Back to school

Whilst away on holiday I made a momentous decision: I’m most definitely, in the wrong job. At least, I am now.

Once upon a time I was happy in what I was doing, (which is research), but of late… I feel like a hamster on wheel – ever peddling furiously away and getting absolutely nowhere fast. Even the jobs I applied for and the people I spoke to during those interviews convinced me of that – it’s only more of the same. It’s like asking to switch from Raspberry Jelly to Lime Jelly, when in fact, I really should be making a beeline towards the Jam Sponge and Lashings of Custard.

So I need to go do something else which I am good at: teaching.

The next steps are pretty obvious – go find out what I enjoy most and then go teach it – so I am currently signing up to a language course (Greek) and also a ceramics course. The ensuing months will indicate which I may end up getting into (teaching English or design). Either way I will need to go on a third course, involving teaching training: which will give me a shiny certificate to prove I can transfer knowledge to others.

By this time next year I want to be out of research and fully entrenched in teaching. And it may not even be in the UK. Given the openness of the EU on borders and work access – Europe can be my Oyster… and I fully intend to savour it. Even if it does taste of jam sponge and custard.

The Great British Weather

What kind of climate means you are pouring yourself a hot water bottle in the middle of August?

I mean… it’s been raining for six days now. SEPA issued 13 flood warnings across Scotland today.

I keep expecting to see The Ark float past the window any day soon. Failing that, performing dolphins.

Oh well. I suppose it’s better to have water than not. Look at poor old Spain…

Now then – a hot cuppa tea, two fleeces and my hot water bottle and off to bed with me. Anyone would think it was December…

checklist

1.) sign up to cunning lingual course
2.) undertake deli reconnaissance
3.) see the dark knight movie soon
4.) track down that annoying tune
4b.) going round my head since last week:
… difficult, as it’s all in Greek
5.) book table at brand new restaurant
6.) buy bottle of wine as present
7.) check dates for meeting friend
8.) …and bank balance for limited spend
8b.) warily eyes up when it’s pay day
9.) wonders about next holiday away
10.) resolves to have much more future fun
10b.) involving sea, sand, wine and sun.

Taping and Bracing

You know, first days back to work are often slow. Wade through a hundred emails, catch up with the paperwork, make a few calls back to clients…

Come mid-afternoon, during a brief break and perusal of the local Metro newspaper a stunning article is discovered: Chris Hoy’s thigh width. Complete with a life size picture of the offending thigh being 9 inches across… (turns out this isn’t even at it’s widest point). Chris Hoy, if you didn’t happen to know, is the Scottish track cyclist Olympic gold medallist. He has thumpingly thick thighs (try saying that pissed up on ouzo).

This instigates an office-wide debate. Just how does this compare to our own middlingly maudlin masses of muscle?

In the pursuit of scientific study and pure break from office work… a full frenzy of thigh tape measuring begins. (Full girth – not just width).

Except nobody has a tape measure.

So necessity is the mother of invention, and rolls of sellotape are produced, and frantic taping of thighs ensue… with much posturing and sounds of stretching glue coated tape slapped on, and around, said bulging quadriceps.

Extracted lengths of tape are then measured in painstaking detail along borrowed plastic rulers.

Can you tell we’re having a busy day?

Even the boss has a go. So really, we’re all in this together. One guy comes in at a stunning 26 inches, followed by another at 24 inches and the boss coming in at 23.

As you can imagine, the double-entendre exclamations on taping, plastic binding, girth and manly muscle width has reduced me to a helpless puddle of laughter in a corner.

A wonderful back to work experience – and fabulously productive for the soul (if not exactly, the workload). Stuff the paperwork: sellotape’s where it’s at.

small steps

little steps, they say
to get through, to walk away
this ocean of feeling
shouldn’t I try swimming?
I haven’t swum for years
not felt these kind of fears
uncertain steps that sink
blurred like smudged ink
undefined, volatile crosswinds blow
pushing me, and yet the pull
of this tide
so wide
so deep

Leap
now,
jump the yawning hole
that threatens if you fall
to empty you
the giving fool
looking down, oblivion
inviting, giving in
seems so easier
than these little steps here…

left
then right
steal yourself tonight
and know that each footfall
will feel
more solid
more valid
more understood

Surefoot, I would
in tidal flood
not stumble now
knowing how

your own steps
equally faltering
perhaps,
are heading
the same way

Giving a damn

I’ve been away from the country for ten days.

I got back in this evening to find that in the space of five hours seven people have all mailed to ask how I am, how the trip was and that I was missed.

I’ll be honest, on the flight back home I was really quite down, for a few reasons besides the usual holiday blues, but having friends that give a damn about how you are, is one of the most precious things a person can have.

I am really thankful, and more than just a little bit touched by that.