I've been wanting to write this for a while, but I haven't been able to figure out what I want to say, so I have been avoiding it.
I still don't quite know what I want to say, but I can't avoid it any longer.
Something is wrong. I know I'm not the only person to notice it. It's, a vague sense of unease that I carry with me all the time. It's a sense of existential dread when I actually sit down and think about my life.
Somewhere along the line, we have made a horrible mistake, and humanity has gone awry.
I don't think I can identify what that mistake was, or what the underlying problem is, but I have noticed a lot of the symptoms.
Back in January, I published an article about Gift Giving, and I mentioned at the end that there was more to follow. Well, this is what I was talking about. Let's start off there.
I've been noticing more and more lately (thanks to the addition of a child who now is able to walk and indicate things that he wants), that everything has become more and more commercialized. Let me give you an example: My son loves Baby Shark. I am rather annoyed with my father for showing it to him, but it has it's perks, so I try not to complain about it too much. I had no idea how much merchandise was available for a YouTube channel! We have a sub that has slots for different block shapes that sings when you put the correct blocks in the slots. We have a book that sings the YouTube songs with the words on the page. He has little cube plush toys that sing if you squeeze them. For Christmas he is getting puppets that sing as you move their mouths. Also, a watch that sings if you hit the button on the side. We have a pop-up tent that's baby-shark themed. Yesterday I saw a hoodie at the mall that had Baby Shark on it. I am sure there's more, but I can't think of it right now, and I think I've made my point by now.
Baby shark is just a YouTube video. Imagine the merchandise available for shows on TV. In our local Wal-Mart, there's an entire aisle dedicated to Disney.
The problem is, this extends beyond Children's toys. What it eventually turns in to is this: we have way more stuff than I'm really used to having in a house as small as ours. A lot of that is just because kids require a lot more stuff, especially when they're younger, but that's not the biggest issue. I mentioned above all of the Baby Shark stuff we have. That's just Baby Shark. There are so many toys in my house that most days I step on at least one. If we go a week without breaking a toy I'm impressed. It has become literally impossible to keep all the toys cleaned up unless we clean when the kid isn't here or is asleep, and even then the moment he's here and moving around again there are toys on the floor. It's a bit depressing to have to watch where I'm walking so carefully around my own house for fear of injuring myself or breaking another toy.
Again, though, the kids' stuff isn't everything. My wife and I have been acquiring more stuff, too. I'm a bit of a tech enthusiast, and lately Megan and I have been allowed to work remotely on a semi-regular basis, so I spent a good bit of dough on upgrading our office space from a desk that I sat at with a laptop to a dual-monitor, L-Shaped desk with a mechanical keyboard and wireless printer. If I had a coffee pot in here, there would be little reason to leave this room for hours on end. Did these upgrades make me more productive when working from home? Slightly, but, in all honesty, I could have lived without them. The only upgrade that was actually a necessity was a new chair, since sitting on the tiny task chair that was too low for the desk we use wasn't really a long term option if we cared for our backs, and I didn't really splurge too much on that. The new monitor and docking station to allow me to run two screens were each more expensive than the new chair we picked (which is quite comfy, by the way).
My office isn't the only place I've been splurging since we moved in. I've filled the house with IoT gadgets in the last two and half years, and I've spent quite a bit of money on all the gadgets and the upgrades to my network that having so many gadgets connected to it required. As I've likely mentioned at some other point, my wife and I are book hoarders, and in this office alone I am sitting with six 6' book cases full of books, some of them with books stacked on top of books. There is another case in the living room with more books that we like to show off. We're paper hoarders as well, and recently had to upgrade from a two drawer filing cabinet to a four because we are afraid to throw away anything that might be important later. My wife and I both like shoes and have probably more than we actually need, though I try to keep my shoe collection at a level in which all of my shoes actually have a use and there are no duplicates besides running shoes (which I rotate through). It still means that I have at least ten to fifteen different pairs of shoes for different purposes, and my wife has more shoes than that. An excess of other clothing is also becoming a problem, as my dresser is no longer able to contain all of the clothing that wouldn't normally be hung, and my closet is completely full.
Here's the thing: I generally hate spending money. I've mentioned this before. My upbringing made me understand the value of a dollar (or so I thought, more on that later), and our budget, assuming we want to meet our financial goals, doesn't really leave much room for splurging on stuff all the time. Thus, almost every time I spend money, I spend time thinking about whether I need to or not. Example: I want to make most of the lights in my house into IoT controlled smart lights. I cannot justify spending exorbitant amounts of money on the smart bulbs, so as I replace switches, I'm putting in smart switches. Even with that, so far I've only done switches that needed to be replaced, so I haven't purchased any that I didn't need; I just spent a bit more on the ones I did need. Long story short, I spend a lot of time justifying any purchase I make, especially larger ones.
As such, and due to the fact that for ten years or so I was moving from place to place every 8-15 months, I've never had the ability to accumulate a bunch of stuff. Now, we've been in this house for two and a half years, and it seems like it's bursting at the seams a little bit. What happened? Well, I'd love to blame it all on my kid or my wife, but though they share in the blame, so do I. I've become a mass consumer, and it's been weighing on me. Every time I throw away food because I let it rot in my refrigerator, I make myself a little sick. Every time I break a toy and just throw it away because it's not worth fixing, I make myself a little sick. All of this consuming with little to nothing to show for it is starting to wear me down.
This is where I've been trying to get. Consumerism is just a symptom, but, lately, I've been thinking, "Is this really life?" I mean, as a teenager and young adult, I spent a lot of my time thinking about purpose and meaning. Lately, though, I can barely put five minutes together to just think...about anything. I've been putting off writing this post because I didn't know how to write it, mostly because I honestly haven't given myself time to sit and think about what it is I want to actually say. My wife and I make more money than we've ever made, but, due to our spending habits, both now and in the past (because I'm still paying for past mistakes), I still feel pinched for money every month. I don't feel like we're getting anywhere with our debt. I don't feel like I am going to be able to retire at an age where I can appreciate being retired. Most of all, though, I don't really feel all that happy a lot of the time.
I have all this stuff, but most days I come home and veg out on the couch with my phone or watching Netflix or YouTube for hours and accomplish nothing. I don't feel like I spend enough time with my son. I don't read anymore (which I want to get into somewhere else). I don't exercise as much as I should. My house is never very clean. Cooking has become such a chore that most nights we don't cook, even on the weekends when we have plenty of time to cook. It took over a week to put up our Christmas decorations, which is especially bad when considering that 75-80% of them were put up on a single Saturday, then no work happened again until the following Saturday. I don't walk my dog as regularly as I should. The list goes on, but the point is the same: I don't feel like I'm doing anything with my life lately. My job is, less than fulfilling to say the least, and at home I'm existing more than I am living. I want to do more, but then I get distracted by some desire for some new thing and spend the limited funds I have on junk I probably don't need. The more I think about it, the more depressed I get, so instead I do my level best to stop thinking about it and distract myself with my phone, or TV, or computer, etc.
This is wrong, and I know I'm not the only person that is feeling this. The problem is, I don't know what the real problem is, so I can try to fight this symptom, but then I get caught up with another symptom, and in the end I don't feel like I'm making any progress. I'll discuss some of the other symptoms later, but what I'm really trying to figure out is, What's Wrong with me, and the World at large, and why does it make me and so many people I know so depressed, anxious, and otherwise feeling awful most of the time? More importantly, how do we fix things and actually start to approach self-actualization and happiness?
Sunday, December 8, 2019
Friday, September 27, 2019
What Motivates Turnover?
I mentioned in my last post that my complaining would eventually lead to larger discussions. Today, I'd like to start one of those.
The reason I was complaining in my last post was mainly because my workload has shifted and increased significantly and multiple times over the course of the summer. This type of thing has happened to me before, and I've talked to other people and read enough about it that I know this is a pattern that is not limited to my experience or the companies I have worked for.
Let's get into the full story. My current role is one where there has historically been large amounts of turnover at this company. I understand why that would be. It's a fairly low level supply chain position, thus open to just about anyone with fairly minimal experience. Many of the people that start in this position move on to better positions in the company or just move on with their careers in general. I also understand that supply chain positions, especially one such as mine on the front line of a manufacturing environment, are challenging and not everyone is cut out for them. It's rare that materials personnel are praised when things go right and goals are met, but when materials are short and goals are missed, we're usually the first department on which to place blame.
