days gone by

I went to my old office last week. My old boss, a guy I just LOVE, is retiring. I haven't been back in almost 10 years. There are times when it feels like I just left. And other times where I can barely remember that part of my life.

But I remembered how much I loved my job. I had a lot of different ones over the years, but my last one... it was the best. I was surrounded by brilliant people. (Not to say that brilliant and quirky don't go hand in hand. We ARE talking about librarians here.) I had really interesting work. I don't mean to brag, but I was good at it - it was a great fit for me.

Lots of my old co-workers are still there and many of the ones who have left came back for the retirement luncheon. I had nice clothes on, no kids with me, I ate fancy food and talked about travel, fashion, politics, law, the economy and business with these amazingly smart, well-read, informed people.*

Gosh how I miss that life sometimes.

But right now, there's just no way I could have that life and still have my four kids, and there's no way I would trade my life with them for that. But I do still miss it.

Of course, it doesn't help that I left the party and went straight to the carpool line to pick up my kids and they were fighting and complaining and being generally annoying as they are EVERYDAY when they are hungry and tired and have been in school all day.

The rewards in this job are so intangible. And so distant sometimes. The rewards in my old job were so much more immediate. My paycheck. People thanking me for a job well done. My boss was STILL talking about some of the projects I worked on and how well I did them.

I made a really good dinner last night and the kids treated it like it was rat poison. You can bet there was no thank you. And 10 years from now, they certainly won't say, "Hey... remember that one time, you spent ALL AFTERNOON in the kitchen and made that huge dinner from the Martha Stewart cookbook? Yeah. Now THAT was fabulous."

I can only hope they pick out a really great nursing home for me.

*Not to say that I don't have good conversations with really smart people now, because I am fortunate to know a lot of really interesting people, BUT it's just not the same conversation when you are interrupted every 32 seconds by breaking up a kid fight, or wiping a butt, or cleaning up a spill, or chasing a 2-year old down the block. Kids are pretty much the antidote to conversation.