How Was My Last Day of Work?
I feel as if I've been blogging about leaving my job forever, so I'll be as brief as possible. It was fairly uneventful. I mean, my boss wasn't in, his boss wasn't in. . . everybody showed up late and didn't feel like working. I didn't feel like working, either, but I did have to wrap up a couple of things.
Made one last tiny dent in the impossibly huge document generation project--I estimate there were still over 90 left to do (over 1/3 if you've been keeping track). I tried, and had little help to work on it, so that's what I was able to do in between training and meetings. Noted the outstanding items of work on a sheet and left a packet, including all my training notes (i.e., who was shown what, so they can't deny it), for the boss so he'd be up to speed.
Some co-workers took me to lunch, which was very nice of them. Twelve were supposed to go, but we ended up with eight. Out of the eight, two were from my department, which is the largest department in the company. Two more were supposed to come, but when one backed out to go to the doctor, the other one followed suit. Weird. But I enjoyed the little party.
When I got back from lunch, I saw I had an e-mail from the person who went to the doctor. Asking if we could meet to discuss anything else about my responsibilities I needed to tell her. Oh, come on. I've trained you every day for the past week. I don't like the insinuation that I've been holding out on anyone, and I don't have time to shoot the breeze for two hours because someone doesn't feel like working. I packed up my things in a hurry--and God bless the smart Office Services person who came up with the clever idea of packing my Bookends poster in a big overnight envelope so it wouldn't get wet. (I've had that poster since 2004--guess I've always had books on the brain.)
At 2:30 I was called into a conference room where angel food cake, strawberries, and a nice card awaited me, along with just about everyone in the office who came to wish me well. I explained a little more about what I was doing--and dude, the librarian stereotypes were in overdrive. If I had a nickel for every librarian stereotype thrown at me in the past two months, those school loans would be well on their way to being paid off.
The person who went to the doctor's arrived right at the tail end of the cake-eating and stereotype-destroying. She sat right down at her desk and made phone calls. I was looking to start saying my goodbyes so I could bail before five and avoid any parking lot weirdness. Any further parking lot weirdness, anyway. Finally, she came over, and said she just wanted to touch base with me and make sure there wasn't anything left I had to tell her. I said nope, I've shown you everything and we're done. All she had left to say after that was, "Good luck." One down, a few more to go.
It had started raining after lunch. I took my copier paper box of personal possession out to the car and got my umbrella. Came back in, said some goodbyes, turned in my access card and file cabinet key (my office door has no lock), and walked out.
No tears, no looking back. I feel good about how I left. And I have bigger things to think about. I have to figure out what I'm going to pack for lunch Monday.
Made one last tiny dent in the impossibly huge document generation project--I estimate there were still over 90 left to do (over 1/3 if you've been keeping track). I tried, and had little help to work on it, so that's what I was able to do in between training and meetings. Noted the outstanding items of work on a sheet and left a packet, including all my training notes (i.e., who was shown what, so they can't deny it), for the boss so he'd be up to speed.
Some co-workers took me to lunch, which was very nice of them. Twelve were supposed to go, but we ended up with eight. Out of the eight, two were from my department, which is the largest department in the company. Two more were supposed to come, but when one backed out to go to the doctor, the other one followed suit. Weird. But I enjoyed the little party.
When I got back from lunch, I saw I had an e-mail from the person who went to the doctor. Asking if we could meet to discuss anything else about my responsibilities I needed to tell her. Oh, come on. I've trained you every day for the past week. I don't like the insinuation that I've been holding out on anyone, and I don't have time to shoot the breeze for two hours because someone doesn't feel like working. I packed up my things in a hurry--and God bless the smart Office Services person who came up with the clever idea of packing my Bookends poster in a big overnight envelope so it wouldn't get wet. (I've had that poster since 2004--guess I've always had books on the brain.)
At 2:30 I was called into a conference room where angel food cake, strawberries, and a nice card awaited me, along with just about everyone in the office who came to wish me well. I explained a little more about what I was doing--and dude, the librarian stereotypes were in overdrive. If I had a nickel for every librarian stereotype thrown at me in the past two months, those school loans would be well on their way to being paid off.
The person who went to the doctor's arrived right at the tail end of the cake-eating and stereotype-destroying. She sat right down at her desk and made phone calls. I was looking to start saying my goodbyes so I could bail before five and avoid any parking lot weirdness. Any further parking lot weirdness, anyway. Finally, she came over, and said she just wanted to touch base with me and make sure there wasn't anything left I had to tell her. I said nope, I've shown you everything and we're done. All she had left to say after that was, "Good luck." One down, a few more to go.
It had started raining after lunch. I took my copier paper box of personal possession out to the car and got my umbrella. Came back in, said some goodbyes, turned in my access card and file cabinet key (my office door has no lock), and walked out.
No tears, no looking back. I feel good about how I left. And I have bigger things to think about. I have to figure out what I'm going to pack for lunch Monday.
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