bits n' pieces

God, so much to catch up on. Lots of things I wanted to point out in the world at large, and I've forgotten most of them...

First, the me stuff...

Work continues to be an interesting barrage. With the spectre of a possible promotion on the horizon thanks to BossLady's pregnancy, I've been gently asserting myself in an effort to get people more gradually accustomed to my style. I tend to be a lot less tolerant of people who make themselves useless, and my boss has acted as a buffer to my occasionally overzealous approach. It's a very good thing, because it has taught me the value of fairness and measured judgment. I've learned that idiots do not need to be exposed -- they reveal themselves much more quickly most of the time. So I began the gradual process of letting people know where I stood, measured over the next four months to allow them an opportunity to know what the score was going to be when I took over.

Until Wednesday, when BossLady confided in me that she will not be leaving in August... no, indeed, she will be making her exit in APRIL.

This also coincides with organizational changes the company has been tossing around, and now it looks like my location gets to be the guinea pig to see if it works. The new model removes the role of general manager and splits it amongst the remaining deparment heads. The role I will be stepping into: Operations Manager. Most of the split up duties will fall onto my plate. Better still, the stuff I'm not too keen on (sales) is OFF my screen. There's still a lot of undefined turf that will have to be hammered out over the next two weeks, but I'm quite intrigued by the potential: a position that will, in effect, be created and defined specifically for and by me.

Neat.

In other news, I cashed in some of my savings and bought a new bike. It will be a process learning how to trust my own reflexes again. My body lost its sense memory over the last two years, too, so I'm trying to re-adjust to certain things..not the least of which: I've lost my crotch callous. I've been walking bowlegged for the last two days. I expect my brothers to run wild with that line, but anyone who bikes knows what I'm talking about.

--

On the political front, I'd like to draw everyone's attention to KnightsOut.org. Knights Out is a group comprised mainly of West Point Military Academy alumni who have served within the military, either currently enlisted or retired. The public face of the group, Dan Choi, is an combat veteran in the Iraq war and an infantry platoon leader with the National Guard. He graduated West Point majoring in Arabic language and environmental engineering, which have served our country well in our current conflict.

Two nights ago on national television, Choi openly defied Title 10, Part II of the U.S. Code -- better known as the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. He went and told everyone without being asked. There is now justifiable cause (in the purest legal sense) to discharge him from the military. Aside from that Choi has a clean record and proved himself of great value, acting as a translator in town meetings and winning the confidence of many locals in Iraq.

As his coming out has been such a public affair, the scrutiny around any possible dismissal will be massive, and as such I somehow doubt he will actually be removed from his post. If he is, it goes to prove his point, that valuable soldiers are being tossed away. If he is not, it goes to show that the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy is a joke, a policy applied in a fashion that can only be described as arbitrary.

Obama has promised to repeal the measure, and I hope he makes a move on it soon. To date, 11,694 soldiers have been removed from their posts under invocation of this policy. Perhaps some were reasonable discharges to address transgressions beyond the mere mention of sexuality, but when a dismissal is centered on a part of the human psyche which can not be altered and has no bearing on a person's ability or performance as opposed to the REAL transgressions, it is not justice nor justifiable. It is discrimination, and it must end now.

back in the saddle?

I've been considering it for a few days... I have a little extra cash in my savings at the moment, and god knows I need the outlet...

I'm thinking about buying a new bike.

You may recall my old bike was stolen four months after my accident. I never got the opportunity to fix it up or ride it again. It's just as well, though, because in my consideration of buying a new one, I've realized something.

I'm still scared shitless of it. The crash was pretty traumatic -- it was the first time I went to the emergency room and had to stay -- four days, no less. Major reconstructive surgery, piles of painkillers. And while it made for great conversation, it is something I never want to repeat. The pain was excruciating and the lasting impact of having to replace my teeth haunts me to this day (remember my apicoectomy last summer? Owwww...).

But then... this little philly (well, Raleigh) spoke to me from a shop window. And I remembered how much I really enjoyed the ride. And as I've gained a little extra heft since my bout with pneumonia, I have to get my exercise in somehow.

