Banged Up
So after agonizing all weekend about whether to accept the perfectly-fine-but-not-ideal job (the one that was offered to me on the spot after the marathon XTreme interview, pending SIX reference checks), the universe got all spontaneous on me. The offer was withdrawn. Apparently my references sang my praises to the extent that I was deemed overqualified for the job. I was floored but not upset; I had major reservations about it all along. And (barring any disaster) I have my foster job. The whole experience definitely shook me up, though.
Then: the guy from Sunday's blah date disappeared, didn't follow up. I'm relieved not to have to "give it another chance." But still, my pride is dented.
THEN: one of my neighbors slammed into my adorable beloved Honda Civic, mangling the driver's side panel to the extent that the door won't open. The car was parked innocently on my street. The neighbor left a note on the windshield, begging me to let her pay for the damage (and avoid insurance claims). After many consultations with friends/advisors, two people at the insurance company, roadside assistance people, towing people, and people at two mechanic shops, I am still unclear about what to do.There is no deductible and my rate won't go up since this woman is entirely at fault. There is basically no reason for me to avoid the insurance company other than karma (car-ma). And frankly I have no reason to believe that she would pay for the repairs. She sounded nice, and she did, after all, leave a note accepting responsibility for the damage, but this could cost thousands to fix. The car is currently being examined at the mechanic's. When I get an estimate, I will see what she says.
So all in all, you can see that this week has left me a little banged up.
Posted by Dori at 11:44 AM
An Update and UpDATE #501,212
So the work stuff is still getting resolved. I already requested (and got) a major increase the first time I asked for more money, I did ask again and they said it wasn't possible and I believe it. It was worth a shot, though, and I'm still eligible for COLA and bonuses. Also my prospective supervisor agreed to change around parts of the job so I'd have more responsibility. That's all I'll say for now; will fill in more when everything is finalized. It's been a roller coaster of uncertainty and indecision. I did a lot of difficult soul-searching this weekend. I really hope all will be settled quickly.
I also had a date for the first time in a long time, despite the fact that I remain enmeshed with Banter Boy. I think I rather love BB now. He has been so, so good to me these past few months, and has been incredibly attentive and supportive. I have these stirrings in my heart, which are probably loving feelings for a guy that has become a trusted friend, but they are damn similar to romantic longing feelings for a guy that maybe? could be my husband if he got over his ex and learned to communicate differently and could somehow become interested in my psyche. But, as my wise friend E. pointed out, the best part of our relationship has always been the banter, and that's exclusively what I'm getting now, along with lots of kindness and helpfulness, so it's no surprise that I'm posthumously smitten. And because I am weak and attention-starved, and a procrastinating idiot, I installed googletalk on my computer and this enables constant (and I mean
constant) communication with BB.
And yet. He's fully dating again, so despite major pangs and wistfulness, I have concluded I need to get back on the circuit myself. So I contacted Mr. Biotech, a match.com guy with whom I corresponded months ago but never met. As you may remember, Mr. Biotech is a former doctor (former doctors are hotter than doctors, because they actually have time for you) who started his own pharmaceutical startup and now he's developing a secret drug which he told me about but which I cannot tell you about. (Oooh, you know
now you're intrigued.) He was flaky about planning the outing, which really pissed me off, and he's definitely not 5'7" and (while far from unattractive), he's not as cute as I expected, even with the wiry glasses.
And he could stand to lift some weights, I think. It bothers me that women spend all this time and energy staying as thin as possible, because being a little curvy is apparently a problem in our weight-obsessed culture, but so many men (especially brilliant Jews) feel exempt from the same physical fitness requirements. That said, Mr. Biotech was very nice and clearly smart and we had a very nice conversation. No major (or even minor) sparks, however, even though I wore a sexy-but-not-trashy top (because a few people have said that I dress too conservatively lately).
So: I'm not ruling him out or anything, but thus far, lackluster.
Posted by Dori at 8:02 PM
Craziness
So the presentation went swimmingly. The
15 role-playing staff members behaved and were warm and welcoming. All the interviews went well and at the end of the 2.5 hours they unofficially offered me the job. We had some salary negotiations and I got the salary upped by $5K, but it would still be less than I was making at my last job. Since I'm switching fields and higher ed in general isn't so lucrative, I'm OK with it (although now I wish I'd asked for even more).
I'm totally torn over what to do. The permanent job is at a huge, urban, and innovative school, but the foster job is situated somewhere truly elite. There's no guarantee that the foster job would lead to a full-time position elsewhere in the university, and the foster job itself promises to be crazy and probably not something I would want to do long-term. But there's something lovely about it, and I've gotten to know the people a bit, and it's so hard to weigh two unknowns.
Thoughts?