As I mentioned in my previous post, for good or ill, I'm built for this job. I, like everyone, could use a bit more recognition from time to time, but, by and large, I don't mind taking some heat. In fact, I usually work better when under a certain amount of pressure.
Here's the rub: pressure is a funny thing, and it's easy to go from good stress to bad stress.
Back to my story: Turnover has been historically high, but when I started I was rounding out a full department, and so I was given a reasonable workload that I could easily handle in an eight hour day. In fact, on Fridays I would often have the chance to leave a little earlier than usual. A few months into my stay, though, and things began to change. There was a retirement, a misstep on a replacement, and suddenly our full department was short an individual. At first we were promised this would be dealt with in all due haste, but that was late spring and the entire summer went by without refilling our department.
Here's my next tangent: every business I have ever worked for has a habit of losing people, then not replacing them. For some, pushing more responsibilities onto fewer people and seeing if it would break was part of the business strategy. I don't believe that's the case here, but I can't think of a worse idea. I know every department everywhere wants more bodies, and there's usually some reasonable explanation for why the department is sized the way it is. However, having a department set to a fairly optimal size, reducing that department when productivity demands on the individuals in the department are not falling (or worse, when they're rising), can only lead to disaster. This is a major contributor to employees leaving because of burnout.
Going back to my story, as I said, we were promised we would not be asked to shoulder this increased workload for long. I don't believe the reason we went the entire summer is anything other than large businesses move fairly slowly, and unfortunately our company just has to jump through a lot of bureaucratic hoops in order to hire someone. The people left, though, were all qualified and willing to put in the extra effort with the knowledge that by the end of the year we would likely be back to our normal workload.
Had that been the case, my previous post would not have happened. What actually happened was that another individual in my department found another opportunity. The story there is long, but I won't get into it here as it's not mine to tell. Suffice it to say that our department was effectively halved in a few months, and suddenly I went from being the least senior person in my department to the most senior person in my department. I am also, as I mentioned, really good at my job, so, as one of my coworkers put it, I became "a victim of my own success." The most difficult tasks were assigned to me, and I am now drowning in work. My easy eight hour days have suddenly become exhausting ten hour days in which I leave three hours' worth of work on the table at the end of the day because I just can't focus any longer.
This is a trend, not a one off. This has happened to me at every company I have ever worked for. I don't sit on my hands. I don't mess around at work. I don't make my workload fill my day. I have never had that kind of work ethic. I find work to fill my day, and that's what has caused me problems time and again.
This work ethic is not the norm. I know plenty of people that have this work ethic, but standard clock-punching employees by and large look for ways to do as little actual work in the time they're required to be at work as possible to continue to get paid. It's something I've always rebelled against, but I know that's the norm. The issue is, since I'm willing to put in the effort, I'm inevitably asked to do more than my peers. This is the real issue I have with most businesses: people who are good at their work are generally rewarded with, you guessed it, more work. Worst of all, people who are not all that good get to keep their jobs and do as little as possible, and the better employees have to pick up whatever slack those types of employees leave behind.
This, coupled with dumping extra work on employees in times of staff shortages and not lowering expectations of output, can only ever lead to burnout. Employees leave companies because they are overworked and underappreciated. When I left my previous employer, I was doing what had previously been four to five positions by myself. I was overloaded, and it was affecting my health, so I started looking for another job.
The worse thing to happen, though, is not to lose that employee, but to keep that employee and lose what makes them a special employee. I've seen others like me who, after numerous increases in responsibility, just begin to shut down. Suddenly they don't care about getting their work done, because, frankly, no matter how hard they try, they're never going to finish. That attitude is what causes the employees who come in to work to punch a clock, do as little as possible, and go home.
I know that there has to be a balance somewhere between what's good for the bottom line, and what's good for the employees. Overwhelmed employees aren't doing excellent work; they're frantically flailing about trying to keep things from falling apart. How long a person can do that before resigning, physically or mentally, is not something a business should be trying to figure out. Businesses should look to keep their employees satisfied in their positions, because happier employees are more productive, and more likely to go out of their way when things really do require extra effort. Also, do I really need to explain how expensive hiring and training new employees is?
Here's the long and short: good employees do a good job because they want to. Pushing them to do more and overwhelming them with responsibilities is a surefire way to kill morale, reduce productivity, and, eventually, lose them. Treat employees well, and they'll treat your business well.
The reason I was complaining in my last post was mainly because my workload has shifted and increased significantly and multiple times over the course of the summer. This type of thing has happened to me before, and I've talked to other people and read enough about it that I know this is a pattern that is not limited to my experience or the companies I have worked for.
Let's get into the full story. My current role is one where there has historically been large amounts of turnover at this company. I understand why that would be. It's a fairly low level supply chain position, thus open to just about anyone with fairly minimal experience. Many of the people that start in this position move on to better positions in the company or just move on with their careers in general. I also understand that supply chain positions, especially one such as mine on the front line of a manufacturing environment, are challenging and not everyone is cut out for them. It's rare that materials personnel are praised when things go right and goals are met, but when materials are short and goals are missed, we're usually the first department on which to place blame.
As I mentioned in my previous post, for good or ill, I'm built for this job. I, like everyone, could use a bit more recognition from time to time, but, by and large, I don't mind taking some heat. In fact, I usually work better when under a certain amount of pressure.
Here's the rub: pressure is a funny thing, and it's easy to go from good stress to bad stress.
Back to my story: Turnover has been historically high, but when I started I was rounding out a full department, and so I was given a reasonable workload that I could easily handle in an eight hour day. In fact, on Fridays I would often have the chance to leave a little earlier than usual. A few months into my stay, though, and things began to change. There was a retirement, a misstep on a replacement, and suddenly our full department was short an individual. At first we were promised this would be dealt with in all due haste, but that was late spring and the entire summer went by without refilling our department.
Here's my next tangent: every business I have ever worked for has a habit of losing people, then not replacing them. For some, pushing more responsibilities onto fewer people and seeing if it would break was part of the business strategy. I don't believe that's the case here, but I can't think of a worse idea. I know every department everywhere wants more bodies, and there's usually some reasonable explanation for why the department is sized the way it is. However, having a department set to a fairly optimal size, reducing that department when productivity demands on the individuals in the department are not falling (or worse, when they're rising), can only lead to disaster. This is a major contributor to employees leaving because of burnout.
Going back to my story, as I said, we were promised we would not be asked to shoulder this increased workload for long. I don't believe the reason we went the entire summer is anything other than large businesses move fairly slowly, and unfortunately our company just has to jump through a lot of bureaucratic hoops in order to hire someone. The people left, though, were all qualified and willing to put in the extra effort with the knowledge that by the end of the year we would likely be back to our normal workload.
Had that been the case, my previous post would not have happened. What actually happened was that another individual in my department found another opportunity. The story there is long, but I won't get into it here as it's not mine to tell. Suffice it to say that our department was effectively halved in a few months, and suddenly I went from being the least senior person in my department to the most senior person in my department. I am also, as I mentioned, really good at my job, so, as one of my coworkers put it, I became "a victim of my own success." The most difficult tasks were assigned to me, and I am now drowning in work. My easy eight hour days have suddenly become exhausting ten hour days in which I leave three hours' worth of work on the table at the end of the day because I just can't focus any longer.
This is a trend, not a one off. This has happened to me at every company I have ever worked for. I don't sit on my hands. I don't mess around at work. I don't make my workload fill my day. I have never had that kind of work ethic. I find work to fill my day, and that's what has caused me problems time and again.
This work ethic is not the norm. I know plenty of people that have this work ethic, but standard clock-punching employees by and large look for ways to do as little actual work in the time they're required to be at work as possible to continue to get paid. It's something I've always rebelled against, but I know that's the norm. The issue is, since I'm willing to put in the effort, I'm inevitably asked to do more than my peers. This is the real issue I have with most businesses: people who are good at their work are generally rewarded with, you guessed it, more work. Worst of all, people who are not all that good get to keep their jobs and do as little as possible, and the better employees have to pick up whatever slack those types of employees leave behind.
This, coupled with dumping extra work on employees in times of staff shortages and not lowering expectations of output, can only ever lead to burnout. Employees leave companies because they are overworked and underappreciated. When I left my previous employer, I was doing what had previously been four to five positions by myself. I was overloaded, and it was affecting my health, so I started looking for another job.
The worse thing to happen, though, is not to lose that employee, but to keep that employee and lose what makes them a special employee. I've seen others like me who, after numerous increases in responsibility, just begin to shut down. Suddenly they don't care about getting their work done, because, frankly, no matter how hard they try, they're never going to finish. That attitude is what causes the employees who come in to work to punch a clock, do as little as possible, and go home.
