transactions on the system. I am saving the financial information until Tuesday, like a little treat.

    On Monday I am having such a big event I can’t even think about that right now.

    So, to go over Sunday; finish all the applications, email my boss who is returning Monday from leave, and then prep for Monday. My son returns at approximately 6pm. Will keep you posted.

  • Thursday 10th July 2025

    A confession; I am as white as boiled rice. The sun and all its works wring me out more thoroughly than linen on a washer board. Yesterday saw me moving across town, until I gathered my son and two of his friends to go see a movie. It went well, which was a relief; as a boy with autism friendship isn’t a certainty. But getting home by 6pm with the weather in the 70s saw me drained far beyond my capacities. I made dinner, and then I tidied up, and then I felt myself more empty than a dry gas tank. I was in bed by 8.40pm, and slept hard until 4am. I want to call it moral decline, but honestly it’s sadder than that; it’s old age.

    Today, with all my hours of sleep behind me, I still felt exhausted. But up and at it, at 5am. Not all things got done, but all things were attempted, even when I wanted to give up.

    I even managed to have lunch with my sister. We rarely if ever get together. Her daughter, my niece, has been through hell and back, and now has had her long term partner break up with her. The weight of the sadness I know she is going through… The gift of today was seeing my sister again, though. Salads and chats, and catching up. Plans and hopes for the future, especially when I thought once it might never happen.

    Afternoon, I had my online session with my counsellor. We talked over the week, my exhaustion, and possible plans for change. I have sought out so much change recently that I hesitate. I doubt myself. I would love new pastures, but only if they’re pastures, not battlefields. I want everything to be All Right. Which of us don’t?

  • Tuesday 8th July 2025

    I woke at 5am for some reason believing it to be Saturday. My brain is craving release. I managed to get up today and get some work done, then took my boy to art camp. Yesterday saw me hunt for him in the car park. He is 13, not a big deal, but today they ensured that no child from his group would be let out without a parent coming to pick him up. Of course I was the last one there, so I managed to cause a lot of delay for all the teenagers minding the place. Lordie.

    Today was the release of the brand new, all shiny, will-solve-everything financial system in my workplace. This thing will, and I quote, see the institution hopefully do away with lots of administrative staff. It was supposed to roll out at 9am. That became 1pm. At 2.30pm there was no sign, and I had to collect my son and make it home to work from there.

    At home in the afternoon, maybe it was the coffee, maybe the consciousness of the extra needs of my son, but I was alerted and somewhat agitated. I got as much done as I could by 5.30, then made dinner.

    By 6.30pm I and my son were online, playing our very first round of Dungeons and Dragons. The DM is a friend from work and there was a third person joining us. My son finds it hard to regulate his excitement, even his voice, so I had to tell him to ease up on the volume a few times. This was enough to see him upset, thinking that I was making him feel left out. Maybe I was. The truth is that I have no friends, no activities and no hobbies other than this, and the chance to do something, anything, just for me, is rare. And he didn’t like it. I hope we get to do it again, it was a good space for my brain to be in.

    And now, the laundry is out of the machine, the clothes are laid out for tomorrow, and I will be at my computer by 6am at the latest to see if I can sort out the financial issues of my unit. Talk to you then.

  • Monday 7th July 2025

    This day is the anniversary of the attacks in London. I was working in Finance at the time and we had to scramble to ensure transactions were noted and closed off before anyone lost any more money. It wasn’t much but it was the least we could do. The whole thing was horrific; we have much better understanding of what that means nowadays.

    Today I got up at 5am and just could not work hard. I sat and dawdled and did almost nothing until 8am, at which time I was able to go for a shower and start the day. My son has summer camps, a mere band-aid to the time I need to devote to work. I am supposed to carry out forty hours-plus, but will be lucky to get thirty-five. I sought valiantly to get something in the vicinity, but senior management shut down the project three weeks before it was to start; quite deliberately I now feel. These are men who might honestly be threatened by such an idea.

    I did run into two colleagues from another unit, who tell me that they have a role vacant. This is in fact very interesting to me. I am well aware that the idea of moving roles is very attractive, as my ego wants me to find something new. But my disaffection for my current role is not frivolous, and the unit with the vacancy is certainly much more up my bleeding-heart-liberal street. I am conscious that the idea of moving absolutely fulfills my emotional regulation, and makes me very happy.

    There is a need to watch this space. So I will.

  • Thursday 26th June; Part One

    I have long suspected that I am a character in a TV show. One of the reasons for this is that each year there is one day that is a culmination of all the events and themes of that particular year; a season finale, if you will. This year, that day was this Thursday.

