Dear Diary,

13.  My standard rule regarding my weight ticker is that once I've hit a weight and kept it there for a week, I change my ticker, whether it be up or down. This week, a new low: 146.

12.  Then I got a Groupon for a local Greek restaurant, and ate a shitload of Greek food, and Poof!  Back up to 148, for a day or two, but then dropped again.

11. So, yes, I got THE CALL on Tuesday morning, would I like to come and interview for an internship at the VA?  Oh, wait, let me think HELL YES I would.  So, my interview was today, at noon.

10.  I went to my favorite clothing store to see about getting something decent to wear for the interview.  As a former teacher, I had few summer work clothes to begin with.  In the past two years, the only ones I've amassed are too big.  So, I stopped to get a nice warm-weather office jacket at my favorite store.

While I was at the store I tried on some slacks.  What size, said the sales lady.  "8".  I replied.  She brought me some 8s.
Um.  Miss?  Well....These are too big.

She brought me 6s.  They fit - just a tad snug, but they have spandex in them, so they work.  For the first time since I was a junior in high school, I'm in this newer, lower number.  Cool.

9.  WELL.  Should I be a slave to numbers?  Well, I am anyway, so it might as well be a small one.

WHY am I so hung up on this number?

But the weird thing is taht when I looked into the mirror, I didn't see a smaller number.  I saw--in the words of David Letterman--my pasty white thighs.

*sigh*

I'll just focus on the smaller, new number, and ignore the pasty white thighs.

8. So, I walk into this interview with a sense of confidence because I know a lot of shit.  Being smaller doesn't hurt either .

7.  The interview was a highly structured interview where people took turns asking questions.  I hope I had good answers. Nobody frowned and tapped their pens impatiently.  Nobody looked bored, or unhappy.  Most of the time, they were smiling.

Why do you want to do an internship at the VA?

Tell us about a time you had a conflict where you worked, and how you resolved.

In what way have you used social work in your previous work?

Occasionally there is no stipend available.  Are you still willing to do the internship if that is the case?

How have you worked with veterans in the past?

What strengths do you have to bring to this experience?

and so on...right up to my favorite (and last) question:

What software applications, if any, are you proficient in?

Seriously?  This is the last question? The one that will, hopefully, resound after I leave?

I was flustered for a moment, but just a moment.  Then I said, That's hard for me to answer.  I mean, 'proficient'...I've taught excel, and powerpoint, at the college level, and conducted training in web authoring.  I guess I'm what you might call a 'power user'.  I use email, I spent all day these days using Word.  I'm familiar with your computerized record system; I've used it.  

Smiles all around.

And then I asked my questions.  And then, well, it was over.  It's all over except for the waiting.  It's a highly competitive internship.

6.  Here in 'Burque, where I live, we had Ladies Night at the local cycling store, The Kickstand.  These beyond cool.  There was wine, beer, snacks, and people who represented various cycling interests. I showed up in Outlaws Multisport Regalian, to, you know, represent.  

5. AND, I broke down and bought a pair of cycling knickers this week.  yes--cycling.  Knickers.  I also committed to doing Albuquerque's first women-only triathlon, to be held in August.  I'm very excited about such a thing being in New Mexico.  The finishers will get necklaces, and they are planning a very basic sprint course.  If you live in Albuquerque, come out to Rio Rancho to support this event.  http://livelovetri.blogspot.com/

4.  I also put in my name for the La Luz trail run, which is a local run that happens every year.  I don't think it raises money for charity.  It's 9 miles long.

Oh, c'mon.  You know there has to be a catch.

Well,

Take a gander:





 I know, right?  RIGHT?  I mean, how could I NOT?  It's a 9-mile climb to the top of a mountain.  The mountain is just a few miles from my house.

So, it's a lottery.  I'll find out April 16th if I was selected.

3.  I'm not sure why a kid would show up in an office where someone is deciding if they need mental health treatment and swear constantly at their parent, call them foul names, and believe that it's going to end any way but bad for them.  I really don't.

2.  This is my last build weekend.  10 miles tomorrow, 24 miles on Saturday, and 17 miles on Sunday.

1.   After this weekend, I start tapering down to the first double at the end of the month.  In the meantime, I have assignments to finish, and internships to (hopefully) win.  And numbers to obsess over.  I don't know if things will turn out the way I want them to turn out. For this double coming up, I haven't kept my training up the way I should have.  But for the rest of it, the internship, the La Luz lottery, it's not up to me any longer.  So I'll just focusing on relaxing, and accepting what happens.

...

Thanks for the memories, now go away.

So today I went down to the district office for my final "checkout." This is where, I've come to realize, that they make sure you aren't taking off with all manner of equipment, such as, who the hell knows. Textbooks? Wire in-baskets? AND they wouldn't check me out until I turned in (yesterday) my annual reflection of my year as a teacher. I'm not making that up. I was tempted to just type, "I'M QUITTING. HOW DO YOU THINK IT WENT?"