I know that there has to be a balance somewhere between what's good for the bottom line, and what's good for the employees. Overwhelmed employees aren't doing excellent work; they're frantically flailing about trying to keep things from falling apart. How long a person can do that before resigning, physically or mentally, is not something a business should be trying to figure out. Businesses should look to keep their employees satisfied in their positions, because happier employees are more productive, and more likely to go out of their way when things really do require extra effort. Also, do I really need to explain how expensive hiring and training new employees is?
Here's the long and short: good employees do a good job because they want to. Pushing them to do more and overwhelming them with responsibilities is a surefire way to kill morale, reduce productivity, and, eventually, lose them. Treat employees well, and they'll treat your business well.
Sunday, September 22, 2019
Back to the Old Grind
It's funny how, no matter where you go or what you change, at some point, you always end up back where you started.
I'm not saying that's 100% true, but, man, it takes an awful lot of work to make lasting change, doesn't it?
Example: I wasn't terribly happy with my life in high school. I was socially awkward, fairly obnoxious, and found myself generally angry a lot of the time for reasons I couldn't always define. My solution: move hours and hours away to a place where i knew no one and no one knew me. That way, I could redefine myself however I wanted. The result: I left college with one lasting friendship, which actually began because I was moody and obnoxious. Sound familiar?
How about another example: I was presented with an amazing opportunity to move across the country and take over the entire supply chain for an entire manufacturing facility in Southern California. Within two years, my wife and I were ready to move back. The biggest lesson we had learned: California is weird and expensive.
Most recently, I began a job with a new company for the first time in over seven years. That was February. It's been a mere seven months, and I already feel like I'm caught in the same story arc as I was at my last job. I'm a cog in a machine, destined to be no more than that. I might get slightly more recognition as the least beat up cog in that machine, but that will change in time, and I'll be right back where I started.
I'm not saying I haven't learned anything throughout all of this. I've uncovered parts of my identity I don't think I would have learned in different ways. I've decided that career isn't as important as I once did, and I'm a lot more concerned with trying to find happiness outside of the workplace.
That being said, I still wish there was a way to find some measure of happiness inside of the workplace. You know, seeing as I spend 40-50 hours a week there (which, if you don't count the time I'm in bed, is more than I spend in my own house), you'd think being unhappy there all the time might start to affect other parts of my life.
You'd be right.
I'm starting to feel the strain at work. I know all business have flaws and all workplaces have challenges that have to be overcome, but things seem to be stacking up at my current place of employment. My duties have changed multiple times in the past two to three months alone, and suddenly I'm actually the second most senior employee in my department (yeah, the one I started working for just seven short months ago). I was recently designated the head trainer for my department, which, while pretty cool and right in my wheel house, has only added to my already maxed out workload.
So, let's bring this back around. I left my previous employer because I was in a place where I was feeling completely overworked every day. I was always unhappy. I hated getting up in the morning, and would call in sick multiple times a year just because I couldn't get the motivation to get myself out of bed to go in to work. I hated that job by the end, and when I received the offer from my current employer, I didn't even bother trying to negotiate with my previous employer; no reasonable amount of money was going to make me happy enough to stay where I was.
Why does that matter now? Well, I'm not quite there yet with my current employer, but I can certainly see why the turnover ratio is as high in my department as it is. We're understaffed currently, and recent developments make me believe that there is little chance that will ever change. The expectations for the performance of the people in my department are varied, and often conflicting. The role is not well defined and often overwhelming in it's potential scope.
I am fully aware of my strengths, and my limitations. It has taken a multitude of experiences, some of which I outlined above, but after all that and more, I know myself fairly well. Here is what I am sure of:
I am good at my line of work. I am dedicated, focused, and seemingly built to do what it is that I do. For good or ill, I am more capable than your average bear, at least in my current career.
That being said, I am also sure that what is being asked of the people in my department is not possible, even for me, unless I am willing to spend more than 50 hours a week devoted to my job. 50 hours a week is already more than I am really interested in dedicating to a part of my life that I'm not getting joy out of, especially when it takes me away from time with my family. I'm certainly not going to spend more time on something like that, and my compensation, while fair, does not cover that kind of commitment. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that there needs to be a balance in my life between career and family, and right now I'm not happy with the balance I have. I am certainly not willing to tip it further in favor of work over family.
I'm in a difficult place right now. I don't hate my job, but I am finding it more and more difficult to like. I don't want to look for a new job, but I have made my needs known to my manager with little effect. I have things that are being asked of me that will have direct effects on whether or not I get any kind of bonus or raises/promotions in the coming year, but I have little incentive other than money to take the time necessary to complete those things. Frankly, the amount of money involved isn't enough to make it worth the time I'd much rather spend with my family. Even know, as I type this, I'm not alone; my son is sitting my lap trying to play with the new keyboard I just installed.
I think this will lead to a few larger discussions, but today I just needed to get back into the flow of writing, and, honestly, complain a bit to a few random people on the internet who might actually read this. If you're one of those people, thank you for listening.
I'm not saying that's 100% true, but, man, it takes an awful lot of work to make lasting change, doesn't it?
Example: I wasn't terribly happy with my life in high school. I was socially awkward, fairly obnoxious, and found myself generally angry a lot of the time for reasons I couldn't always define. My solution: move hours and hours away to a place where i knew no one and no one knew me. That way, I could redefine myself however I wanted. The result: I left college with one lasting friendship, which actually began because I was moody and obnoxious. Sound familiar?
How about another example: I was presented with an amazing opportunity to move across the country and take over the entire supply chain for an entire manufacturing facility in Southern California. Within two years, my wife and I were ready to move back. The biggest lesson we had learned: California is weird and expensive.
Most recently, I began a job with a new company for the first time in over seven years. That was February. It's been a mere seven months, and I already feel like I'm caught in the same story arc as I was at my last job. I'm a cog in a machine, destined to be no more than that. I might get slightly more recognition as the least beat up cog in that machine, but that will change in time, and I'll be right back where I started.
I'm not saying I haven't learned anything throughout all of this. I've uncovered parts of my identity I don't think I would have learned in different ways. I've decided that career isn't as important as I once did, and I'm a lot more concerned with trying to find happiness outside of the workplace.
That being said, I still wish there was a way to find some measure of happiness inside of the workplace. You know, seeing as I spend 40-50 hours a week there (which, if you don't count the time I'm in bed, is more than I spend in my own house), you'd think being unhappy there all the time might start to affect other parts of my life.
You'd be right.
I'm starting to feel the strain at work. I know all business have flaws and all workplaces have challenges that have to be overcome, but things seem to be stacking up at my current place of employment. My duties have changed multiple times in the past two to three months alone, and suddenly I'm actually the second most senior employee in my department (yeah, the one I started working for just seven short months ago). I was recently designated the head trainer for my department, which, while pretty cool and right in my wheel house, has only added to my already maxed out workload.
So, let's bring this back around. I left my previous employer because I was in a place where I was feeling completely overworked every day. I was always unhappy. I hated getting up in the morning, and would call in sick multiple times a year just because I couldn't get the motivation to get myself out of bed to go in to work. I hated that job by the end, and when I received the offer from my current employer, I didn't even bother trying to negotiate with my previous employer; no reasonable amount of money was going to make me happy enough to stay where I was.
Why does that matter now? Well, I'm not quite there yet with my current employer, but I can certainly see why the turnover ratio is as high in my department as it is. We're understaffed currently, and recent developments make me believe that there is little chance that will ever change. The expectations for the performance of the people in my department are varied, and often conflicting. The role is not well defined and often overwhelming in it's potential scope.
I am fully aware of my strengths, and my limitations. It has taken a multitude of experiences, some of which I outlined above, but after all that and more, I know myself fairly well. Here is what I am sure of:
I am good at my line of work. I am dedicated, focused, and seemingly built to do what it is that I do. For good or ill, I am more capable than your average bear, at least in my current career.
That being said, I am also sure that what is being asked of the people in my department is not possible, even for me, unless I am willing to spend more than 50 hours a week devoted to my job. 50 hours a week is already more than I am really interested in dedicating to a part of my life that I'm not getting joy out of, especially when it takes me away from time with my family. I'm certainly not going to spend more time on something like that, and my compensation, while fair, does not cover that kind of commitment. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking that there needs to be a balance in my life between career and family, and right now I'm not happy with the balance I have. I am certainly not willing to tip it further in favor of work over family.
