i worried about how to quit my job for at least two years. for a while, i had an excuse. no one ever left this place (for good reason. a tight-knit bunch we are.), and who wants to be the first to go? i am very susceptible to peer pressure, for better or worse.
but beginning with w’s departure-by-firing last fall, followed by the disappearance of l over the winter, and finally the legit going-back-to-grad-school goodbye from j.u. this spring, well, at least i knew i wouldn’t be first anymore.
after that, i mostly worried because i simply didn’t know HOW to quit, my only real experience doing so being the time i left a note with my supervisor at a call center after somehow enduring two or three weeks of telemarketing. hello, would you like to receive a quote from country insurance?
i never went back after that. and it’s been half a decade since then.
i’ve had other jobs, sure, but prior to four years ago, i had the benefit of being a college student on my side. these were not careers. they were summertime flings and resume fillers.
i thought about ways i could do it.
there were times when i half-heartedly applied for new jobs in the area, thinking i would shuffle up c’s stairs one day and tell her i was leaving, i was getting paid more money, and so long and farewell because i would be gone in two weeks.
that was just a fantasy of course. and that is sort of why i decided i just needed to do it, because finding a new job is just an excuse to delay the process, and finding another job in d.c. is just an excuse to delay my entry into the next phase of my life. or something.
but anyway.
this time around, when i finally summoned my courage, having prepared some sort of little speech explaining the why’s and now what’s, i made my way to c’s office just as the phone rang. so i went back to my desk and waited. and waited some more. and then i just gave up, because fuck it was getting late.
funny enough, the next work day began with an announcement from m that she must leave as well, since her husband got a promotion and is being relocated. due to the degree to which our work is intertwined, i guess this should have made it harder for me to talk to the big c, but somehow it made my escape seem easier.
so i told her. and any sort of speech i had planned was just sort of thrown out the window, and she sort of had a heart attack, but other than that, there was nothing dramatic about it. just a promise that i’d stay until we can find someone new.
after that i skipped out the door and down the street to the metro stop, feeling light as a feather, yet strangely let down. that was all it took? i could have done this at least a year ago and perhaps it would have been for the best. but of course i didn’t, so now there is another mess to contend with on the domestic front. at least i’ve gotten over my quitting anxiety when it comes to boyfriends, i suppose.
hi.
(photo from wednesday 6-25)
