Escape from the Corporate Deathstar!!

Well, it happened! I finally escaped the Secret Vortex of the Corporate Deathstar (thanks again to Pam Slim and Cubicle Nation). Friday was my last day in corporate banking, and quite possibly as a software analyst too. You'd think being so close to the end would have me skipping & whistling through this last week, but in fact it was the longest week of my LIFE. Each day felt like 100 years wandering the desert! When Friday finally came, the first thing I did at work was step out of my car onto a nail that went right through my shoe. How fitting! It seemed like yet another sign among so many that it was time for me to move on. I kept the nail as a souvenir, and if I ever start to think of going back I can get it out & step on it a few more times just to remember why I left.

It sounds cliche, but since about 4:10 pm on Friday I feel like a whole new person. It's not happiness so much as acute relief, like having a headache for about 18 months straight that finally stops hurting. This weekend was the first one in recent years where I didn't have a cloud of dread hanging over me about Monday. That sense of hurry and rushing to cram everything into nights or weekends is gone. The daily tiredness is suddenly gone; now that I'm doing something I want to do I have tons of energy (for me, tired always seems to be the opposite of joy). The things I've done since Friday are not spectacular: soak in a hot tub, clean the house, walk the dog, cook a meal--but for the first time since I came back to work before Christmas, I feel like I can really catch my breath and be completely present. I'm actually excited rather than dreading getting out of bed in the morning. I guess I didn't realize how much this had been affecting me.

Of course I'm not totally naive. I know that quitting a job won't magically cure all life's problems, & this is just the beginning of a whole new climb. I don't this is about the job so much as a decision to stop resisting my essential nature and trying to conform to a career that isn't me. In the next few weeks school will start for me, I'll probably start working part-time, and life in general will go on.

For now though, I'm content just to rest in the perfect here and now: the perfect blue spring emerging outside my window; being on vacation for a month; getting to curse, dye my hair "unnatural" colors and flaunt my tattoo at will(ah, the little annoyances of corporate life); planning a spring getaway to New Mexico and Arizona. I'll keep you posted!