I'm in a difficult place right now. I don't hate my job, but I am finding it more and more difficult to like. I don't want to look for a new job, but I have made my needs known to my manager with little effect. I have things that are being asked of me that will have direct effects on whether or not I get any kind of bonus or raises/promotions in the coming year, but I have little incentive other than money to take the time necessary to complete those things. Frankly, the amount of money involved isn't enough to make it worth the time I'd much rather spend with my family. Even know, as I type this, I'm not alone; my son is sitting my lap trying to play with the new keyboard I just installed.
I think this will lead to a few larger discussions, but today I just needed to get back into the flow of writing, and, honestly, complain a bit to a few random people on the internet who might actually read this. If you're one of those people, thank you for listening.
Sunday, May 26, 2019
A Trip Without the Kid
Last week I was required to take a trip to get training as part of my new role. I didn't go far, just to Cleveland, which is only two or so hours away. I did have to spend four nights alone in a hotel, though, and that was a lot more difficult for me than it was even in November.
The first night, I was, thankfully, exhausted. I haven't slept alone much in the last 6 years, so I almost always sleep poorly when I'm alone. Coupled with the fact that I was in a strange hotel in an area I had never been in before, and I was sure I would hardly sleep at all. Like I said, though, I was graciously exhausted by the time I made it back to the room, and between that exhaustion and the beer I had with dinner, I was able to fall asleep fairly easily. I did wake a few times in the night, but by and large I got a decent night's sleep, so I was pleasantly surprised.
Unfortunately, even the exhaustion and the beer didn't help with the incredible disconnectedness I felt. I was able to get to the room in time to video chat with Megan and the baby, and he cooed and yelled, "Dada!" He could very clearly tell it was me, which was nice because back in November when I had to spend a night in a hotel he was confused by the video chat and didn't recognize me. However, I just wanted to pick him up and snuggle him, but I couldn't, and the rush of emotion I had at not being able to hold my son was a bit overwhelming.
Unfortunately, I didn't make it back to the hotel room before the baby fell asleep any other night that week, so Monday was the only night I was able to video chat with him. That was incredibly challenging in its own right.
I had to put this down for a few minutes to take care of my baby. He woke earlier than I had expected, so I had to change him and feed him and play with him, then we snuggled to watch some TV so he could fall back to sleep for another hour or two. That's normal for me now, and even though it's sometimes annoying that I can't always do what I want to do when I want to do it, I am used to it by now. I even expect it. I always think it would be nice to get away from him for a night so I can do my own thing when I want to do it, but it's strange to not have to take care of him every time he cries, to the point that I miss it.
By Friday morning, I just wanted to see my family. One of the other employees in my training class was able to have her family in the room with her. I didn't know until Friday morning when I came down for breakfast earlier than I had any other day that week (sleep became progressively more difficult as the week went on), and I saw her feeding her young daughter. I was honestly so jealous I was nearly enraged. Then her husband sat down with her and I thought I was going to cry and shout and otherwise make a huge scene. I knew I was going to be home by that evening, but the fact that this woman that I had only just met four days prior was able to have breakfast with her family and I was not was so upsetting to me that I had to physically restrain myself. I have never felt that kind of jealousy before in my life.
Long story short, I thought I would love a trip without my son so I could get time to myself and do the things I wanted to do when I wanted to do them. Unfortunately, I was wrong. I absolutely hated it. I'm going to have to do it again in six to eight months, and I am absolutely not looking forward to it.
This parenting thing is more complicated than I had imagined going into it, and I have a pretty good imagination...I guess no one is really prepared for what parenting is going to be like until they're in it.
The first night, I was, thankfully, exhausted. I haven't slept alone much in the last 6 years, so I almost always sleep poorly when I'm alone. Coupled with the fact that I was in a strange hotel in an area I had never been in before, and I was sure I would hardly sleep at all. Like I said, though, I was graciously exhausted by the time I made it back to the room, and between that exhaustion and the beer I had with dinner, I was able to fall asleep fairly easily. I did wake a few times in the night, but by and large I got a decent night's sleep, so I was pleasantly surprised.
Unfortunately, even the exhaustion and the beer didn't help with the incredible disconnectedness I felt. I was able to get to the room in time to video chat with Megan and the baby, and he cooed and yelled, "Dada!" He could very clearly tell it was me, which was nice because back in November when I had to spend a night in a hotel he was confused by the video chat and didn't recognize me. However, I just wanted to pick him up and snuggle him, but I couldn't, and the rush of emotion I had at not being able to hold my son was a bit overwhelming.
Unfortunately, I didn't make it back to the hotel room before the baby fell asleep any other night that week, so Monday was the only night I was able to video chat with him. That was incredibly challenging in its own right.
I had to put this down for a few minutes to take care of my baby. He woke earlier than I had expected, so I had to change him and feed him and play with him, then we snuggled to watch some TV so he could fall back to sleep for another hour or two. That's normal for me now, and even though it's sometimes annoying that I can't always do what I want to do when I want to do it, I am used to it by now. I even expect it. I always think it would be nice to get away from him for a night so I can do my own thing when I want to do it, but it's strange to not have to take care of him every time he cries, to the point that I miss it.
By Friday morning, I just wanted to see my family. One of the other employees in my training class was able to have her family in the room with her. I didn't know until Friday morning when I came down for breakfast earlier than I had any other day that week (sleep became progressively more difficult as the week went on), and I saw her feeding her young daughter. I was honestly so jealous I was nearly enraged. Then her husband sat down with her and I thought I was going to cry and shout and otherwise make a huge scene. I knew I was going to be home by that evening, but the fact that this woman that I had only just met four days prior was able to have breakfast with her family and I was not was so upsetting to me that I had to physically restrain myself. I have never felt that kind of jealousy before in my life.
Long story short, I thought I would love a trip without my son so I could get time to myself and do the things I wanted to do when I wanted to do them. Unfortunately, I was wrong. I absolutely hated it. I'm going to have to do it again in six to eight months, and I am absolutely not looking forward to it.
This parenting thing is more complicated than I had imagined going into it, and I have a pretty good imagination...I guess no one is really prepared for what parenting is going to be like until they're in it.
Monday, May 13, 2019
A Change of Priorities
Over the last few weeks, I've done a lot of thinking about my needs and priorities. It all started when I began a new position back in February. After years of working with my previous employer, I decided that the time had come to pursue other opportunities, and a great one opened up close to home that I couldn't turn down.
The first few weeks were stressful, as any new job would be, but I stepped into it fairly quickly all things considered. I'm given to understand that I am fairly good at this position, but that doesn't come as a surprise to me. I thought I would be stepping into a position with more responsibilities than my last, but it turns out, since I joined a much larger organization, that I actually have significantly less responsibilities. Much of what I do now is similar to a portion of what I did at my previous employer, and while there are certainly still some stresses in my daily routine, I am facing nowhere near the amount of daily anxiety I was up against before.
That realization hit about three to four weeks into the new position, when everything started to come very naturally to me. Now I'm at three months into the position, and I have reduced my daily stress levels to what I can only describe as historically low. This happens to be amazing time, though, because my daily stress levels at home have never been higher. My son, as I mentioned in my last post, spent some time in the hospital back in February. It was my last week with my previous employer, and made the transition especially difficult, but the real lasting issues are with him at home.
Prior to his hospital stay, he was routinely sleeping through the night. Now, if he sleeps through the night once in two weeks it's a godsend. Last night he woke four times, which is also unusual, but he was having trouble breathing again last night. He never really recovered fully from the RSV. He's had a stuffy nose and an intermittent cough since January. Yesterday he had a bit of a relapse, and the draining of his sinuses really made it difficult for him to eat or sleep. He's learning to be mobile as well, which adds a level of anxiety that I wasn't really anticipating, and he's been teething off and on since his hospital stay, too, which has made him more restless and irritable.
Spending time with him, despite all of the difficulties described above, has generally been the most amazing experience of my life so far. I love watching him learn. In the past few weeks he's been pulling himself up on tables and other objects, and trying a few steps here and there. It's amazing to watch; I can literally see the learning happening on his face. I've watched him learning spacial reasoning skills, movement skills like rolling and scooting, and social skills like smiling, making eye contact, and even attempting to form words like "ba-ba, da-da," etc. It's the most exciting time of my life so far.
