Twitter / atb20

Saturday, July 20, 2013

drained

things are surreal here in moosk-world. it seems as though my boss (more accurately, one of my bosses) is dying. earlier this year, he found out that he has stage 4 cancer. after an initial hospitalization, he returned home and ultimately to work. recently (on my birthday, in fact) he had a relapse, and now he is home, receiving palliative care... it's heartbreaking. not only is it desperately sad to watch someone you've worked closely with for seven years succumb (rather quickly) to cancer... someone who's always been very thoughtful and kind; but for me, it's a daily reminder of the worst year of my life. watching his family deal with this rollercoaster -- that seems to only have drops -- brings me back to my own sleepless nights of worry and tears. in some ways, i am grateful that we never really acknowledged that my mom was going to die from her cancer. sitting with someone who knows that they are dying... and with his family that knows that they are saying "good-bye" is just so painful. at the end of the day i feel as if i've been wrung-out. and then, in quiet moments, i start to think about how this is going to affect me. i may not have a job much longer. what should i do? should i look for another one? should i try to find someone else here to work for so i can keep working for my other boss -- whom i've worked for for the last 10 years? do i just throw in the towel, and say i'll stay home with my kids for the next year and see where we are then? ah... it's too much. my puny brain can't deal with the emotions and the stress and the small children who wake me up so early in the morning. anyone want to step in here and take over? ***FYI, this is an old post I finally published.*** at the time it wasn't common knowledge that my boss was dying, and I didn't want to make it public even in this quiet, relatively desolate spot on the internet. He passed away almost a year ago now, and I still have a job, so that's good. Still makes me very sad to think about him and how transient life is... but it also makes me grateful for the present.

places i'd like to go

in no particular order: - Galapagos - Fiji - Japan - Indonesia - Austria - Australia - Scotland places i'd like to go back to: - Hawaii - Amalfi coast - Ireland - Maine - Rhode Island