Posted by Dori at 8:20 AM
XTreme Job Search
After an incredibly depressing job-search dry spell, I landed my lovely foster job. And because life is ironic, I immediately got a call from another leading university (also not Harvard), about a different (permanent) student services job. During a speed-round 29-minute phone interview, I was told that the position would involve a caseload of 1,000 students. "You mean in the department, right?" I asked, "A 1,000 students split up over everyone in the office?" The interviewer set me straight:
There are 9,000 students split up over everyone in the office.
You'd have 1,000.OK, then. The job sounds challenging at best. And having the foster job in place makes me loath to break out the leather folder with my name engraved on it, and reluctant to trot out my answers to holy trinity of interview questions: Tell us about yourself? Describe your ideal supervisor? Describe a time when you solved a difficult problem under pressure?
And yet I am doing it, because I am one driven chick. Tomorrow I am meeting with three sets of decision-makers in a 2.5 hour interview marathon in which I will also deliver a 10-15 minute
presentation. I was invited to create a PowerPoint for this.
The interviewers will "role play" as students, and this makes me suspect that it's not a presentation at all, but rather an "elimination challenge" in which they will act like nasty disgruntled students, or else refuse to engage at all so that I will have to demonstrate how well I can draw out recalcitrant participants.
I agonized all week about this presentation, and promised myself I would
not create a new workshop, since I've done workshops on approximately 6 zillion topics in my day and I don't know if I even want this job. And yet. I this entire day developing a flier, talking points, and two handouts for a faux workshop that showcases brand new content.
When they ask for my strengths and weakness, I'll just point to the work I did. Ambitious and self-directed? Yes. And also
insane.
Posted by Dori at 6:11 PM
The First Day At School
So my foster job is underway. Even though I don't officially start until October, I completed two days of training this week. My co-workers are hilarious and lovely, and immediately gave me the lowdown on various office personalities and politics. For example: apparently the Physics department and the Engineering department have a longstanding turf battle over The Orange Room, which features an up-to-to-the-minute A/V system and other amenities. Last year, one of the department chairs threatened to quit if his people couldn't hold a special event in the space. And apparently the Orange Room (which is not, in fact, orange, it's named after some donor) is so sought after that students use it as a makeout space in the evenings. In the science/technology division where I'll be working, this kind of stuff is considered romantic.
Anyway. I'd forgotten what it's like to start a new job, even a short-term foster job. I wanted to be eager but not over-confident, ask questions without appearing stupid, and come across as friendly but not trying too hard. I also blanched when I realized just how complex the work will be. The worst of it won't start until January, but last night I already dreamed about the forthcoming madness.
It's funny how we're all allocated a set amount of anxiety (and I've gotten an extra-large dose), and it never really abates. It just moves from one thing to another. Now that I've stopped worrying about imminent financial ruin, I've begun to worry about succeeding in this role, which is, in many ways, a colossal, 4-month long audition for a full-time position.
Posted by Dori at 8:04 AM
Baby Talk (aka Baby Fish Mouth*)
So this weekend mostly sucked. As I predicted, my pregnant friend (J.) heaved herself around, complaining constantly. She heaved and complained only moderately more than when she's
not 7.5 months pregnant, so I deem her behavior par for the pregnancy course, especially since the temperature hovered over 95 humid degrees.
J.'s
mother, however, is not pregnant at all, and thus has no excuse for her over-the-top sighing, whining, fanning, ranting, and worrying. Among other things (such as the scheduling of the bris, the risk of birth complications, and the cost of college), she fixated on the steps in J.'s 2-level house. She wondered (aloud and often) how J. will manage to carry the baby and assorted baby gear up and down the single flight of stairs. We all pointed out that most of us survived infancy on multiple floors, but J.'s mother was uncomforted.
It's not the same, she objected in a grating, hysterical tone;
J. doesn't have a husband to help.The baby shower itself was held in a
pink ticky-tacky stucco house in an Agrestic-like gated community. The 22 guests consumed bagels and played games including "Guess the Baby Food Flavor", "Fill in the Nursery Rhyme" and "Don't Say 'Baby'." For the latter, we all wore blue ribbons around our necks with baby diaper pins on them, and if we caught someone saying the word 'baby', we were supposed to claim their pins, until the guest with the most collected pins won a prize. I am proud to say that while I instantly lost this game, and only guessed 7/12 baby food flavors, I correctly guessed the circumference of J.'s belly, and won a $5 Starbucks gift certificate.
J. lives in a similarly ticky-tacky complex, so I swam every day in her pool, which was a nice respite from the talk about the hazards of motherhood (and the equally scary hazards of putting off motherhood, which many shower guests and well-meaning relatives mentioned pointedly), the complaints, and the overkill air conditioning.