Which brings me back to my priorities and thinking about life. Almost a month ago, my manager took a different position with the company, and a new manager was hired. The new manager wanted to meet with each of his staff individually to get to know us and learn about our lives and career aspirations. A year ago, I would have had all sorts of ideas for things that I wanted to learn and what path I wanted my career to take and what steps I needed to get there, but when I sat in the room with my new manager and he asked where I wanted to be in five years and what my career trajectory looked like from here, all I could think was that I was pretty happy right here doing what I am doing right now.
It hit me like a brick.
I have never before in my life abandoned my ambition to better myself. I've looked down on other people with low ambition. Yet, here I sit, with no desire to take on more responsibilities than I have right now.
I like my new job. As I mentioned above, it's a lot less stressful, so I can conserve my energy and spend it on my son. I also have a more flexible work schedule, so I don't have to worry if I need time to take him to the doctor, or leave early to pick him up from daycare because something is wrong. My work hours are also nicer, as I start my day an hour sooner, and can leave up to an hour and a half earlier based on my choice of lunch break length. Mornings are a bit rougher due to the earlier start, but I feel like I get more time with my son because, even though he's still asleep most mornings when I leave the house, I come home with him usually an hour and fifteen minutes or more earlier than I used to. I never spent much time with him in the mornings, anyhow, as I generally like to wake as close to the time I need to leave as possible, so I spend all of my waking time in the morning getting myself ready for work. I mentioned above the new position is much closer to home, but I didn't mention that it's within walking distance of the daycare and that, because of the only 6 mile commute, I have increased my time with my family even more. Honestly, the whole thing seemed almost too good to be true.
Since that meeting with my new manager, I've been thinking about my aspirations. Other than the need to earn enough money to support my current standard of living, I honestly don't have any specific career goals any more. All of the effort and energy I've put into building my professional image and maintaining my career have been redirected into raising my beautiful son and spending time loving my family. Maybe in a few years that will change again, and I'll start wanting to focus on my career more, but last week I considered the ease of a job as a machine operator with jealousy, wishing I could have something as simple as that right now. Megan thinks I'd be bored, but I think it would just be another way to keep myself occupied throughout the day so that I can make enough money to spend more time with my family. Ah well. No point in moving backward, but at least what I have now is satisfying and relatively stress-free.
I finally have a reason to look at life outside of a job or classroom, and it amazes me how wonderful it looks. Now I want to start focusing on the self-work needed to be a better father, husband, and generally better person.
The first few weeks were stressful, as any new job would be, but I stepped into it fairly quickly all things considered. I'm given to understand that I am fairly good at this position, but that doesn't come as a surprise to me. I thought I would be stepping into a position with more responsibilities than my last, but it turns out, since I joined a much larger organization, that I actually have significantly less responsibilities. Much of what I do now is similar to a portion of what I did at my previous employer, and while there are certainly still some stresses in my daily routine, I am facing nowhere near the amount of daily anxiety I was up against before.
That realization hit about three to four weeks into the new position, when everything started to come very naturally to me. Now I'm at three months into the position, and I have reduced my daily stress levels to what I can only describe as historically low. This happens to be amazing time, though, because my daily stress levels at home have never been higher. My son, as I mentioned in my last post, spent some time in the hospital back in February. It was my last week with my previous employer, and made the transition especially difficult, but the real lasting issues are with him at home.
Prior to his hospital stay, he was routinely sleeping through the night. Now, if he sleeps through the night once in two weeks it's a godsend. Last night he woke four times, which is also unusual, but he was having trouble breathing again last night. He never really recovered fully from the RSV. He's had a stuffy nose and an intermittent cough since January. Yesterday he had a bit of a relapse, and the draining of his sinuses really made it difficult for him to eat or sleep. He's learning to be mobile as well, which adds a level of anxiety that I wasn't really anticipating, and he's been teething off and on since his hospital stay, too, which has made him more restless and irritable.
Spending time with him, despite all of the difficulties described above, has generally been the most amazing experience of my life so far. I love watching him learn. In the past few weeks he's been pulling himself up on tables and other objects, and trying a few steps here and there. It's amazing to watch; I can literally see the learning happening on his face. I've watched him learning spacial reasoning skills, movement skills like rolling and scooting, and social skills like smiling, making eye contact, and even attempting to form words like "ba-ba, da-da," etc. It's the most exciting time of my life so far.
Which brings me back to my priorities and thinking about life. Almost a month ago, my manager took a different position with the company, and a new manager was hired. The new manager wanted to meet with each of his staff individually to get to know us and learn about our lives and career aspirations. A year ago, I would have had all sorts of ideas for things that I wanted to learn and what path I wanted my career to take and what steps I needed to get there, but when I sat in the room with my new manager and he asked where I wanted to be in five years and what my career trajectory looked like from here, all I could think was that I was pretty happy right here doing what I am doing right now.
It hit me like a brick.
I have never before in my life abandoned my ambition to better myself. I've looked down on other people with low ambition. Yet, here I sit, with no desire to take on more responsibilities than I have right now.
I like my new job. As I mentioned above, it's a lot less stressful, so I can conserve my energy and spend it on my son. I also have a more flexible work schedule, so I don't have to worry if I need time to take him to the doctor, or leave early to pick him up from daycare because something is wrong. My work hours are also nicer, as I start my day an hour sooner, and can leave up to an hour and a half earlier based on my choice of lunch break length. Mornings are a bit rougher due to the earlier start, but I feel like I get more time with my son because, even though he's still asleep most mornings when I leave the house, I come home with him usually an hour and fifteen minutes or more earlier than I used to. I never spent much time with him in the mornings, anyhow, as I generally like to wake as close to the time I need to leave as possible, so I spend all of my waking time in the morning getting myself ready for work. I mentioned above the new position is much closer to home, but I didn't mention that it's within walking distance of the daycare and that, because of the only 6 mile commute, I have increased my time with my family even more. Honestly, the whole thing seemed almost too good to be true.
Since that meeting with my new manager, I've been thinking about my aspirations. Other than the need to earn enough money to support my current standard of living, I honestly don't have any specific career goals any more. All of the effort and energy I've put into building my professional image and maintaining my career have been redirected into raising my beautiful son and spending time loving my family. Maybe in a few years that will change again, and I'll start wanting to focus on my career more, but last week I considered the ease of a job as a machine operator with jealousy, wishing I could have something as simple as that right now. Megan thinks I'd be bored, but I think it would just be another way to keep myself occupied throughout the day so that I can make enough money to spend more time with my family. Ah well. No point in moving backward, but at least what I have now is satisfying and relatively stress-free.
I finally have a reason to look at life outside of a job or classroom, and it amazes me how wonderful it looks. Now I want to start focusing on the self-work needed to be a better father, husband, and generally better person.
Saturday, February 16, 2019
Hospitalized
This has certainly been a long week.
This past weekend, our baby started developing cold symptoms. He was fussier than he's ever been for two days, and his breathing sounded awful. We took him to the pediatrician on Monday and they told us it was a viral cold, and there was nothing they could do about it.
We called three times on Tuesday, as his symptoms were getting worse. The nurses who answered the phone kept assuring us that we were doing everything we could.
He hardly slept Sunday night. Between the coughing and the crying, he slept for three or four stretches of less than an hour each. Monday night was much the same. Tuesday night, I'm not sure he slept at all. He was struggling to breath all night, and constantly making this low cry noise that Megan was calling a "comfort" noise, but we learned later was him struggling to breathe.
I was also sick on Monday, so I didn't go in to work. Megan decided to stay home to take care of the baby since I was sick and thus not going to be able to take care of a sick baby alone. The daycare prefers not to have us drop our sick child with them, and, honestly, they're not really equipped to give a sick baby the kind of attention that a sick baby needs, so Megan also stayed home on Tuesday since he was still sick. Wednesday, Megan's mom was off work and agreed to watch him, so both Megan and I went into work.
That didn't last long.
Around 9:15 Megan's mom decided to call Megan because our little guy wasn't able to hold his head up anymore from exhaustion. He hadn't had a wet diaper in eight hours, and he was just not looking good. Megan called the pediatrician, and they finally relented that we should probably take him to the ER. Megan called me, and we both left work. She is closer, so she went home and picked up her mom and the baby. I met them at the ER. He looked terrible, and the doctor decided that he needed a chest X-Ray because his lungs sounded bad.
I won't spend much time talking about the local ER because, even though we spent four hours there, I never felt like they took this very seriously. The chest X-Ray was the most serious thing they did for us, other than call Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and get us moved there. I will say, the doctor at the local ER said that the X-Ray looked like pneumonia, which turned out to be wrong, but more on that in a bit.
