For the longest time, I have been trying to get out of The University position I currently hold. I have been here for 3 years. Three long years. Out of all this time, I really could never see the future. I could never see where I was heading. I could never visualize what would get me out of here. There were periods of contentment over the past 3 years and periods of pure anxiety, stress and loathing. Oh, there was loathing. Bosses changed, the environment stayed the same. The cold concrete building, the bright florescent lights, the condescending PhDs, save a few. Everything about my experience here has been very high and low, up and down, one extreme to another - much like my inner nature, I suppose. Perhaps that's why I've stayed this long...a lack of balance - a sense of connection to the job? A tie between my highs and lows and the positives and negatives to this job. The work was sometimes challenging, but the biggest challenge, by far, has been actually doing the job, functioning on a basic clerical level. I'm not cut out for work like this. The lack of creativity, the hard cold office box, the close supervision and extreme restrictions. The constant monitoring, the precision of tracking minutes of sick leave - just too much for my fragile creative soul to handle.
But I've survived.
And now comes the final stretch of time where I, for the first time since July 1st, 2003, clean out my office, eliminate all traces of Kristen Mallia and her presence and file away the last ditch attempts of office work. This is the time where I meet with Ms. Director to show her where all my important files are. The time where she comes and sits in my office, beside me, with her fun jewelry and pretty pedicures, her smile that says, Kristen, I am truly sad to see you go. I believe her smile. I believe the unexpected water in her eyes. She was here from the beginning and I was here from the beginning. We had a creative tie. And I believe she will be sad to see the tie break down, the connection, severed.
I am happy to be moving on with my life, and I, honestly, have been dreaming of the day I would leave this box, since my first week of work. And despite having suffered (and believe me, I have suffered), I feel a sadness. There has been a sadness present since the beginning of the week - as I've started cleaning and organizing and trying to leave a sense of preparation for those who will remain and those who are yet to be here - a sadness has overtaken me. How can I feel such sadness for a place that I've despised for years? How can I feel sadness towards an office and computer and bulletin board and file cabinet that has been the environment of my hatred's growth? Why do I feel this way?
I know you might be thinking that I'm insane - especially those of you that know me. Why am I crying when this is exactly what I've wanted for so long? This sadness within me does not translate into wanting to stay. I do not want to stay. I am excited - so excited - for my future, for my education. I think the reason I am sad is because, despite all the anger and fighting and soul sucking, I know I am leaving forever a place that has been a part of me for three long (and very short) years.
I came to The University job 2 months after my graduation from GW in 2003. My boss at the time who hired me, did so not because I was qualified for the job (though I was), but because I was a creative individual and he was creative. There was a connection. He was excited about my work, my energy. Over the course of the past 3 years, I have gone through many changes. The summer of graduation, I saw close friends become friends no more. I felt the strongest sensation of loss and being lost, watching some one close to me fight the worst sort of despair. I felt the sense of no longer being a student - the joy of not worrying about exams and late night paper writing, but also the feeling of confusion, the lack of focus, the lack of money, the lack of purpose. The lack of. I watched my closest friends move away to other towns, states - watched them leave my life...and many have not returned. I've watched the summer heat overtake. I've taken classes as an employee, for survival. I've tried to relive classes, studio life, to bring back the way it was. I've traveled home and back again, wondering where my place is. I reconnected with people, a person. Over the past couple years, I have become so close to tracie - the reconnection that saved me, that made being here possible. I've talked with her everyday of the work week about 1000 times, phone, messenger, email, office visits, and have never tired of laughing with her, surviving with her, bitching to her, crying to her, yelling, swearing, eating with her. And now I will be leaving her. I will be leaving our life, here, together. We will still talk and hang out and be close, yes, but our time HERE, NOW, together as employees of the same Insitution, will be over. This stage of our friendship is now being phased out, and will become something else. We have laughed and ridiculed and embarassed ourselves in public, cried over poor dying mice, freaked out over overfriendly squirrels and I've watched her baby talk the birds, yes - in public.
I have gone through phases of being lonely, missing people. Missing family and that sense of home. I have made new friends. I have trained with the AIDS Marathon Training Program and raised over $2000 for AIDS victims in the DC area. I have completed a 26.2 mile marathon in under 5 hours. I have given up french fries and have woke up at 4 a.m. to eat and digest and run at 6 a.m. I have been dedicated. I have partied. I have spent time alone. I have supported The Boyfriend and his creative needs, he has supported mine.
I have cried a lot over the past 3 years, but I have also survived. I have grown. This summer, I grew as an artist. I matured. I delivered. I became overwhelmed with pride.
I have found that time is precious to me. Time alone is precious. Time inside, away from the superficial, from the distractions, in my head, with myself, is valuable. I have pushed myself and pulled myself up and I have reached when I thought I couldn't and I have crossed the finish line. There is nothing left to do but admire my life's progress over the past three years, the ups and downs, the quiet triumph of reaching the end of this phase, leaving The University means leaving a moment in my life - a big moment - leaving it as an image of a girl behind a giant computer monitor, dreaming big thoughts, great escapes from this tiny concrete office box.
So yes, I am sad. I'm sad because this is not just a job, it is a part of my life that I am, at long last, leaving behind.
