One summer, many years ago, my sister and I worked together at a seaside motel. I trust the term has evolved into something more gender-neutral, but at the time, the position posted in our town paper’s classified section was that of “chambermaid.” It paid more per hour than our previous summer jobs, and we were seeking a short term means of earning as much cash as possible for our ultimate goal: two weeks in Europe.
We had planned the trip with friends, and we were leaving in the middle of the summer. We reasoned that we could work up to the day of our departure with absolutely no intention of returning to the polyester uniforms and the icky surprises that greeted us on every shift in one room or another. Imagine our shock when my father vehemently opposed the plan to quit. We would be shirking our responsibilities halfway through a busy tourist season, he argued; it would be unfair to our employer to leave her shorthanded. He insisted that we see the job through to its Labor Day conclusion, and indeed, we celebrated our traipse across London and Paris all the more for the knowledge that August would be spent cleaning rooms.
One does not abandon one’s responsibilities.
Or does one?
Perhaps, had my father lived longer, he would have had the chance to expound upon his principles of duty and accountability. Maybe we would have had the conversation where he urged me instead to recognize when it is time to leave.
This past June, I survived my company’s lay-offs. I wish I had not. In fact, the department for which I had worked the past eight years was promptly dismantled. Within days of my boss’ early retirement, I sat in a meeting with the two people deciding my fate. I was informed that I would be removed from my office. The projects with which I had been involved were to be reassigned to other departments, outsourced, or canceled altogether. When I voiced my concerns that I was being demoted, the reply was, “Well, you are.” As I sat at my new cubicle, I was mistaken for an intern. My new supervisor asked me whether my lunch break would last thirty minutes or one hour. I gave my notice the next day.
Pulling the plug on that chapter of my life has afforded me the opportunity to see the ripple effect this change has created in and around me. In more ways than one, it is time to move on.
My sister and I began this blog with the purpose of asking “How did we get here?” but this question concerns me less than it used to. The more pressing question these days seems to be “Where are we going?”
In July 2004, I returned to New York after adventuring overseas for a year. I was unemployed and without a plan. That same summer, my sister moved back to New York after her year living in Hawaii. She was going back to her old teaching job.
In a few weeks’ time, my sister will be once again moving back to New York from Hawaii to return to her old teaching job and I am once again unemployed.
We know this time around will be so, very different. And I, for one, am eager to pose in our next blog, the next big question: “And what then?”