The baby was taken by ambulance all the way into Pittsburgh for the transfer to Children's. What followed is a hazy two night stay in observation while we waited to see if he would get better. He has RSV, which caused bronchiolitis. I'm given to understand that the fancy term I just used actually means acute inflammation of some of the smaller airways in the lungs that allow us to breathe. It's not pneumonia, which is a bacterial infection in the lungs, but I guess they look similar on an X-Ray and could be mistaken by a doctor that is not trained to read infant X-Rays.
His oxygen levels dipped in the ambulance and he was put on oxygen, which he was kept on until Friday morning. He was also dehydrated, as evidenced by the lack of wet diapers, thus was given fluids to help hydrate him. He was connected to the IV for fluids until Friday morning, also.
Thankfully, the oxygen and fluids helped him have a relatively quick recovery. We only spent two nights in the hospital. On Thursday he was already starting to look better. By Friday he was almost completely back to his normal self. The doctors say he'll still be a little sick for two to four more weeks, but today he's already even better than he was yesterday. He's sleeping better again, eating more (even had some banana's today!), and playful. He's still fussier than normal, and he does still have that nasty cough, but otherwise he's looking so much better.
The above story was told about as blandly as possible. In truth, I'm not sure I have the words to describe the emotions I was feeling throughout this experience. I have had some difficult experiences in my life before, but I don't know that I've ever had a more heart-wrenching moment than when I walked into his hospital room at Children's and saw him hooked up with all the tubes and wires. I nearly broke down right then. I certainly couldn't stop the tears. Pain, fear, panic...these words don't quite capture the emotions.
He scared us again Thursday morning by getting his oxygen tube out of his nose without any of us noticing. His oxygen level dipped pretty low and wasn't coming back up, so alarms went off and the nurse rushed in to fix that. It was a bit crushing to know at that point that he'd been on the oxygen for eighteen hours and was still dependent on it, especially since he was starting to act more himself by that point.
I can say, though, that without a doubt, if we had to go through this horrifying experience, I couldn't have asked for a better hospital to have to do it in. The staff at Children's was absolutely phenomenal. There was never a grumpy person that we dealt with. Nurses from the ER recognized me the day after we were admitted when I was passing through, and they stopped to ask me how the baby was doing. The desk staff was compassionate and always wished us and our child well. The security guard, upon entering the building, gave me a free parking pass since my son was taken into the ER. Even the cafeteria workers joked with us and chatted with us and wished us and our child well. The staff in the observation unit where we stayed for two days consistently went above and beyond to make us as comfortable as possible. The doctors spoke to us like people, and never once talked down to us. Even when the doctors were rounding, one doctor was reading the chart, and another doctor would take time in between to explain what all the medical terms were and what everything meant for us so we knew what was going on at all times. Everyone was kind, compassionate, and friendly. I cannot thank the staff there enough for doing everything they could to help us through one of the most terrifying and difficult situations I've ever had to go through.
Finally, RSV is a virus that many believe can be prevented. There is already one potential vaccine for it, and at least two other studies that I am aware of are looking to make better vaccines. We contributed to that research because this was an experience that I certainly don't want to repeat, and I don't want other parents to have to go through, either. This was truly one of the most difficult experiences in my life so far, and I hope I don't have too many more of these to look forward to.
This past weekend, our baby started developing cold symptoms. He was fussier than he's ever been for two days, and his breathing sounded awful. We took him to the pediatrician on Monday and they told us it was a viral cold, and there was nothing they could do about it.
We called three times on Tuesday, as his symptoms were getting worse. The nurses who answered the phone kept assuring us that we were doing everything we could.
He hardly slept Sunday night. Between the coughing and the crying, he slept for three or four stretches of less than an hour each. Monday night was much the same. Tuesday night, I'm not sure he slept at all. He was struggling to breath all night, and constantly making this low cry noise that Megan was calling a "comfort" noise, but we learned later was him struggling to breathe.
I was also sick on Monday, so I didn't go in to work. Megan decided to stay home to take care of the baby since I was sick and thus not going to be able to take care of a sick baby alone. The daycare prefers not to have us drop our sick child with them, and, honestly, they're not really equipped to give a sick baby the kind of attention that a sick baby needs, so Megan also stayed home on Tuesday since he was still sick. Wednesday, Megan's mom was off work and agreed to watch him, so both Megan and I went into work.
That didn't last long.
Around 9:15 Megan's mom decided to call Megan because our little guy wasn't able to hold his head up anymore from exhaustion. He hadn't had a wet diaper in eight hours, and he was just not looking good. Megan called the pediatrician, and they finally relented that we should probably take him to the ER. Megan called me, and we both left work. She is closer, so she went home and picked up her mom and the baby. I met them at the ER. He looked terrible, and the doctor decided that he needed a chest X-Ray because his lungs sounded bad.
I won't spend much time talking about the local ER because, even though we spent four hours there, I never felt like they took this very seriously. The chest X-Ray was the most serious thing they did for us, other than call Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and get us moved there. I will say, the doctor at the local ER said that the X-Ray looked like pneumonia, which turned out to be wrong, but more on that in a bit.
The baby was taken by ambulance all the way into Pittsburgh for the transfer to Children's. What followed is a hazy two night stay in observation while we waited to see if he would get better. He has RSV, which caused bronchiolitis. I'm given to understand that the fancy term I just used actually means acute inflammation of some of the smaller airways in the lungs that allow us to breathe. It's not pneumonia, which is a bacterial infection in the lungs, but I guess they look similar on an X-Ray and could be mistaken by a doctor that is not trained to read infant X-Rays.
His oxygen levels dipped in the ambulance and he was put on oxygen, which he was kept on until Friday morning. He was also dehydrated, as evidenced by the lack of wet diapers, thus was given fluids to help hydrate him. He was connected to the IV for fluids until Friday morning, also.
Thankfully, the oxygen and fluids helped him have a relatively quick recovery. We only spent two nights in the hospital. On Thursday he was already starting to look better. By Friday he was almost completely back to his normal self. The doctors say he'll still be a little sick for two to four more weeks, but today he's already even better than he was yesterday. He's sleeping better again, eating more (even had some banana's today!), and playful. He's still fussier than normal, and he does still have that nasty cough, but otherwise he's looking so much better.
The above story was told about as blandly as possible. In truth, I'm not sure I have the words to describe the emotions I was feeling throughout this experience. I have had some difficult experiences in my life before, but I don't know that I've ever had a more heart-wrenching moment than when I walked into his hospital room at Children's and saw him hooked up with all the tubes and wires. I nearly broke down right then. I certainly couldn't stop the tears. Pain, fear, panic...these words don't quite capture the emotions.
He scared us again Thursday morning by getting his oxygen tube out of his nose without any of us noticing. His oxygen level dipped pretty low and wasn't coming back up, so alarms went off and the nurse rushed in to fix that. It was a bit crushing to know at that point that he'd been on the oxygen for eighteen hours and was still dependent on it, especially since he was starting to act more himself by that point.
I can say, though, that without a doubt, if we had to go through this horrifying experience, I couldn't have asked for a better hospital to have to do it in. The staff at Children's was absolutely phenomenal. There was never a grumpy person that we dealt with. Nurses from the ER recognized me the day after we were admitted when I was passing through, and they stopped to ask me how the baby was doing. The desk staff was compassionate and always wished us and our child well. The security guard, upon entering the building, gave me a free parking pass since my son was taken into the ER. Even the cafeteria workers joked with us and chatted with us and wished us and our child well. The staff in the observation unit where we stayed for two days consistently went above and beyond to make us as comfortable as possible. The doctors spoke to us like people, and never once talked down to us. Even when the doctors were rounding, one doctor was reading the chart, and another doctor would take time in between to explain what all the medical terms were and what everything meant for us so we knew what was going on at all times. Everyone was kind, compassionate, and friendly. I cannot thank the staff there enough for doing everything they could to help us through one of the most terrifying and difficult situations I've ever had to go through.
Finally, RSV is a virus that many believe can be prevented. There is already one potential vaccine for it, and at least two other studies that I am aware of are looking to make better vaccines. We contributed to that research because this was an experience that I certainly don't want to repeat, and I don't want other parents to have to go through, either. This was truly one of the most difficult experiences in my life so far, and I hope I don't have too many more of these to look forward to.