"But, but, but you work in a gym!" you may say... true. But when you spend eight-ten hours a day working in the place, the last thing you want to do is hang out for another 90 minutes. And knowing myself and my patterns, I will never start anything up unless it is an ingrained part of my daily routine. Biking to work would take about the same amount of time as taking MARTA, with the added bonus of physical activity. The nifty side effect of biking to work was that I actually had the desire to do a real workout at the gym, regardless of the ten hour day.

But still... scared.

imagination run amok

I moved to Atlanta three and a half years ago, somewhat under duress. It wasn't where I wanted to be but if I was to make any sort of step forward in my life and break the cycle of comfortable living into deep pits, it was a necessary move. I made my designs on leaving Atlanta within the first year and heading back to NYC, transferring with the company I started working for.

That didn't happen, clearly. I'm still working for that company, and in August, it will be four years. It's longer than I've stayed with any other job, and it's allowed me to be mostly comfortable on a fairly consistent basis. I've grown and learned within my position, though when I've thought of making a switch I was never quite sure where else I could apply it.

I've stuck it out, though, and it's beginning to pay off. After a lateral move across town to help resurrect a dying location, my boss and I managed to draw a profit for the month of December. It's the first monthly profit that location has seen in perhaps 3 or 4 years. In the space of two months, we somehow miraculously made a $90,000 turnaround. Add in the issue of economic hardship everywhere, and that turnaround is even more remarkable. It won't last, as we start the new year attempting to tackle some big ticket items that have become very necessary. Still, it's a testament to the abilities of my boss and myself -- even if it's horribly immodest for me to say as much.

And now, in six months time at my 4 year anniversary with this company, it's within the realm of possibility to pay off some awesome dividends. My boss revealed to me that she is pregnant once again, and she's doubting that she'll come back this time. In the last year, I have proven myself to be an embarrassment of riches, ably demonstrating my worth during my boss's first maternity leave, and our subsequent turnaround of the new location following her return. In short, the job is mine should it come available.

It goes along with a major pay raise (just shy of double my current check... I do the payroll, I know these things!), a bonus structure, and most importantly to me -- choice.

Although I will not be doing what I dreamed of doing from a young age, it affords me the opportunity to live the way I wish to live. Everything I do now in my daily, non-professional life is comfortable, but limited. I live where I live because it's what I can afford without living in squalor. I go where I go because it's what's nearby or accessible, since I don't drive. It's lucky that for the most part I'm OK with these things, but the potential of things I can do with a little extra scratch in my pocket is exciting to me. A place of my own in a nicer, more secure part of town. A CAR to go exploring. The option of seeing a movie in Dunwoody without having to set aside an hour and a half to get there, and an hour and a half to get back. Like I said, the options I have now aren't BAD, they're just limited, and I've always been one who wants to explore. It's all running wild in my head -- the potential to improve the basic features of my life. What's more, it's sustainable if I keep working the way I do and am prudent with the choices I make.

Now THAT is exciting.

life is good

I finally did it. After fifteen months of growing it out, I cut it all off yesterday. My hair will shortly be shipped off to Locks of Love, to be made into wigs for children with cancer. It's wonderfully gratifying, and there's the added bonus of having a cute new 'do. I feel good. And those good feelings have led me to think about my station in life.

It's a good life. It's not perfect, but it's working for me. I have a great roommate who takes good care of me. I have a job that keeps me somewhat comfortable, and the best boss a person could hope for. I've regained my health after a long, questionable period. I have all my family still here, and mostly doing what they want to be doing. And after three and a half years of active disdain, I'm getting to be OK with Atlanta. I'm not in a bad place.

I'm sure next week something will happen that temporarily throws it all into flux again, but for now, I'm relaxed, lucid, and OK. And all of this is coming out because I gave something of myself to someone who otherwise wouldn't have it. I like this.

coming together

We had a corporate visit this week, and oddly, after four months of tearing my hair out and feeling like I was trapped in an exercise of futility, I walked into a workspace that felt like progress had been made. Sales numbers were up. It was clean and organized. There was finally a plan to fix some of the broken down junk that had plagued us. The first words my boss's boss said to me were "Everything looks really, really good" in a way that made me feel like he hadn't gotten to say that in a very long time. I finally felt like maybe we've made an impact.

Progress. Finally. I went home and breathed a sigh of relief.

--
Next, a memory.

