For a couple of hours yesterday I enjoyed having consonance between my inner and outer working lives. That is, what I perceived to be happening externally was also happening internally. This was a nice change from the usual feeling of not quite having things line up. Externally I just had my annual review at work, I got a decent raise and some new responsibilities. Internally I had a great dream recently that elegently showed how well my internal work life was going. And although I knew the feeling wouldn't last, I didn't know it would be quite so brief.
One of my co-workers was fired yesterday. Weirdly, some other co-workers had just been joking about the boss "needing to have a word with (insert name) in my office", and similar scenarios. So when my (now former) co-worker said they'd just been fired I immediately asked them why everyone was making jokes about getting canned. But they insisted this really had just happened, then said, well, I think so anyway. When I asked them what that meant they said they'd been given a severance check. That seemed pretty concrete, and I finally believed what they said. All I could say was "That really sucks. Good-bye.", as they walked out the door. Entirely inadequate for the occasion and hopefully forgivable under the circumstances, as I was totally shocked.
It sounds like, from the little information I have from the former co-worker, that the decision to let them go came out of nowhere. That's hard to understand, as it's very rare for people to get fired where I work (I think in it's ten year history maybe one or two people...but I'm not sure about this). So if it's really rare for someone to get fired it must mean people are given a lot of chances to change so they can remain employed, if that's what they want. So how did the former co-worker not know this was coming, or have some idea they were under probation, or something? I'm really confused, because the general information the employer gave about the decision could be applied to a couple of people who are definitely still employed. So something else was part of the mix, something specific about which I will never know, but also about which I am very curious.
In the meantime my former co-worker is also very confused and having a hard time, as is their family, which felt very connected to the place we worked together.
I'm all a-jumble about it. One of my (still current) co-workers and I re-visited job-leave takings yesterday. I realized while we were talking that I wasn't the only person who was feeling anxious and fearful as a result of this event, which helped somewhat. But the overall feeling I'm left with is something is not right. I don't want to cross the line into knowing details I shouldn't, but I wish there was some way to know things and then put the knowledge back where one found it, as if the information had never been accessed. Since that's not possible I'll just have to sit with being uncomfortable with not knowing and never knowing what really happened.
I really want to respect my employers and their priorities. This firing makes it harder, not because of why they said they did it, but because it doesn't line up with my experience with this former co-worker. But I don't know everything and I never will, and I'm just going to have to live with that.
Showing posts with label ruminations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ruminations. Show all posts
Friday, June 12, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
Another 25 minutes and it'll be the last day in March!
The whole month has gone by and I've hardly posted a thing.
What have I been up to?!
Watching a lot of movies and slightly delayed TV, on hulu. I've been sucked into the vortex and it's extradinarily hard to extricate myself.
On top of that a few days ago I joined facebook and in the space of three days accumulated 51 friends (as of 7:30pm...who knows how many more I've gotten since then).
However, this past Saturday, a wonderfully balmy 60 degree day, I dragged one of my old futons (the one that's over 15 years old, not the one that's only 3 years old...that one is replacing the gone to the landfill sofa cushions of yesteryear) over to my studio. You'd think this would be a fairly simple matter, but it took some doing. Then I did a little painting with caran dache crayons, with the window open (!) and the radio on.
I've been staying up past 12:30, 1am, most nights and feeling all dispeptic and abashed when I wake up and it's almost 10am (okay, this happened...twice). If there was someplace I had to be before then I would, of course, get up to make the appointment or what have you. But my work schedule is noon to 8pm (give or take), so unless I have something planned I can sleep in, if I need to. Kind of nice sometimes. But I always feel a bit, um, decadent, when I do.
Anything else to add here? Passover is coming. I will be at my brother's place in Massachusetts for the 2nd night, Thurs. Apr. 9th. I lent my mother's self-published cookbook to a co-worker, whose wife is Jewish. The co-worker was saying he wasn't fond of any of the dishes that were usually served at the seders he's been to, so I thought good old mom could help him out. Here's hoping.
Happy end of March everyone! See you in April.
What have I been up to?!
Watching a lot of movies and slightly delayed TV, on hulu. I've been sucked into the vortex and it's extradinarily hard to extricate myself.
On top of that a few days ago I joined facebook and in the space of three days accumulated 51 friends (as of 7:30pm...who knows how many more I've gotten since then).
