Taking those leaps of faith

Leaps of faith. Those words always bring the Fools card of the tarot to mind. I have made a life of avoiding them, as I tend to prefer stability and certainty over uncertainty and the possibility of chaos.

So here I am at age 47. Two years and eleven months into a job with the state of North Carolina. I am leaving. While my job search has been greatly hindered by my record of assault (200+ applications, 100+ resumes sent out,  in the past five years, and only four interviews- three of which landed me a job)

I have to leave. I find the job to be physically, spiritually and emotionally draining. It had been fun, but now was not. A job that began as a dishwasher and quickly morphed into managing the employee cafeteria of a state medical facility.  I enjoyed my work- I was able to interact with residents, staff and the myriad of locals who patronized us for lunch each day. A small place, but we managed about 150 covers. When I started I was preparing about 8 cold items a day and running the cash register. I enjoyed it. I worked Monday through Friday and had weekends and holidays off. I could see me hanging out for a long haul.

Fast forward to the summer of 2015. My director is being a bear. At every turn I am met with a stern and unhappy woman. Her son is in the midst of legal issues- felonies are involved as is alcohol. Her mood can be gauged by the continuances of her sons court dates. It becomes a joke, and the staff knows when the dates are and make plans to stay out of her way. (Thanks, Internet!) She redesigned my workday to longer be cashier, but to rather serve lunch (which I detested, as do all of my coworkers). This is seen as a spiteful move by many, I even came to see it this way in time.

While my director has never been known to be a happy, cheerful, build your staff up kind of boss, things were tolerable. That is, until she started in on me in July. It was a constant borage of negative remarks. Always something wrong- be it the way I cooked her eggs for her sandwich every morning (which had been fine for the first year and a half...), to the strength of the coffee, or the freshness of the fruit I was cutting for lunch. Every day I came to loathe seeing her, as I knew it was going to be another occasion of something lacking, something not right. I went to a peer to seek guidance, and was told again and again, "thats just the way she is..." An unhappy thirty year veteran of the state. 

This went on from April through July. I bit my tongue, tried to make the adjustments required and realize that she was stressed. I began taking Chantix again in July to continue my annual pilgrimage to NonSmokerVille.  I came to work on a mid July day as normal. Things were progressing, I was prepping for my day. She arrived and began complaining because the coffee urn was empty. I made coffee. A little while later she commented negatively about some salads I had made. A little later she pointed out in a hateful way some cleaning deficiency. In less than 1.5 hours she had not said anything nice. I said to her, I wish you could say something nice, half jokingly. I tried to bring some levity. She huffed off. A while later we got really busy. I sold out of the fruit I had bowled up and that somehow pissed her off. She started bowling up some more, as I was bowling up something else that had sold well. She pulled a piece of cantaloup out of the pan, held it up and yelled at me across the kitchen that I was not to mix old and new fruit. The entire pan of fruit she was pulling from had been cut fresh that morning. I said I hadn't mixed old and new. She slammed it down, making it very apparent that she didn't agree. She said, yes you did, again holding a piece of ripe cantaloup up as her evidence. I replied that I had cut it all that morning. I really didn't like the confrontational manner or the accusation that I was somehow lying. Her huff continued and I said that I wish that she could say something nice. 

She stormed off, leaving the pan of fruit. The day continued. Later in the afternoon, after lunch, I was called into a meeting with her and my immediate supervisor. I was told I was lucky she wasn't calling Human Resources and filing insubordination. I said that I was not being insubordinate, but that I did ask if she could say something nice, as she had not in the 1.5 years of me working in the cafeteria ever said anything nice- she always had a complaint, was always finding a deficiency. My director told me that if I wanted a boss that said something nice, I needed to find another job. She let me know that I was not making the recipes she asked me to (which I had been making weekly) She then stormed out of the meeting and said she was leaving us to discuss being nice.

​I apologized to her the next day, as I saw that my manner was not professional or becoming. She indicated she accepted. Things remained strained for weeks. I called Human Resources as something really felt wrong. They advised that I document everything I made, every interaction. So I did. About four weeks in to the documenting, I took a three day weekend and upon my return was informed that in less than two weeks I would be transferred back to dishwasher, that I made too much money and the budget couldn't afford my wage. I was stunned. Many of us (myself and coworkers) had noticed her speaking and being very friendly with the guy who used to run the cafeteria. I had even gone to my boss while documenting and asked directly what was going on, was he coming back. I was told no. So, I called her boss who was leaving for a three week vacation in Europe and asked about my transfer "due to financial" reasons. She indicated she knew nothing of these "financial concerns." I called Human Resources, they said to stick with the documentation. The next morning, I was again called into my directors office with my supervisor. She tells me that she knows that I went to her boss and to HR, and that in addition to the financial reasons she was not happy with my performance and was still planning on my transfer. 

So the transfer progressed. I worked my ass off. She and I haven't spoken since September, even though our paths cross every day. It is very uncomfortable. I began looking elsewhere in October. I interviewed for Omni in November (finally got my "no thanks " email today (Feb 12, 2016). I applied to every job posting I thought I could do- some of them repeatedly. My record haunts me.

I finally garnered an interview with Mission- not in food service as I would have assumed and where I applied often, but in behavioral health. The process is ongoing. I took the interview and prayer afterwards to come to the place that it was time to leave the state job. I resigned. This past Tuesday was my last shift.

I leapt off the cliff. I will now either grow wings and soar, or I will find a net. I know I won't die :-) 


​...to be continued