Strongly Worded

I Ain't No Lame Duck

So now that I've announced my imminent departure from this job, I can share freely.

My last day will be on June 22. I have agreed to teach a last hurrah job-related class on the 23rd (generating some extra cash). And I have a final Board meeting on the 28th (which I suspect will have some sappy closure component that I would just as soon avoid, but hey. Maybe I will get a present. Hopefully not dwarves.).

Then I'm mostly free. I'm teaching this online class about leadership (and trying to convey to my students that 1) A Certain Celebrity is not a leader because he has "spoken out" about Scientology and 2) Reinstalling a backyard swimming pool is not an adaptive leadership process), and also doing this contract project for a local trade association. My goal is to be a dean someday, so if you know of anyone who wants to hire a dean-in-training, by all means let me know. Hopefully the universe will reward my perseverance and loveliness and shake out a job for me by the end of the summer. ASAP, in any case.

In the mean time, I have to bide my time at my current job. I am deriving satisfaction from shrugging off the familiar sinking feelings of doom every time a) funding doesn't come through or b) program participants misbehave. This is just like that sensation we all had in college when there were lulls in the day and we thought about all the reading and homework that was hanging over our heads. Remember? And then after we finished the last final exam of each semester, we'd experience that same ingrained doom-inspiring reflex, and then realize that it was unwarranted because in fact the semester was over? Remember that bliss? That's how I felt this morning after a higher-up left me a nasty voicemail, and how I felt last week during a cash flow crisis.

We have already hired a replacement, a really amazing former volunteer who will truly kick ass. She's been coming in for orientations, and expressed sympathy last week because "it's hard to leave a job, since people gradually stop consulting you and you start to feel like a lame duck." I tried to tactfully express that not being consulted brings me huge heaps of joy. I am no lame duck. I am a swan. I am honking happily, while spreading my lovely white wings and getting ready to fly swiftly away.

Posted by Dori at 4:11 PM