However, this past Saturday, a wonderfully balmy 60 degree day, I dragged one of my old futons (the one that's over 15 years old, not the one that's only 3 years old...that one is replacing the gone to the landfill sofa cushions of yesteryear) over to my studio. You'd think this would be a fairly simple matter, but it took some doing. Then I did a little painting with caran dache crayons, with the window open (!) and the radio on.
I've been staying up past 12:30, 1am, most nights and feeling all dispeptic and abashed when I wake up and it's almost 10am (okay, this happened...twice). If there was someplace I had to be before then I would, of course, get up to make the appointment or what have you. But my work schedule is noon to 8pm (give or take), so unless I have something planned I can sleep in, if I need to. Kind of nice sometimes. But I always feel a bit, um, decadent, when I do.
Anything else to add here? Passover is coming. I will be at my brother's place in Massachusetts for the 2nd night, Thurs. Apr. 9th. I lent my mother's self-published cookbook to a co-worker, whose wife is Jewish. The co-worker was saying he wasn't fond of any of the dishes that were usually served at the seders he's been to, so I thought good old mom could help him out. Here's hoping.
Happy end of March everyone! See you in April.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Update
Hi everybody. I have to get up early tomorrow morning, so I won't be long. Just want to keep myself from falling off the edge of the blogging universe with this little update.
I've been doing some drawings of my Aunt Rose from photographs, three so far. They are very rough so I won't be posting them, just want to say I'm doggedly making progress in my studio, one drawing at a time.
I went out and got a 17" LCD monitor (for my apt) and a new CD/radio (for my studio) - yay tax refunds! -, and found how listening to the radio helps me stay in my studio longer than without it. I kind of knew this, but actually experiencing it was unnerving.
My Aunt Elaine died last Saturday (she was my Dad's sister; Aunt Rose, also deceased, was my Mom's sister). I went to the funeral, in Philadelphia, where a lot of my family lives, and where my aunt lived her whole life, except the year she was pregnant and gave birth to my cousin Jancy, when she lived in Japan. The stories I will be needing to tell. You betcha.
In the meantime, think end-of-winter thoughts: Day light savings time starts this Sunday. It's gonna be light out at 6:45pm.
I've been doing some drawings of my Aunt Rose from photographs, three so far. They are very rough so I won't be posting them, just want to say I'm doggedly making progress in my studio, one drawing at a time.
I went out and got a 17" LCD monitor (for my apt) and a new CD/radio (for my studio) - yay tax refunds! -, and found how listening to the radio helps me stay in my studio longer than without it. I kind of knew this, but actually experiencing it was unnerving.
My Aunt Elaine died last Saturday (she was my Dad's sister; Aunt Rose, also deceased, was my Mom's sister). I went to the funeral, in Philadelphia, where a lot of my family lives, and where my aunt lived her whole life, except the year she was pregnant and gave birth to my cousin Jancy, when she lived in Japan. The stories I will be needing to tell. You betcha.
In the meantime, think end-of-winter thoughts: Day light savings time starts this Sunday. It's gonna be light out at 6:45pm.
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Bizarre and more bizarre
Back in this past winter and spring I posted a bit about health issues.
On September 1st my doctor died from a stroke. He was, I think, 61 or 62, and in otherwise good health. This in itself is a shock, but there's more. I was deeply immersed in my art making project in September and so wasn't reading the newspapers much and completely missed the obituaries that were published in the weeks following my doctor's death. I even missed the letter I got from my insurance company telling me my doctor would no longer be available. They didn't say he died, they said he would no longer be able to provide care.
Finally, about a week ago, I got a new insurance card in the mail with a new doctor's name on it. I got my mail too late in the day to call the insurance co., but I did call my doctor's office. I got the answering service. Not a machine, but an actual person. I said I assumed I was reaching the service, and they said yes, but the office was closed. I said, sure, it's 7pm, I figured that. And the woman said, no, the office is closed for business - the doctor has died. Well. I'm sitting there with my mouth hanging open. The woman apologizes, says she understands how shocked I must be, and every time she tells another patient she herself is shocked all over again. She tells me some details about how the doctor died (in a kayak, with his wife). There isn't much else to say, so I mentally note that I have to call the insurance co. and the doctor I've been assigned on Monday morning.
