NJM23 - Entry #4 in These Foolish Things

You can find the NoJoMo prompts here!

Prompt: If you could go back in time and visit one event in history, where would you go and why?

I don’t know that I’d want to visit a historical site or something like that. Like, I don’t want to go to Jurassic times or Anne Frank times or even like Back to the Future type things like going back to the 1950s. I think I’d actually just take myself back to my early career and point myself in a better direction. Not that I’m in a terrible place right now…but I do feel like I should be in a different place. And if I’d gone in a “better” direction, maybe I’d even be married with a family or something. I’d tell myself to take those chances and put myself even further out there than I had before. I don’t think I would have taken the job before The Cutie Pie Company (the one that I was in for 10 years). I stumbled through that job and my boss never liked me but kept me on through a PIP and various other dick moves and I stayed and I stayed…and I wish I hadn’t because in the end they just let me go anyway.

I’m not bitter - I’m just saying I would love to tell my younger self to take chances! And push a little bit harder for things you want! And don’t stay in one place too long if it’s not working for you.

I could use that last sentence about my love life as well. How many relationships did I stay in years after I should have walked away?

But yes, today was the day I had brunch with my former co-worker from The Cutie Pie Company. Let’s call her M. We met at this super cute, totally Instagrammable restaurant (of my choosing - and it made me want to start a new version of Brunch Club here in my not-so-new town). I was so happy to be going to brunch and was DYING to hear some juicy scoop!

M. didn’t give me any real new news. Just the same thing - that Chief Cutie is absolutely impossible to work for/with and that she wants to quit ASAP.

She did tell me that the company had its Holiday Party early this year because Chief Cutie will be out for maternity leave during the holidays. She said that this one bitchy designer (I can’t remember the name I gave her, but she’d been part of my staff) got stumbling drunk and slurry and acted like an idiot. No real shocker there. The shocker was that this designer also won some bogus Rising Star award??! Which, of course, made her funny little head even bigger and her speech even slurrier.

I mean, all the news was the same old news and it did make me think about how I felt back then - sick and anxious and unhealthy and freaked out - vs. how I feel now - so much more relaxed, and though I’m not 100% satisfied with my situation, at least I have the job and the title and it’s more about what I DON’T have: the horrible, horrible, constant anxiety-inducing situation where I felt like I had to wash down a valium with a glass of wine before leaving for work every single morning.

M. then asked me for advice on whether she should quit now or after the first of the year. I told her quite frankly, that if she can stick it out until she gets a new job, to just collect the paycheck and then GTFO when the time is right. After all, she’s been able to stay there for a year and a half now, even though her most tenured employee is 4 months in!! I don’t know how she’s hanging on. I honestly don’t. Because nobody stays. NOBODY.

Anyway, that was brunch.

And there’s no looking back.

The only thing to do is move forward into a much, much, much better place.

Happy Weekend,
GS