slowly she turned

Well, it’s been a crazy week. I was lucky to spend the previous week with Edwina Bringle and a fabulous small group of fiber artists at Wildacres Retreat near Little Switzerland, North Carolina, but that post will be coming after I sweep out the brainpan.

“Be careful what you wish for,” as in when you don’t word it carefully for the djinn out of the bottle, was the phrase of the week. I was called in to the office of the assistant dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, who is the budget officer, on Monday morning. He came straight to the point – my position was being moved out of my department and I would be doing budget and financial work in another department. I did not have a choice because I “work for the state, not the department.” There was no recourse. The dean and the provost had made the decision and it was final. I was to move in three weeks.

The assistant dean handed me the position description with a list of its duties, and I have only been trained or had experience in half of them. I have no aptitude for accounting and my stress level and panic disorder doesn’t work with training for something like this. When I told him that I didn’t know how to do much of what was on the list, he said that his staff members and the current department assistant would train me.

Now, do keep in mind here that I genuinely believe that he was sad to be the one to tell me all this. As he pushed the box of tissues across the table, he said that he had argued against this move and that I was one of the best employees in the College. He’s correct. I’ve been in my position for nearly 20 years (in January) and had time to hone it along the way. I’ve won the Staff Excellence Award for the College twice, most recently during the pandemic. We shared some personal observations and I told him that I would need to confer with my co-workers and my husband and sleep on the decision, but for him to keep in mind that retirement was an option for me.

I already knew that I would not be forced into a job that I didn’t want and was not right for me.

Here’s what upsets me as much as anything – they did not bother to contact my supervisor first. The assistant dean told me that my department head knew, but my department head only had the vaguest impression that something was going to happen because the dean wouldn’t talk to him when he started asking questions the week before. This lack of communication and clarity and honesty from above has been one of the biggest sources of frustration in my job.

Anyway, my supervisor (K) and co-worker (D) are also two of my best friends. We have worked as a well-coordinated team for fifteen years. After I left the assistant dean’s office with a buzzing head, I walked a blind student to the building she was trying to find, which gave me a bit of oxygen and calm. Then I went straight to K, who was waiting anxiously to hear why I had been called over there. We were all gobsmacked and then I really broke down and cried.

Because it’s not just me. My job duties would be divided between them with no extra salary. Just as my “sideways shitty” move (as the assistant dean put it) would bring me no extra money. The faculty that we support would have to do more as we all adjusted to this sudden change because my co-workers would have no time to train in my job duties at this busy time of year, and the complicated bulk of my job happens from January through May. The students that I care for and guide through the bureaucracy of getting paid and moving through their degrees will suffer.

This is what working for an uncaring organization who has been tasked with running public education like a business is like. When the Republicans decided to drown Government in a bathtub, they weren’t concerned about the people in the tub. To them, “Government” is just some vague monster redistributing your money to undeserving people and grooming your kids to be gay and opening the borders to criminals coming over in hordes to rape your women and murder your kids and take your jobs. It’s not people.

But I did have a choice. There’s always a choice. Always.

On Tuesday morning, after meeting with my co-workers and department head to determine how to proceed, I called the assistant dean with this proposal: let me work in the department through June 30, the end of the fiscal year, and then take my position in a budget cut. That way I could train my co-workers in my job duties in the spring. He thought that was a reasonable and good response and he would take it to the dean and let me know this week if possible.

In the meantime, my co-workers went to the College annual meeting for grad directors and admins with our grad director in my place and they all informed everyone what had happened and challenged the associate dean in charge of the meeting (who, sadly, is also a friend, and I had already talked to him on the phone and cried for 15 minutes earlier that day) about what had happened.

I saw my therapist that afternoon, and she was the one who suggested FMLA – the Family Leave and Medical Act – to save my job and keep me from having to “play” sick if I was moved to the other department. Because when you have a mental illness, your sickness is not always believed, especially when you find yourself plunked down in a job in a department where nobody knows shit about you.

I wasn’t just doing this stuff, I was also racing against a deadline to get the Spring course schedule into Banner on Friday, since I had taken vacation the week before. It wouldn’t have been an issue had I not run into this emotional roadblock. However, I found it to be a leveling activity for me. This was data entry, pure and simple, with the decisions already made. It actually helped, I think.

Late Wednesday afternoon, I got a call from the assistant dean. The decision was to leave me in my current department until the end of the year, then my position would be moved to the other department on Jan. 1. A damned sight better than Oct. 9, but still wouldn’t allow me to train the others in my main job duties that happen January through May.

I told him to tell the other department that I would not be working for them, and that I would retire in four months and take FMLA leave as necessary.

K and I went to HR on Thursday morning and turned in my retirement request (it would have to be for Jan. 1, turns out) and the supervisor’s part of the FMLA paperwork to protect me in case the dean decided to renege on the Dec. 31 verbal agreement. I took the other part to my therapist that afternoon and she submitted her part.

They said I didn’t have a choice. It wasn’t the choice I was ready to make, but I did have a choice and I made it. DEATH AND ILLNESSES ARE THE ONLY CHOICES YOU DON’T HAVE. Your choice may have repercussions that are untenable to you, or that feel impossible, or may put you living under a bridge, or even be deadly, but other than death and illness you always have a choice. Never, ever, accept that you do not have a choice. This is something I realized many years ago, which is why I asked if I had any recourse, not if I had any choice.

I am VERY VERY VERY lucky that I had already been thinking intensely about early retirement and had met with a financial advisor and had done a ton of research on it. I was leaning toward sticking it out for a couple more years because my department has been extremely kind and flexible with me. My negative issues have always been with upper administration, not my department.

I will get my remaining vacation leave paid out to me. I will get my longevity bonus pro-rated. I will have the same medical insurance at the same or almost the same price. I will get a pension. I will probably file for Social Security. I will probably get a temp job or a part-time position. I will work on developing an art practice and career.

I’ll probably continue walking over to my old office and helping out and training my co-workers and friends, having lunch with them, and just sitting around and yakking. My friends on the faculty and I will still have lunch or have drinks sometimes after work. I’ll be invited to the parties. At least as long as the History Department exists, which at this time is a worry. I have made lasting friendships at work in the past twenty years.

Now, Slowly She Turned will turn into more of a web site for Slow Turn Studio pretty soon, and my blog will be pushed to the back of it. I may revive my Etsy shop, and/or I may set up shop here. I’ll probably post more to Facebook, Instagram, and Threads, which I generally do anyway. I’ve got ideas for items to sell. I’m starting to get excited about this unexpected turn of events. I will absolutely feel overwhelmed with the transition from time to time, but as I get over the shock and anger I will feel better and better. I’m sure of it.

And my focus on this blog will return to my real life, not my “job.”