Saturday, January 12, 2019
"I'm Sorry"
Such simple words, "I'm sorry." Somehow, this phrase has become such a common saying in my life that I even still remember how to say it in Spanish from my two semesters of the language back in ninth grade. Quick aside, the only other phrases I remember are, "Where's the Bathroom?" and, "Hi, what's up?"
Why has this phrase become so common? I'm sure at some point it was supposed to be something weighty, something difficult to say for one reason or another. There are plenty of TV shows and movies from when I was a kid showing people having trouble saying Sorry, or outright refusing for one reason or another. Heck, I remember as a kid I hated to be told that I had to say Sorry, and I would often get angry and leave if my parents told me I had to instead of just saying Sorry.
Yesterday I told my wife sorry because I walked in the door when I said I was going to, which just so happened to be a half an hour later than usual. Please note that I had already told her well in advance that I was going to be late, and I apologized then as well. I also apologized when I was telling her that I'd be late for making her have to pick up the baby from daycare because I was going to be late. Then, withing 30 seconds of walking in the house, I once again said sorry because I hadn't washed the baby bottles by the time we were expecting guests, which was also caused by my being late.
All told, I apologized four different times (minimum, it's possible I said it a few more times), basically all for the same reason. In retrospect, I'm guessing my wife brushed all those apologies aside like they meant next to nothing, which, honestly, they did. This brings me to my point: if "I'm sorry" is such a meaningless phrase, why did I waste my time and energy saying it four times yesterday about the same event, and why is that not an uncommon thing, not just for me, but for a lot of people I know?
I've been listening to the One Free Family Podcast basically since it aired. I think possibly in the very first episode (but I can't quite remember because there have been so many and none of the titles say anything about it), Taylor and James discuss manners, and "I'm Sorry" in particular. They straight up say that they don't make their children say "I'm sorry" for any reason, and if an apology is warranted and their child won't say it, they will make the apology for their child. I think maybe this is part of the problem with "I'm sorry": many children (myself included) were (and still are) forced to say "I'm sorry" all the time by their parents. Some situations might actually need an apology, i.e., if my son kicks another kid, knocks that kid down, and steals a toy. However, if that happens and I force my child to say "I'm sorry," all I'm doing is cheapening the apology. My son knows that he doesn't mean it, and the child receiving the apology knows it's a meaningless one. Eventually, this happens often enough that we all just start to believe "I'm sorry" is a fairly benign, mostly meaningless phrase.
Now, I don't want to lay all the blame on parents. For starters, parents aren't the only ones that force children to apologize; there are plenty of other adults in the lives of every child that can and often do require apologies even when children don't wish to give them, like Aunts and Uncles, Grandparents, family friends, and even teachers. I also don't believe that forcing apologies is the only reason for the cheapening of the phrase. I believe there's been a movement recently in our culture to cheapen a lot of our language, but that's a topic for another time.
According to Dictionary.com, an apology is defined as, "a written or spoken expression of one's regret, remorse, or sorrow for having insulted, failed, injured, or wronged another." Thus, in order for an apology to be meaningful, it must be an expression of regret, remorse, or sorrow. Of the four times I said, "I'm sorry," yesterday, I maybe once felt any regret. After actually having the feeling, one must apologize for having insulted, failed, injured, or wronged another, thus making any apology without an actual cause meaningless as well. Thus an apology for showing up when I said I would is meaningless because I have not insulted or wronged my wife in any way, nor have I failed to show up when I committed to. Finally, I would add that an apology has to come with some expectation that the party in the wrong is expected to not take the action that caused the insult or injury again in the future. I can certainly say that neither I nor Megan actually believe that I won't stay late at work again some time in the future.
I've been working to be more deliberate in my life lately, and I've been exploring these thoughts on recent posts so I can expound upon them openly and share my intuitions with others who might care to read them. Apologies should have meaning, and I'm not happy about the way that I abuse the words "I'm sorry." In an effort to be more deliberate in what I say, do, and think, I will be working to stop apologizing when I don't truly mean it, or when an apology is not warranted. I want my son to understand that an apology is a phrase that should have weight, and if I cannot model that behavior, then he won't learn the right lessons.
Why has this phrase become so common? I'm sure at some point it was supposed to be something weighty, something difficult to say for one reason or another. There are plenty of TV shows and movies from when I was a kid showing people having trouble saying Sorry, or outright refusing for one reason or another. Heck, I remember as a kid I hated to be told that I had to say Sorry, and I would often get angry and leave if my parents told me I had to instead of just saying Sorry.
Yesterday I told my wife sorry because I walked in the door when I said I was going to, which just so happened to be a half an hour later than usual. Please note that I had already told her well in advance that I was going to be late, and I apologized then as well. I also apologized when I was telling her that I'd be late for making her have to pick up the baby from daycare because I was going to be late. Then, withing 30 seconds of walking in the house, I once again said sorry because I hadn't washed the baby bottles by the time we were expecting guests, which was also caused by my being late.
All told, I apologized four different times (minimum, it's possible I said it a few more times), basically all for the same reason. In retrospect, I'm guessing my wife brushed all those apologies aside like they meant next to nothing, which, honestly, they did. This brings me to my point: if "I'm sorry" is such a meaningless phrase, why did I waste my time and energy saying it four times yesterday about the same event, and why is that not an uncommon thing, not just for me, but for a lot of people I know?
I've been listening to the One Free Family Podcast basically since it aired. I think possibly in the very first episode (but I can't quite remember because there have been so many and none of the titles say anything about it), Taylor and James discuss manners, and "I'm Sorry" in particular. They straight up say that they don't make their children say "I'm sorry" for any reason, and if an apology is warranted and their child won't say it, they will make the apology for their child. I think maybe this is part of the problem with "I'm sorry": many children (myself included) were (and still are) forced to say "I'm sorry" all the time by their parents. Some situations might actually need an apology, i.e., if my son kicks another kid, knocks that kid down, and steals a toy. However, if that happens and I force my child to say "I'm sorry," all I'm doing is cheapening the apology. My son knows that he doesn't mean it, and the child receiving the apology knows it's a meaningless one. Eventually, this happens often enough that we all just start to believe "I'm sorry" is a fairly benign, mostly meaningless phrase.
Now, I don't want to lay all the blame on parents. For starters, parents aren't the only ones that force children to apologize; there are plenty of other adults in the lives of every child that can and often do require apologies even when children don't wish to give them, like Aunts and Uncles, Grandparents, family friends, and even teachers. I also don't believe that forcing apologies is the only reason for the cheapening of the phrase. I believe there's been a movement recently in our culture to cheapen a lot of our language, but that's a topic for another time.
According to Dictionary.com, an apology is defined as, "a written or spoken expression of one's regret, remorse, or sorrow for having insulted, failed, injured, or wronged another." Thus, in order for an apology to be meaningful, it must be an expression of regret, remorse, or sorrow. Of the four times I said, "I'm sorry," yesterday, I maybe once felt any regret. After actually having the feeling, one must apologize for having insulted, failed, injured, or wronged another, thus making any apology without an actual cause meaningless as well. Thus an apology for showing up when I said I would is meaningless because I have not insulted or wronged my wife in any way, nor have I failed to show up when I committed to. Finally, I would add that an apology has to come with some expectation that the party in the wrong is expected to not take the action that caused the insult or injury again in the future. I can certainly say that neither I nor Megan actually believe that I won't stay late at work again some time in the future.
I've been working to be more deliberate in my life lately, and I've been exploring these thoughts on recent posts so I can expound upon them openly and share my intuitions with others who might care to read them. Apologies should have meaning, and I'm not happy about the way that I abuse the words "I'm sorry." In an effort to be more deliberate in what I say, do, and think, I will be working to stop apologizing when I don't truly mean it, or when an apology is not warranted. I want my son to understand that an apology is a phrase that should have weight, and if I cannot model that behavior, then he won't learn the right lessons.
Wednesday, January 2, 2019
Gift Giving
Last week I had been intending to write this post about gift giving, but instead I read John Taylor Gatto's Dumbing Us Down, and was so inspired I had to write about that instead. Check it out here.
Either way, I do really want to discuss this topic as it's been eating at me for a month or so now, maybe more.
This year was our first Christmas with our son, and because of that it was a big deal for a lot of reasons. I could get into all the reasons why it's a big deal that we actually have a child to celebrate Christmas with, but I feel as if I've likely discussed that elsewhere. If not, that's a post for another time. At any rate, with a four month old at home, Christmas felt a lot different this year than we're used to.
