I wake before my alarm. My husband left for work about 5:15 which helped me get started at 5:45. He normally only drives for work on Friday so I have some extra tasks today that he normally handles. I let the dogs out and then went to the bathroom to shower and get ready for work. After, I turn on the tea kettle, cooked eggs for the dogs, and made a breakfast smoothie. The dogs get the cooled fried egg on top of their food. I flossed and brushed my teeth. We had the floss tool that included two strips of floss held together with a plastic tool. I enjoyed using them but apparently we only had them so my daughter could add flossing at night time to her routine – a new habit. That is a real feat. New habits. And, I love that I learned that about her. Too much wasted plastic to use forever is what I was told so I am back to the floss string with no tool other than my hands. I have a bit of a mess that needs straightened up from the weekend purge. I fold and put up clothes and then put the storage bins in the closet. We hired a friend’s daughter to clean our house to help her earn some money and she is coming today and I wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything in the way.
I leave the house with my lemon water, smoothie, and the dogs. I drink both during the drive, about 20 minutes total. I stop at my Mom’s to feed her two cats, give them fresh water and make sure their litter box is clean. Her dog is staying with us. She is in Gulf Shores, AL for a couple months, snowbird. I drive downtown to leave the dogs at the downtown apartment and I am not sure why I didn’t leave them at my Mom’s. I open a couple shades for them so they can see outside, make sure they have fresh water and food, and leave for work.
I arrive and get started at work. Most days feel like a race through the day of tasks. I spend much of my time working with my team to help them get through their tasks while also trying to get the management tasks done. Today is a little different in that I am taking the time to read through the info regarding the board meeting in March that will include the vote to approve the sale of the bank and approve the money paid to specific people on contracts in the bank. I read it and texted the important dollar amounts involved to a colleague losing her job. She kind of prompted me when she asked me if I had voted my shares. We consider the number of people who have read the info and that prompts me to start checking. I had not voted my shares, it wasn’t priority, yet. What is reality? Pay-outs of multi-million dollars to people running the bank. Many people are losing their jobs and yes they have the best severance packages I’ve seen. Maybe a little less guilt about the strong support for each to help land on their feet.
I also stopped to have an important conversation about 10:30 with a colleague. There are plenty of those losing their jobs. I am not one of them nor are the majority of the people I work with directly daily. The conversation revolves around our manager who is stressed… I have a list of three things I spoke with my colleague about that are intended to be shared with our manager when he takes the time for it. If he takes the time for it. My colleague and I are on the same page most of the time. We talk about all the important things at work and it’s great to have someone like that in my work life. We will help each other navigate the change.
I read an article that leads me to reading about the aquiline nose. A nose that has a bit of a hump and curve down. My Dad and Grandfather have this nose and we always thought it was of native descent. That looks to be wrong given the DNA results and if son is like father then probably more likely Jewish. However, the article indicates the nose is found across all kinds of people and is not of a specific ethnicity or people. I wonder how I have gone my entire life and not heard that term.
About 5:30, the last staff member still working stopped in to ask me about an email received near or after the typical end of the workday. It requested an answer to the intent of staying at the bank. I simply stated that I don’t have a job elsewhere right now so I answered yes. We didn’t debate further. He seemed fine with the answer. Answers like that can always change.
My husband is coming to town to take our friend’s daughter home and we decide to go to Savage’s for dinner. He picks me up at work. Good friends, a couple, walk in shortly after we arrive and join us for dinner. This is one of the things we love about Savage’s. If we don’t make plans with people, we will see people we know and sometimes we join for dinner. We have really important discussions during dinner which includes wine, salad, and chicken strips with buffalo sauce for me. The couple incudes one who wants to leave Muncie now and the other who doesn’t want to start over somewhere else. That kind of makes me laugh. This lady knows everyone and is easily able to connect and would have no problem finding ways to help kids, her passion, in a different location. We talk about the apathy in the community and the impact that has on people and the community. I am certain apathy which seems to be part of life in Muncie played a role on our daughter’s decision to move south. I am still waiting on pictures of her new place that I have had to prompt for a couple times. That, apathy – she and I discussed just a couple weeks earlier, and a bold statement made by the guy at the table with us last time we had dinner, about a month ago. Something about being a young adult living here when she has the opportunity to go anywhere. I am happy he did because she clearly wasn’t happy and that may have been the boot in the butt to make a decision. She left Monday and had an entry level job with benefits the day after she arrived.
Next topic, she loves to socialize and he prefers to not. We learn some details of a topic we already knew but this time we learn some more personal aspects of the challenge. She asks if we will have dinner with them once a week so she can get him out of the house and they can enjoy an evening together. We go out once a week and are happy to include those who want to join us. We leave and she takes him home and then heads out to meet other friends. We go to the downtown apartment leaving my car at work and making a decision to walk to work the next morning in freezing temperatures. No big deal, it’s just a few blocks. My husband has to get up early for a 5:00 am workday start in the morning. We go to sleep. It’s probably 9pm or so.