    I was up at 5am as I usually am, and I carried out my meditation, exercises, and tried to get as many emails as possible done. However, at 11am, there was to be a reception that my unit was hosting, seeing every other unit in our section potentially joining us. A complication was that I was due at a hugely important meeting from 10am. A further complication was that Problematic Colleague was no longer available to assist; in fact, it was quite likely they would show their face so as to point out errors, demean me to others, and likely have help in their efforts from my boss. A secondly supposedly helpful colleague frankly refused for no reason other than she didn’t like my boss.

    The new online finance system saw delay after delay in getting the purchase order system to the Caterers. I finally got it out to them Wednesday evening, and when I arrived Thursday morning I wasn’t sure if the items would be there in good time; even if they would arrive at all.

    I needn’t have worried. Tea, coffee and thirty beautifully arranged cupcakes were delivered at 9.30 am, giving me plenty of time to rearrange the boardroom tables, set out the catering, and… the vegan options? Where were the vegan options? I thought briefly about contacting the caterers, but remembered the pale faces of the two men, already worn out before 10am. So instead I grabbed my wallet, and got two large vegan bags of cookies from the online shop, as well as grabbing a handful of napkins as well. By 9. 45am everything was set up.

    I took the time to remove old coffee stains from desks, and gave everything one last stare. It is impossible to see every error, every gap, especially by those who strive so hard to locate them. All I could see was a neat and calm set up, with chairs and tables dotted around, treats made ready and welcoming, and a proper reception ready to go. Was it enough? Would fault be found?

    No, and yes. But there was nothing more I could do about it now. I was due at my Hugely Important Meeting. So I locked up the boardroom, handed the key to fellow colleague, emailed my boss regarding all the details, gathered the rest of my papers, and moved on to Part Two…

  • Tears on the Pier

    On Saturday, I and my son saw my niece. It was down in one of the seaside fronts along our city, that on sunny days is filled with the need to do, while at the same time is lazy, hazy, relaxing… I have known my niece all 24 years of her life, and she is a rare and precious thing. She’s young, and in many respects knowing about a lot of things, and at the same time still becoming to know. Getting to walk with anyone while they come to knowledge is a wonderful thing.

    I had concluded fairly recently that she no longer wanted me in her life. She’d made and broken several attempts on my part to meet up, and when we had met her again, she’d finished the meet up fairly quickly. The last time I’d tried to interact with her, I had tried to call round with a gift. I wasn’t even going to call in, merely asked her to drop down and open the door.

    She left me sitting there for half an hour before I’d gotten the hint and left.

    My son, all 13 years of insistent love, was having none of it. I’d told him none of this, and he demanded another meet up last Saturday. I watched over text as they agreed to a time, and a place, and before you knew it away we went. I was pleased they were making time for him, but I expected it to be a less than sweet affair, full of social effort and labour; and I wasn’t terribly interested in the labour coming from me.

    We all met up at 2pm, in some artisan coffee house that couldn’t give him juice, and talked about unimportant things. I myself have a bad habit of fawning in social situations, but really did not want to this time. The coffee I’d been served was as bitter as a barren stepmother, so I gave that up as a bad idea. A good idea was to go walk the pier with ice cream, and so we left the crowded cafe and escaped to the fresh air.

    People walked dogs past us as we talked about nothing in particular; the pier needed to offer boat trips. Chips smell better by the sea. Seagulls are dangerous to all life. All the while we were walking on and on, the length of time of nothing conversation getting longer and longer. A sweet moment in the middle of it was when we turned back, and the healing cool wind reached under shirts and napes of necks to make us exclaim in relief; all a bliss.

    The walk back saw us turn to talk of our shared family. Her mother, my sister, is rarely in either of our company. My niece blames her own sexuality and orientation; I blame my divorce and my sister’s husband. Either way, we feel judged. Each step saw us walk back from the water’s edge, back away from the extremity. The fear of judgement came up as a topic, and before I knew it my recent silence was brought up by her. I explained with clear eyes my efforts at reaching out; and her efforts at pushing back. My niece, however, was crying before I finished; I am it seems her only family, the only one she can trust, the only one who will speak to her.

    She actually cancelled seeing me the day after Christmas with ten minutes notice.

    None of it, apparently, should be read into. She took herself off for five minutes to breathe and compose herself, then joined myself and my son in the book shop. There, among the stacks of paperbacks and coffee table depictions of life, we settled our sad souls as best as we could; to regain the possession of ourselves, and our possession of each other as family, and for me to start to imagine the relationship continuing.

    Before long, it was time to go. She and her girlfriend had made plans to see another friend elsewhere, and my son’s social candle was flickering. I drove both of us home, weary and worn from the effort, and we ate pizza without consciously taking it in.

    I still feel myself untouched by it all. I find myself guarded; if she does all this without even trying, fully engaging with her is not without risks. But still, it is more positive than I led myself to believe on that pier. And now we lead ourselves out from it.