For starters, can I just say that decorating a house with an infant to take care of is next to impossible. I barely got the tree up the first night before he became inconsolable and we had to take turns holding him for the rest of the night, which really hampered our ability to do more than put ornaments on the tree. The next night we finished the mantle and I put up a decoration on the front door and put out two candlestick lights from my grandmother's house, then the baby started crying again and not much more got done. There was a wreath that ended up dying in the box because I was never able to hang it. There were colored light bulbs for my garage and street lamps. There were strands of lights for the windows, and other decorations for the house that all never saw the light of day this year because it just became too difficult to devote time to dealing with them. Frankly, now I'm just concerned about taking down the few things I did get put up as I don't really have tons of time to deal with that on top of everything else.
The big thing, though, is the gift giving. This could easily have been an "Arguing with my Wife" segment, but I want to expand beyond just what Megan and I disagreed about here. I'll start there, though, as that's really what got me started on this path this year. Our child is four months old, almost to the day when Christmas rolled around, and barely capable of sitting up on his own. He does not understand the idea of gifts. He cannot open presents. He wasn't even interested in trying to help. I couldn't get him to grab the wrapping paper or anything. We knew this as early as 12/15 when I had to unwrap all the gifts that were given to him at my father's family Christmas party.
Why do I bring this all up? Simple: I didn't think it was necessary to get him any gifts at all this year. Megan felt it was important, and, frankly, if that was the whole argument, I wasn't going to take away her Christmas cheer. This is her favorite holiday, and she really wanted to get him gifts, so we found some Dr. Seuss books and a couple of cute outfits and I was ready to call it quits. Then she found a stuffed animal (more on these later), and some teething toys (which, admittedly, he is starting to need), and more books, and frankly I'm pretty sure we went way overboard. I mean, I easily spent $100 on gifts for a four month old child who will literally not remember any of them. Maybe he'll still have the Dr. Seuss books when he starts to read...
Anyhow, to add fuel to our argument, Megan individually wrapped every item. For any other child, if I bought them four books and two outfits, they might get two boxes, but for our child, we had to wrap each book separately, and box each outfit separately, etc. There were probably 10-12 gifts under the tree for him, and we had to unwrap each and every one on Christmas morning. Now, don't get me wrong, Megan really enjoyed the entire experience and that makes it worth it, but it does seem a little ridiculous to me when I think about it.
This whole argument Megan and I were having through most of December really got me thinking about the entire idea of gift giving. You see, I have three sisters, and three step sisters, and between the six of them, they have seven children. Megan has two younger brothers who have yet to get to that stage in their lives, but two years ago she was finally contacted by her older half brother that she had never known growing up, and it turns out he has two children. Those two celebrate Hanukkah instead of Christmas, but that fact doesn't really detract from my point. You see, between the two of us, not counting our own child, we have nine children that all celebrate some gift giving holiday in December. On top of that, there's a ton of birthdays in December and January. Megan and all of her brothers are born in January or December. We have two nieces with birthdays in December, as well as a niece and a nephew in January. Not to mention cousins (a lot of Megan's family is born in January). If I count November and February, I pull in a few more as well as I have two sisters in November and another nephew and step father in February. On top of this we have close friends, coworkers, etc, not to mention parents and each other to think about.
It all gets really out of control when I also take into account that we have the family gather with my father's side of the family in the middle of the month, then Christmas Eve with my mother's side of the family, and Christmas day with Megan's family. Each of these gatherings require that we supply some kind of food, drink, dessert, etc, and both of my family's gatherings come with extra gift giving in the forms of Reindeer Games, White Elephant, and Secret Santa. Plus, Megan and I wanted to do special Christmas cards this year since having a baby is kind of a big deal and what better way is there to show off to everyone than to send out a Christmas card with his face in it. I literally could not keep track of the amount of money we spent on Christmas gifts and related expenses, but I can say that we had a Christmas Club account that was certainly not enough to cover this year.
After the difficulties I had with the whole getting a bunch of gifts for a four month old, I then had to go through and figure out what kinds of gifts to get for all of the above named, and I'd be lying if I said it wasn't stressful. For starters, I'm not really a huge fan of spending money, so anything that requires I go out and spend money stresses me out. More importantly, though, is by the time we were getting near the end, the whole ordeal was just starting to feel really forced. I mean, let's go back to the niece and nephew that celebrate Hanukkah. I don't know much of anything about Hanukkah, and I've never actually met either of those children as they live on the other side of the country. Had we stayed in California, we probably would have met them by now; as it stands, we will likely finally meet them in 2019. I've had a few video calls with them, but I don't really know much of anything about them other than what I hear from Megan's mom (she's spent some time there and talks to them frequently). I certainly don't know the kinds of things they're into that would inform good gift decisions, so shopping for them on Amazon (yay free shipping to any destination!) just felt like an odd, detached experience for me. Worse is the fact that, I don't even really know if they received the gifts, liked them, or anything. The whole experience bothered me.
That was only the beginning of my woes, though. I usually like to give books as gifts, but two of the parents this year specifically told me that books would not make good gifts for their children this year as said children "hate" reading now. I could (and may at some point) go on a rant about school making all of these kids that loved reading two years ago hate it now, but I won't right now. It did mean that we had to come up with other ideas for gifts. I don't spend as much time as I probably should as an uncle with my nieces and nephews, so other than Five Nights at Freddy's and Minecraft, I don't really know much that would inform good gift decisions. Toys are really commercialized now (literally every entertainment brand has toys associated with it), and it all feels fake and a bit disgusting. I wanted to buy one nephew Legos, but holy cow when did they get so expensive, and do I buy him Marvel, or DC, or Minecraft, or just Lego Creator? What happened to a big box of a bunch of different Lego blocks and kids just had to be creative and not follow instructions to build the one thing their $10 box of Legos will make? (FYI, I did find a box like this, but its 2000 pieces cost a small fortune, so I had to pass.)
By the time we were looking for a gift for my niece's birthday on 12/26, I was burnt out on gift giving. The whole idea was feeling forced, and I hated it.
When we were living in California, while we were out and about, if I saw something that reminded me of any of my nieces or nephews and I had the cash, I'd pick it up and send it home for them. It felt good getting a call from my sister that her daughter loved the new shirt I bought for her, or my other sister that her son wishes he could have been at the Renaissance Faire with us when we bought the puzzle box we sent home for him. I didn't feel obligated to send home a ton of gifts for Christmas, and, frankly, we couldn't have afforded it then anyhow. I didn't feel bad if I couldn't do more than send a card for a birthday, because if I saw something at any point that I could get and send home, I would and did. That felt right in a way that all the gifts I gave this year for Christmas didn't.
This year I felt obligated to get each and every child a gift for Christmas. More than that, I felt confined by the fact that I had to spend an equal amount on each child else one of my sisters might get upset that some child received better gifts than others. I only even bring that up because that has happened to me in the past already. Once, I bought a gift for my niece and sent it home from CA only to get a call complaining that I didn't send one home for said child's brother as well. Another time one sister complained loudly that I had played favorites with another sister's daughter and spent a lot more money on her than any of the other children. It's disgusting to think about, honestly, but here I am, hamstrung by the fact that it's expected of me as an uncle to get each child a gift, and I have to play it safe and spend the same amount on each child or one sister might be upset that her kids got the short end of the stick. I didn't enjoy the experience at all. To make things worse, since we're all together on Christmas Eve at my mother's house, all the kids opened up all their gifts that night in a huge free-for-all that ended with me not getting to see any of those gifts that I had stressed over choosing opened or how any of the kids reacted to them. Frankly, I'm not sure that kids can really react to any one particular gift, anyhow, when they have 10-20 gifts in front of them to open.
One of my coworkers told me the story of how last year she went all out with her daughter because she was finally old enough to understand Christmas and open the presents herself and really have fun with it, so she had like 20-25 gifts under the tree for her daughter on Christmas morning. The poor girl opened three or four, then turned to her mother and said, "I'm done opening presents now mom. I wanna go play with my new toys. This is boring." I couldn't have said it better myself.
I know the point of this season is gift giving, but I guess I didn't get it this year. I didn't feel generous for giving any of those gifts this year. I doubt highly that any of my nieces or nephews felt particularly grateful for any of the gifts they received, especially from me. Most of the gifts I gave I'm guessing will be forgotten shortly if they haven't already. I don't get it anymore, and I didn't like it this year at all.
More to follow on this. I need to collect myself and try to be a bit more coherent with the rest of my ideas before I try to continue.
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