Monday morning. I call a doctor who a friend of mine really liked, but she's not accepting any new patients. The office is at capacity. OK. They give me the name of a new doctor in town who is taking new patients. I try to find the phone number of the doctor I've been assigned by the insurance co., but I look everywhere and there is no listing for them. I look in the hard copy phone book, white and yellow pages, I look on line. I look under the doctor's name, I look under the practice's name. Nothing. Nada. So I call the friend's doctor's office and they, thank God, have the number. I reach the assigned doctor's office. They advise me they aren't taking patients outside their limited geographical area (even though this is who the insurance co. assigned me to). This area doesn't include where I live, and they recommend the same doctor my friend's doctor's office recommended. Apparently this guy is probably the only doctor in central Vermont who is taking new patients. OK then. On to the new doctor. I call, I explain. They know all about it. We make an appointment for December (which I later change to January so it'll be an annual physical, and therefore covered by the freaking insurance). They say they will send me an introductory pack of forms, including a release of records form that I can use to get my medical records from my deceased doctor's office.
Which is really good, because it turns out the deceased doctor's office isn't releasing records directly to patients, but only transferring records to other doctor's offices. I find this out when I call the deceased doctor's answering service on Tuesday, because the answering service told me I could talk with someone there on Tuesdays and Thursday between 2-4pm. It turns out I couldn't actually talk with anyone besides the answering service, but they did clarify that I could drop my release form at the office during those hours, but only to drop it off (or fax it over), that I could not actually get my records. And how, I asked, would I know that, first, they'd recieved the request, and second, responded to it and sent it to my new doctor? Oh, they said, you could call your new doctor's office and check with them. As much as I wanted to argue the circular logic of this response I saw that the woman at the answering service couldn't help me, so I said thanks and hung up.
One thing that took a day or so to sink it was a detail the answering service woman had told me (or maybe it was one of the receptionists at one of the other offices...it's kind of mushed together in my mind now). It's this - the deceased doctor's office will be processing requests to release medical records until the end of October. I called my new doctor's office yesterday (Friday) asking if they had the correct address for me, as I hadn't recieved the forms yet. They told me they had a big stack to send out, but they appreciated getting a confirmation of my correct address, and that they'd be sending the forms out shortly. I sure hope I can get my records transferred before Oct. 31st. I don't want to think about what I might have to do after that date. Sue? File a brief in civil court? What all?
Then, today, Saturday, I'm at the farmer's market. I see the nurse practitioner from my deceased doctor's office. I tell her I feel badly for her, she must be having a hard time. Well, she wants to know if I got a letter from the office letting me know what happened. I told her no, that I found out from the insurance co. She told me the family of the deceased doctor, through an intermediary, told her they didn't have any money to pay her a week after the doctor died. That she couldn't work there anymore, not even to contact patients to let them know what happened. The nurse, on her own, looked for (in the phone book) and was able to find 53 of the several hundred patients she knew, and in this way was able to let them know by letter, that the doctor had died and they needed to find a new doctor for their primary care.
So she is trying to find her own way and is working to get a new practice together. You see, a big reason I was a patient of the deceased doctor was because the nurse practitioner was on staff. I could get my physical examination with a woman. Now? Now I have to start all over again, with a new doctor whose only recommendation is that he's so new he has room for me. Meanwhile, if the nurse practitioner starts a new practice I may or may not join her there, as she is a bit muddled in methods and communication. Fun all around.
But I can see even though this is a general pain in the ass, it is not so awful as it might be. I am in good health. I am not dependent on the deceased doctor for any prescriptions, treatments or diagnosees. As frustrating as this situation is, it could be so much more so. I'm grateful for that. My heart goes out to the patients who actually have to find their way through this morass, not just checking in around the edges like I am doing.
Hopefully everything will go smoothly with the transfer of records and I won't have anything new to report until next year. I'll let you know.
On September 1st my doctor died from a stroke. He was, I think, 61 or 62, and in otherwise good health. This in itself is a shock, but there's more. I was deeply immersed in my art making project in September and so wasn't reading the newspapers much and completely missed the obituaries that were published in the weeks following my doctor's death. I even missed the letter I got from my insurance company telling me my doctor would no longer be available. They didn't say he died, they said he would no longer be able to provide care.
Finally, about a week ago, I got a new insurance card in the mail with a new doctor's name on it. I got my mail too late in the day to call the insurance co., but I did call my doctor's office. I got the answering service. Not a machine, but an actual person. I said I assumed I was reaching the service, and they said yes, but the office was closed. I said, sure, it's 7pm, I figured that. And the woman said, no, the office is closed for business - the doctor has died. Well. I'm sitting there with my mouth hanging open. The woman apologizes, says she understands how shocked I must be, and every time she tells another patient she herself is shocked all over again. She tells me some details about how the doctor died (in a kayak, with his wife). There isn't much else to say, so I mentally note that I have to call the insurance co. and the doctor I've been assigned on Monday morning.
