Tuesday, September 08, 2015

Eighteen years ago

Eighteen years ago tonight, I was laying out clothes and making lunch for my very first work day at Marquette University.

I'm still here.

The actual work has changed, and I haven't done any strictly accounting work in the last five or so years, but I'm hanging in here. It's not all that unusual: until just recently, the average employee in our office had about fifteen years in, with a few over the twenty-five year mark.

It's difficult to tell whether the longevity stems from contentment with the job or ennui. I do know finding similar benefits in today's career climate would be difficult (and you kind of hate to say in an interview that the benefit you most covet and appreciate is...additional time not working). The location, hours, coworkers and most of the work suits me (spending over an hour on hold with a certain government agency known mostly by its initials as I did today would be one of the parts that does not suit me).

University life is changing, though. The traditional, four year residential university is on a fast track to dinosaur-ville, the train only slowed a bit by the hordes of tenured faculty desperately clutching the rails. The nasty termites of political correctness are eating away at our nominally faith based foundations. It's most certainly not the same place as it was eighteen years ago.

Anyway, an anniversary is an anniversary. I may even bring doughnuts tomorrow.

After all, nothing says "I love and appreciate you" to your coworkers like putting them in a sugar coma.

4 comments:

melissa said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
melissa said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
melissa said...

Congratulations. That's something to be proud of. As my mom has always said, "Some folks just have that stick-to-it-iv-ness." :)

melissa said...

It appears my comment was so thrilling that Blogger decided to print it three times. Sorry for the mess.