by We have four levels of meetings at work. They have various names like group meetings and team meetings but I always forget which is which so in my head I number them 1 to 4. Level 3, the highest level at which dozing off isn’t an option, is always the most unpleasant for me. Today I attended my last ever Level 3 meeting. As usual, my carpool mate began proceedings with a so-called ice-breaker game. My participation in the game involved having to walk around with my eyes shut making cow noises; it’s come to something that I was relieved that “mooo” was as far as things went. The rest of the meeting was taken up with the subject of empowerment. I kept getting flashbacks to a meeting I attended in 2005 on the very same corporate BS topic. Shit, eleven years and what’s changed? I’m so glad I felt empowered enough to break that cycle.
My mum came up here on Wednesday to “sort me out” and left this afternoon. She was extremely helpful with all the cleaning and packing and sorting. We even hired a Rug Doctor; my carpet was dirtier than I realised. Mum and I got on well. She’s supportive of my move to Romania; it helps that she’s travelled extensively herself. The chances that I get myself a proper job over there, meet a nice domnișoara and have a couple of copii, are rather slimmer than Mum thinks.
We popped over to my cousin’s place last night. Bringing up kids these days seems such a pressure-filled venture that I wonder how parents don’t collapse under the weight of it all. My cousin recently texted me about the logistical nightmare of fitting her boys’ football, hockey, swimming and UWH around homework and a whole-class birthday party. The very thought of inviting everybody in my class to my birthday party would have horrified me when I was eight. Oh, and UWH is underwater hockey. If you’re going to be doing swimming and field hockey, why not combine the two I suppose.
I’ve got 14 more days at work and four more weeks in New Zealand. It’s only 39 days until I arrive in Timișoara. I’m now in full-on countdown mode but I’m far less stressed than I was three weeks ago, even if my apartment remains unrented.
