Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Speed Post

I have a few minutes before I have to get ready to go to the café, and I haven’t posted for awhile. So I decided that I would just sit down and start typing, unedited, and write as much as I can about…whatever.

I lost an employee last week. This is the kid I have referred to as "the last piece of dead wood on the schedule." She was an eighteen-year-old with lots of issues, not the least of which was that her mother up and moved out of town without her scant months after she graduated from high school last June. She was pretty much given the choice to go with Mom and live somewhere she was not familiar with, with a man, by the way , whom she despised, or figure it out on her own. I’m mystified that a mother could just throw her kid to the wolves like that. Poor kid ended up shacking up with a boyfriend she had been seeing for only about a month. THAT relationship didn’t end well. And, since, she’s been casting about for SOMEWHERE to live, with SOMEONE, anyone…

Trouble is, she is just not mature enough to handle this whole mess. She can’t seem to buckle down and get the idea that she is going to have to work, full-time, and make money if she’s going to live on her own. She would complain that she couldn’t live on the number of hours I gave her, than totally flake out when I scheduled her for more than thirty hours in a week. She maxed out at about fifteen to twenty. Can’t really live on your own if you’re only bringing home about $200 a week.

I felt sorry for her, so I really tried to make it work. And she was one of those frustrating kids that could do the job when she wanted to, and unfortunately would do it once in a while, so the cat was out of the bag on that one. Nothing makes me crazier than someone who CAN do the job but, for whatever reason, WON'T. Anyway, her life "got unbearable," and she suddenly had to upsticks and move in with a relative, too far away to work HERE. Can’t say I’m sorry to see her go…but I did try to help her, and I always feel bad when I try to help someone and they aren’t helped. Which is how it works out 90% of the time, n’est ce pas?

Let’s see…I don’t even want to talk about the primaries. Neither party is advancing a candidate that is worth his/her weight in horse manure, so I just can’t go there. I keep telling myself that whichever one of the current cast of characters ultimately ends up on the throne, he/she can’t do as piss-poor a job as the current occupant. I keep telling myself that. Over and over. ::sigh::

The weather has been funky here in Ory-gun. The sun came out for a whole week (just in time…I was about to turn into a mushroom…) Since then, we’ve had snow, rain, ice, sun, often all within moments of one another. I guess it’s more exciting than the constant drenching rains we’d been experiencing since November. And I like snow well enough…it’s pretty and all. But it has been doing a number on the last few days of what had started out as a good business month. People stay home in droves around here when it’s snowy or icy. Which is just as well, because they can’t drive worth a damn in clear weather, much less in dicey conditions. We’ll still have a good month, but not as good as if the damn weather had cooperated for one more week

Oh, well, that’s all I have time for. Going to spell check, copy, paste and head for the shower. Have a great day, all!

7 comments:

  1. Business owner + social worker, huh?
    http://searchthesea.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  2. "Let’s see…I don’t even want to talk about the primaries. Neither party has is advancing a candidate that is worth his/her weight in horse manure, so I just can’t go there. I keep telling myself that whichever one of the current cast of characters ultimately ends up on the throne, he/she can’t do as piss-poor a job as the current occupant. I keep telling myself that. Over and over. ::sigh::"

    I hope whoever gets the job will have "good" staff and advisors.  Ideally few, if any, who have worked at the Whitehouse before.  Not this same old stuff and no ass kissers.  {Pardon that last phrase, not a usual part of my vocabulary.  This whole politics, especially federal has caused me to speak many words and prases I don't like to use, but nothing else covers what I mean.} Amber

    ReplyDelete
  3. xxooxxoo

    Sometimes it is sad to see if the bads ones leave....warm bodies are warm bodies.


    And then sometimes, well, it gets easier.

    I still love the snow.


    xxooxxooxxoo

    Who is gonna win the vote?

    ReplyDelete
  4. All you can do is the best you can. And it sounds like you did.

    I'm going to research how to cast a write in ballot. I suggest everyone else do the same. The biggest shell game of all is that we can only vote for the one's who qualify for the ballot. I don't know who I'll write in but we aren't helpless.

    Jackie.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sorry to hear about the employee but...as I was on my own at 17, and managed to survive without even moving in with anyone...I know it can be done.

    I'm glad Rudy lost in Florida, because I really disliked his arrogance in "not bothering with" the earlier races.  Sheesh!  

    Obama gives me hope...

    J

    ReplyDelete
  6. Ahhh...girlie needs some hardening to really "get it"...it's never easy, at first...for anyone...it shouldn't be.  Hopefully she learned something from you and your efforts.

    Candidates...bleh...completely hopeless.  I think we're all sensing that...and it's been the pattern, I think for quite a while. ;)  C.

    ReplyDelete
  7. ((((Lisa)))))  you didn't ask for hugs but I think you need them.

    FOCUS.  

    You did help the girl.  She didn't starve to death.  She at least had an opportunity to work and you showed her kindness in action.  ALL of that HELPED her.  Just give it time to sink in a bit.  She's not mature because she is an 18 year old child evidently raised by a huge member of the *me* generation.  She will grow up eventually and the lessons she learned from you will stay with her, long after she lives to regret her treatment of you.

    Politics do suck.  You are right whoever we get WILL BE BETTER than the idiot we have.  Hang onto that.  

    Weather is just weather.  I don't have anything to say to that.  Its gloomy here too.  I am just trying to focus on people instead.

    Take care Lisa.  The world is not such a bad place....YOU ARE HERE.  Makes it better for me.

    ReplyDelete