Once, years ago, there was a letter to the editor in my local newspaper from a couple who had visited my hometown from Nebraska. They wrote of their car breaking down in the dead of night on Christmas Eve, and being helped by some anonymous stranger who just happened to cross their path. The stranger lifted the hood, spent about twenty minutes in there, and then told them to try to start the car again. It revved up again as if it were new. The stranger refused any payment, wished them a merry Christmas, and disappeared into the darkness.

A display of admirable human kindness. I think of this every once in a while when I contemplate the human condition... when the world crumbles into war, and selfishness seems to be the overlying sentiment. It reminds me that good exists, and it's closer to home than you might think.

--

My sister appears to have fallen into the role of town crier within my family. She's often the one who dispenses the news to the rest of her siblings of goings-on when something major happens. I'll never forget the phone call I received one August Sunday morning, when I went into work to get some stuff done. It was a pleasant surprise to hear from her.

(cheerfully) "Hey Sayre, what's going on?"

"Grandma's dead."

Text doesn't do it justice. There was something so incredibly direct and level about it that it was immediately disarming. We talked about it for a moment, and I promptly prepared my travel arrangements. She has this innate ability to break bad news in a gentle way without futzing around with flowery, treacle-filled sentimentality.

So with the arrival of an email from my sister with simply my brother's name in the subject, I knew something had happened. He had been taken to the hospital with symptoms of pneumonia... and from there, every three hours, it was alternating good news, bad news. It's pneumonia, and maybe a pulmonary embolism. No, it's not an embolism. There's a bacterial infection in his bloodstream. He's in better spirits and appears to be responding to the medication. No, wait, he's been moved to cardiac ICU. And then, suddenly, he was released from the hospital. The antibiotics moved incredibly quickly and he recovered, literally, overnight.

The stream of news was absolutely exhausting, and then add a layer of self-mortality to that. It was a little over a year ago that I entered a hospital emergency room with a 104 degree fever and respiratory attacks every fifteen minutes. I felt like I was dying... and I came to find out that I was, and would have if I hadn't sought treatment at the moment I did. I was diagnosed with pneumonia and a pulmonary embolism. I tried to downplay the seriousness to my family -- they all had lives and important things to attend to. It was four days before my fever broke, and another two after that before they felt the danger of the clot detaching and causing a stroke had passed. Now, here's my big brother, in a similar boat... and I know the seriousness of it firsthand, but also know recovery is attainable. I tried to assuage my family's fears best I could through emails and phone calls, while also quietly making arrangements for work and travel, just in case.

It wasn't necessary, thankfully.

--

As the last of six kids, and one who came along a bit after the rest, most of my siblings were already breaching adulthood and defining their directions in life, and as such I often felt left out at family gatherings. Often, it was Jerry who made the effort to make sure I was included, and would often bring me along for the ride of his own life. I witnessed him stop and help countless people along the way.

Time passed, and we grew into very different people -- I'd wager a guess that amongst the family, Jerry and I are the most disparate of the family. He was never particularly comfortable with the gay thing -- it took him ten years to get a hug from his little brother without flinching. I've never told him about my diagnosis, because ultimately, I don't think it's that important for him to know. There's very little common ground between us, but that doesn't lessen my admiration for him.

Jerry is the kind of person so many of us strive to be, and he doesn't even realize it. Every once a tall tale would be spun, designed to cast a light of amazing glory upon himself that would be met with massive levels of incredulity. Instead, it's the things he does not talk about that inspires his family.

That anonymous stranger who saved the couple from Nebraska was Jerry. There were enough details in the letter that those who knew him knew it was him. And the kicker -- Jerry denied it. And still does. His life is lesson in humility, and how to be, truly, a good person. I get the feeling he doesn't envision himself to be a terribly important person, hence tall tales... but the most extraordinary things seem second nature and insignificant to him. He doesn't realize how incredible he really is.

Perhaps the key to true greatness is a complete obliviousness to it.

beginning to figure it out

So for the past month (as regular readers are well aware), I've been generally disillusioned with my job and the way I spend my time these days. It shows all over the place, from my lack of regard for my living space (my room is a hell hole at the moment) to my current physical condition, to just my general demeanor and attitude. I no longer carry the enjoyment or zeal for my work that I once did -- I don't feel as if I'm doing anything I can take great pride in, or get any kind of fulfillment from, which has now spilled over into my personal life. All this means, from the more zen point of view, that it's time to move on.