Monday morning. I call a doctor who a friend of mine really liked, but she's not accepting any new patients. The office is at capacity. OK. They give me the name of a new doctor in town who is taking new patients. I try to find the phone number of the doctor I've been assigned by the insurance co., but I look everywhere and there is no listing for them. I look in the hard copy phone book, white and yellow pages, I look on line. I look under the doctor's name, I look under the practice's name. Nothing. Nada. So I call the friend's doctor's office and they, thank God, have the number. I reach the assigned doctor's office. They advise me they aren't taking patients outside their limited geographical area (even though this is who the insurance co. assigned me to). This area doesn't include where I live, and they recommend the same doctor my friend's doctor's office recommended. Apparently this guy is probably the only doctor in central Vermont who is taking new patients. OK then. On to the new doctor. I call, I explain. They know all about it. We make an appointment for December (which I later change to January so it'll be an annual physical, and therefore covered by the freaking insurance). They say they will send me an introductory pack of forms, including a release of records form that I can use to get my medical records from my deceased doctor's office.
Which is really good, because it turns out the deceased doctor's office isn't releasing records directly to patients, but only transferring records to other doctor's offices. I find this out when I call the deceased doctor's answering service on Tuesday, because the answering service told me I could talk with someone there on Tuesdays and Thursday between 2-4pm. It turns out I couldn't actually talk with anyone besides the answering service, but they did clarify that I could drop my release form at the office during those hours, but only to drop it off (or fax it over), that I could not actually get my records. And how, I asked, would I know that, first, they'd recieved the request, and second, responded to it and sent it to my new doctor? Oh, they said, you could call your new doctor's office and check with them. As much as I wanted to argue the circular logic of this response I saw that the woman at the answering service couldn't help me, so I said thanks and hung up.
One thing that took a day or so to sink it was a detail the answering service woman had told me (or maybe it was one of the receptionists at one of the other offices...it's kind of mushed together in my mind now). It's this - the deceased doctor's office will be processing requests to release medical records until the end of October. I called my new doctor's office yesterday (Friday) asking if they had the correct address for me, as I hadn't recieved the forms yet. They told me they had a big stack to send out, but they appreciated getting a confirmation of my correct address, and that they'd be sending the forms out shortly. I sure hope I can get my records transferred before Oct. 31st. I don't want to think about what I might have to do after that date. Sue? File a brief in civil court? What all?
Then, today, Saturday, I'm at the farmer's market. I see the nurse practitioner from my deceased doctor's office. I tell her I feel badly for her, she must be having a hard time. Well, she wants to know if I got a letter from the office letting me know what happened. I told her no, that I found out from the insurance co. She told me the family of the deceased doctor, through an intermediary, told her they didn't have any money to pay her a week after the doctor died. That she couldn't work there anymore, not even to contact patients to let them know what happened. The nurse, on her own, looked for (in the phone book) and was able to find 53 of the several hundred patients she knew, and in this way was able to let them know by letter, that the doctor had died and they needed to find a new doctor for their primary care.
So she is trying to find her own way and is working to get a new practice together. You see, a big reason I was a patient of the deceased doctor was because the nurse practitioner was on staff. I could get my physical examination with a woman. Now? Now I have to start all over again, with a new doctor whose only recommendation is that he's so new he has room for me. Meanwhile, if the nurse practitioner starts a new practice I may or may not join her there, as she is a bit muddled in methods and communication. Fun all around.
But I can see even though this is a general pain in the ass, it is not so awful as it might be. I am in good health. I am not dependent on the deceased doctor for any prescriptions, treatments or diagnosees. As frustrating as this situation is, it could be so much more so. I'm grateful for that. My heart goes out to the patients who actually have to find their way through this morass, not just checking in around the edges like I am doing.
Hopefully everything will go smoothly with the transfer of records and I won't have anything new to report until next year. I'll let you know.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
on waking up
The sound of cars passing by on Rte 12, with the front porch and a couple yards of lawn between the road and my bedroom window, is more gentle than an alarm clock, even adding on the doot-doot-doot backing-up sounds the construction trucks make just on the other side of the house.
