Twenty-Five Years? Only Feels Like Yesterday...

Well, another two or three week gap, but I'm back again. This time I'm waiting around until the monthy office birthday party (with cake, no less, from Costco) so that I can receive my 25-year service pin from the Boss.

I actually hit the 25-year mark last month, but because of my vacation in New England, I wasn't able to be here to take advantage of it. Now there are three others scheduled to get pins who actually have been here longer, if you can believe it, so some of the bloom, as they say, is off the rose.

Still, 25 years is a long time to be working in the same place. Even longer when you've been doing what I do, day in and day out, same old, same old, just about every minute of it. Most folks probably would have slit their wrists by now, left for greener pastures or have been found by the janitorial staff one night stiff with rigor mortis. I still basically enjoy what I do, with some exceptions, but I'm mainly staying because of (a) the paycheck, (b) the health insurance and (c) the retirement package.

Every once in a while you read something in a magazine or a newspaper about someone who swears up and down with a straight face that their work IS their passion and "Going to work just doesn't seem like work" to them. Now, IF I had one of those jolly souls in front of me, I'd probably kick 'em where it hurts, since they've managed to depress a lot of folks who are probably playing the lottery every week just hoping to win big and tell the Big Boss where he can put that low-paying, soul-sucking job. That's the wonder of our American Dream: Yes, you TOO can work at a job you hate while others brag about a job that they just absolutely love to get up in the morning and drive through Rush Hour traffic to get to.

Now my father-in-law has put it all into perspective for me, as he's been telling me the last few years since he's retired that the last few years of MY job will seem like going down a slope on a Teflon-coated pair of skis. Unfortunately, so far it feels more like I've been Super Glued to the floor of Death Valley.