I returned last night and reveled in the fact that my home is a different color than the other homes on my street, that I can open the windows and walk around outside without suffocating, and that
my mother has a reasonable vision of the challenges of parenthood, as do most of my friends.
*Remember? From the pictionary scene in
When Harry Met Sally?
Posted by Dori at 11:39 AM
The Surrogate Wedding
On Thursday I'm flying South for a friend's baby shower. Whenever I mention this, people look at me admiringly and praise me for being a good friend. Apparently it's normal--even
expected--that one would zip around the country for a wedding, but doing so for a baby shower is noteworthy.
And it's true I debated whether to attend this event, and probably wouldn't have if the situation hadn't been so unique; the mother-to-be (J.) is a close family friend (maybe a cousin equivalent), who I've loved dearly since childhood. Probably more importantly, she hasn't
had a wedding. J. is 40, single, and became pregnant through artificial insemination. She's wanted a baby all her life, hasn't found her soulmate, and decided last year to give this a go. Now she's more than seven months along.
Her shower has become a kind of surrogate wedding, I think. The registry, presents, close friends descending upon her. Which is smart. I believe everyone deserves to be the center of attention at least once in their lives; this is her opportunity.
But it's made me wonder what it is about a wedding (versus other life events like graduations, birthdays, births, etc.) that inspires people to make huge efforts to participate. I'm sure part of it is the ceremony (whereas a baby shower is essentially women sitting around opening presents, most weddings incorporate rituals: vows, toasts, the chicken dance). It's also true that most baby showers are thrown for people whose friends have
already proven their love by flying across the country/buying calphalon cookware and towels/donning color-coordinated evening wear. J.'s friends haven't had the chance to do this for her.
People (namely single people) have said that if you're not married by a certain age (and God knows what age that should be), you should throw a massive birthday party and register for towels and cookware because, after all, why should single people be subjected to eating microwaved, cookware-free meals, and drip-drying after their towel-less showers? A baby-centric event seems a classier way to go about getting the necessary gear (though J. has registered only at Babies R Us).
But in reflecting on all of this, I've realized that weddings are the most exalted life events in our culture, which only increases my desire to have one.
Posted by Dori at 8:12 AM
A Foster Job!
Friends, it has been a very, very,
very long road. I have been trying to find a employment in the higher ed field for
ages. For most of the time, I was also working at my former soul-sucking job, and thus could not share with you the roller-coaster experiences of being considered for--but not hired for--several positions.
I was also unable to share with you the relentless rejection, discouragement, and eventual despair that resulted from my determined yet fruitless search. I sent out zillions of applications into the void of online HR. Usually, all I got was an automated receipt and a smack to my self-esteem. You'd think that, since the Greater Boston region is home to
75 colleges/universities, and one of every four Boston residents is a college student, finding a higher ed job would be easy.
But no. Greater Boston is also home to a frightening number of people who
already work at said institutions, and many of them float around from place to place, either as internal candidates or within the Fort-Knox-like larger system. (I've been told repeatedly that this is not the case in other cities--so please don't freak if you're conducting a similar search elsewhere!). The stiff competition is hard to fathom. I applied to coordinate the writing center at one good but not too famous college. The job probably paid pretty poorly and was by no means prestigious. And yet:
over 200 people applied.
Recently I received an announcement about an opening at a Very Prestigious School (we'll call it VPS--and it's not Harvard, if that's your guess). A woman with a very cool job has become knocked up, and she needs someone to fill in during her maternity leave (from October-February.) There are many reasons that this isn't ideal (namely the opportunity cost--what if I got a full-time job offer during that time?), but the aforementioned discouragement and despair moved me to apply. I figured I'd be a shoo-in. Who else would want a 3-month benefit-less job that doesn't start for a long time?
So when the VPS people immediately called me in for an interview, I assumed they were just desperate. And without going into detail, I'll tell you that they interviewed
five candidates (one of whom crossed my path on my way in; she wore a gorgeous suit and unnerved me completely). I was grilled during a
3-part interview, and asked some very frustrating questions (aka "what do you think life will be like around here in November?" to which I wanted to reply: "hang on while I retrieve my crystal ball"). I was hugely demoralized afterwards, because if they're grilling five people for a somewhat undesirable job which hasn't even been posted (it's not on the VPS website or any other jobs board), then I figured I have no chance in hell of breaking into this field. Ever.
You know where this is going. The guy called me the next day and offered me the job, which actually pays very well, and
does offer benefits. He also emphasized that he and his peeps will do everything possible to hook me up with long-term opportunities at VPS after the pregnant chick returns.
So in essence I have a foster job! I get to care and nurture it for a while, and then give it back to its rightful mother. I know this will be hard. But it can't possibly be anywhere nearly as hard as the grinding failure that has dogged me for eons.
Posted by Dori at 7:33 AM