Would, were that an option. With the state of the economy and job availability such as it is these days, finding something that's just right is a daunting task. You may be hard pressed to find anyone who fits the bill of "jack of all trades, master of none" better than me. It makes me extremely useful and valuable as an employee once I'm in and going, but not at all marketable in the initial search. This has always been the case in both good times and bum times.

All this has led me to a great deal of introspection and reflection about what it really is that would make me feel like I was doing something worthwhile, that I could be really, really GOOD at. I've never felt at greater ease than I did when I was performing, and upon graduating high school I packed up and moved to NYC to pursue those aspirations. Life, as it so often does, got in the way, and despite some very encouraging auditions and a few workshops and readings along the way, after seven years I couldn't keep it going. I left, terribly disappointed that perhaps it just wasn't meant to be... and having absolutely no idea what I would do next.

But on the plus side, during my seven years, I was surrounded constantly by incredibly talented people who I came to know as my dear friends. They had the same struggles with occasionally more success... and the whole time I was there I couldn't understand how people who were so brilliantly talented (moreso than me in many cases) had just as much trouble maneuvering around the road blocks as I did.

Shortly after I moved to midtown Atlanta, I was exploring the neighborhood and found an old church building. It had been sitting vacant for years after the restaurant that had operated there in the 90s vacated. It was a beautiful building that had been masked by graffiti and disrepair, but gazing upon that church my head swirled with a million ideas on how to revitalize it and put it back to use. Last year, the building finally found a tenant in the form of a Presbyterian congregation, but I walk past it nearly every day and another detail of my idle daydream begins to fill in for The Cathedral Theatre. And every time I've looked at that building I've become more and more aware of what it is I'm meant to do.

I want to start and run that theatre company. I want the joy of giving my impossibly talented friends the opportunities that have eluded them thus far. I want the thrill of being able to explore new works, re-examine old works, and present it to the world at large. And just to placate my own ego...maybe a small vanity project or two along the way. The more I imagine of what's possible, the more excited I get. I'm not even doing it yet and I already feel that passion that's been missing for a while now. And realizing that maybe my first instinct wasn't so far off the mark after all is really quite gratifying. This is something that feeds off what I'm good at and is, in turn, good for me.

I don't have the slightest clue about where to start. But, for me, defining the idea is a huge first step.

quick update

Had jury duty yesterday. I was on the standby list, so when I called in to see if I was needed, I was told "Thank you for your service and enjoy your day off." Sweeet! I promptly got to laundry and sitting on my butt, watching TV. I've discovered this show called The First 48 on A&E -- it's a documentary show (don't call it reality, that cheapens it) that follows homicide detectives around in several cities and tracks the case they're assigned to for the first 48 hours after it breaks. It's fascinating to see how quickly they can work and how good they are at their jobs.

Every once in a while I find myself oddly fascinated by some sort of niche -- right now it's forensic science and detective work. Anytime I'm near a TV playing Forensic Files, CSI, Law and Order, or any other of the host of crime procedurals, I get sucked in. And in another lifetime, I probably could have been damn good at that too.

I've been thinking about learning another language. Or six. I'm always in awe of people who can fluently converse in multiple languages and I've secretly yearned to be one of them. I took three years of Spanish in high school and I can pick up bits and pieces of conversation... but I speak what is commonly known as 'restaurant Spanish' -- enough to communicate, too little to converse. I've heard lots of good stuff about Rosetta Stone and it's not astronomically expensive, so maybe one day I'll go learn Spanish. And French. And German. And Japanese. And Welsh (they have Welsh!). While living in NYC, I ran into so many visitors who were so tenative and scared about their broken English. I always wanted to be able to allay whatever fears they had by spilling out with their native language out of nowhere.

--

Finally, had a doctor's visit today. CD4 is 447, VL is 28k. That's a considerable bounce back from my previous readings... in fact, my CD4 is higher than it was when I first started seeing Dr. Z. Meaning: No meds. I'm holding steady and have been for a year, minus that one little blip... that's good news.