I was looking most forward to the exit interview. where, ostensibly, I would have my say. I would be pleasant, diplomatic, but be clear on why I was really leaving. Because, you figure, an organization wold want to know why it was losing an empoyee that had been with them for eight years, right?

In a nutshell, I was planning on saying this:
I've worked hard and never caused problems; the worst rule I've ever broken was perhaps parking where I shouldn't. Every year I have received the high ratings on my evaluations. Every school counselor I've worked with thinks I'd be really good at counseling, and I hold a master's degree in educational psychology, and a second master's degree in counseling.
I've applied for ten counseling positions. Of the ten applications, I've been interviewed twice. The rest of the time I wasn't contacted, not even to be told when the position was filled. Five positions were at the school where I've taught for six years.
Whenever the people they hired (from outside the district) left, I would reapply for the same opening that I hadn't been hired for--only to hear about the new hiree when it was announced at the next staff meeting, usually someone from outside the district. At least two counselors of the ten had never even worked in a school.

So I went to district, loaded for bear.

And then, well

and then, they handed me my exit questionnaire.

It wasn't an "interview at all". They don't really want to know why a veteran employee is leaving. It's all just bullshit. They asked questions such as:

• Do you have any problem with any of your supervisors?
• Do you have any problem with your pay?
• Do you have any problem with your benefits?
• Do you have any problem with your leave?

I answered no, no, no, and no. And then I summarized a little of what I said above, adding this:

I have no complaints about any aspect of my employement here: I liked all my supervisors and my pay was fine. I live in and care about this city. However, Rio Rancho appears to have a policy against promoting their teachers and frequently hires support staff from outside the district. If I were afforded the opportunity to work as a school counselor I would have stayed indefinitely.

I got to look in my file. No letters of incident, nothing but good evaluations and rehires.
I turned in the questionnaire to a junior member of HR who appears to have just graduated from high school herself. I have no expectation that it will ever be read, or that if it is, that anyone will care. I think I saw her put it in my file.
I'm just one person of about 20 who quit just at my school alone.

I doubt that I will be missed - they'll just hire another teacher. One who knows her place and stays there. We're expendable, I guess.

And then I turned in my badge.

And then I left.

And now I'm crying and I don't know why.

...

Shiny new lives require a lot of paperwork.

The mysterious and supportive MJ sent me a couple of really great quotes, which I intend to print out nice and big in a nice, fancy font because I found them encouraging and also because they are entirely appropriate for a therapeutic environment:

It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power.
— Alan Cohen

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind is part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter into another.
— Anatole France

So, I started my shiny new life yesterday the day with a crack-of-dawn spin class at the downtown gym, some swim drills, a shower, and then a 5 block walk to the counseling center. In my previous life I had to report to work by 7:10; the counseling center doesn't don't open until 10, so counselors start showing up at 9:30. Ish.

If I show up earlier, I risk spending quality time with Evil Bill (new reocurring character), who is the Type A boss of everything. He's an ex-counselor whose with abysmal people skills. Even Dr. Ken is afraid of him, but for all his unpleasantness, as office manager, the place runs smoother and more efficiently when he gets his way.

Anyway. There's a 13-page application for licensure that requires signatures, a sealed copy of my college transcript, a notary stamp, and a detailed explanation and court records of a misdemenor incident from my past (1991).

Sigh. Stupid misdemenor. It will haunt me forever. Take it from your Aunt Misty, kids: all your dumbest mistakes will wind up on your Permanant-nant-nant-nant-nant Record-ecord-ecord-ecord-ecord.

After submitting all this paperwork I get permission to take a test called the National Cousenlor's Exam.

Then I joined the American Counseling Association, and purchased professional liability insurance.

Meanwhile, I've begun listening to the 17 hours of NCE audio test prep on my iPod. I have fantasies about phrases like, 'highest posted score evar!' but really, I just want to pass it. (There's a marathon analogy in there somewhere.)

I got a line on a second source of work: an agency closer to my house that works with the county juvenile justice system. I took a DSM class with the woman who that runs it and she remembers me, so I'm waiting to hear back from her about this.

And here's another thing: today I sent my youngest son off for 6 weeks with relatives in Dallas.

Six. Weeks.

For the first time since 1984, I will be an adult living in a home with no children in it. Sweet Baboo is beyond excited because he gets to have me all to himself.
So anyway I started cleaning house, and I'm stunned at the havoc that a teenage boy can wreak. Is EVERTHING a trashcan to teenage boys? I found trash in the umbrella holder, the couch, under the couch, under two rugs, behind various pieces of furniture, tucked into the crevices of the kitchen chairs, and in a cabinet that we use to hold our Costco overflow. Oh, and also, EVERYTHING is apparently a laundry hamper to teenage boys, as well.

Ugh.

Tomorrow: I do my final "checkout" and the exit interview for my old school district, where I answer the question, "why did you quit?"
What ever will I say? Or not say? Hmmm...

...