I hear these sounds and even before I open my eyes I can guess what time it is. If I'm still half asleep I can guess what day of the week it is, too, by the absense or presense of the construction truck doot doot doot. If the cars are passing three or four or more in a row on either side of the two-lane roadway, then I know it's probably 7:30 or 8am, and the morning commute is commencing in earnest.
Meanwhile, I'm deciding whether the dream I just had is worth remembering and writing down. Sometimes I have to write it down quickly before the whole thing fades. Other times they are so vivid I can remember them through the day and can still recall them before I go to sleep that night. Either way I have to decide, and once I do then I have to either write the thing down or get up and go about my day. No in-between there.
Occasionally I'll get a nice surprise, dreamwise. Recently I had a dream that someone I knew, only a little in college and not at all now, kissed me. I don't know why he kissed me. I don't know what was going on before that kiss, or afterwards. But those moments of intimacy, and it's palpable tenderness, linger on.
So the gentle surf-like sound of cars passing on the road is a better backdrop for remembering such moments than the sudden sound of just about anything a foot away from my ear, as you may be able to imagine. No alarm clocks here.
I hear these sounds and even before I open my eyes I can guess what time it is. If I'm still half asleep I can guess what day of the week it is, too, by the absense or presense of the construction truck doot doot doot. If the cars are passing three or four or more in a row on either side of the two-lane roadway, then I know it's probably 7:30 or 8am, and the morning commute is commencing in earnest.
Meanwhile, I'm deciding whether the dream I just had is worth remembering and writing down. Sometimes I have to write it down quickly before the whole thing fades. Other times they are so vivid I can remember them through the day and can still recall them before I go to sleep that night. Either way I have to decide, and once I do then I have to either write the thing down or get up and go about my day. No in-between there.
Occasionally I'll get a nice surprise, dreamwise. Recently I had a dream that someone I knew, only a little in college and not at all now, kissed me. I don't know why he kissed me. I don't know what was going on before that kiss, or afterwards. But those moments of intimacy, and it's palpable tenderness, linger on.
So the gentle surf-like sound of cars passing on the road is a better backdrop for remembering such moments than the sudden sound of just about anything a foot away from my ear, as you may be able to imagine. No alarm clocks here.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
25th high school reunion coming up
Above is my yearbook picture, circa 1983 (actually, it was taken in the summer of '82...but who am I to quibble?).
And this one's from (I think) winter 1983, mid-way through my senior year.
I've been getting notices regarding my high school reunion. It's pretty unreal that it's been 25 years since I graduated from high school. Equally unreal that it's been 21 years since I graduated from college, but that's probably for another post.
I didn't like high school, although it was an improvement over middle school. I didn't have many friends among the kids I spent most of the school day with. I was one of the few people in the school who came from someplace else, and one of the few people who immediately left to start a new life as soon as I graduated. People didn't know what to make of me - for which I can't blame them - as I didn't know what to make of me either. I'm still working on that one, actually.
I went to my 10th year reunion. Um, it was interesting, but not something I want to repeat. I will not be going to my 25th, although the pictures I saw posted on the web site for the 20th reunion made me feel tenderly towards those who did attend. They looked so vulnerable. Much more so than I ever saw evidence of in high school. Seeing those pictures made me think there might still, yet, be some friends to make there. But I don't think I'm gonna go.
I posted the two pictures above, plus the two b&w photos here on the home page of the blog, on the "classmates" web site. Very few people from the class of 1983 are posting photos, or information about their lives, or anything else. It could be because the sight only offers these options for a fee. The site managers are hoping I'll forget before the end of the week that I've got a 7 day free trial, but forget it y'all, I've got a reminder right here on my calendar. Classmates dot com is not getting any money from me, no sir.
One thing I'm kind of pleased to realize - I was a lot cuter than I knew at the time. I mean, I was cute (actually, I'm still cute) but didn't really see it.
I'm so grateful for photography, especially family photos. I was talking with my dad last night about the family photographs my grandmother has. She is a meticulous housekeeper and the photographs are in very good shape, although a lot of them from my late grandfather's side of the family are undocumented. But I don't care about that. I started to tell my dad how much I value these photographs and he interrupted to tell me I could have them (when the time came). I was surprised he understood what I meant so well, and cut right through whatever else I was going to say. Anyway, my grandma is very excitable and the last thing I would want is to mention the photographs and her passing on in the same sentence, so I have to give my dad a lot of credit for saving us all from that. So - thanks, Dad.
Here's his high school graduation photo, circa 1960.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
