Monday, November 19, 2012

ACK What a DAY

Today is a short week at work, thank heavens.  I had to terminate an employee last week and while I believe it was the right decision I am still wishing I had been given a chance to rehabilitate her as an employee.  Well, there was too much of a disconnect between what the rest of my team felt and what I thought we could do and as a supervisor I have to think of what is good for The Whole. 

Terminating her means I am down one person.  I am also losing someone next week who is being promoted (I am proud of her.  I helped her practice her interviewing techniques and I am sure she will do well in her next assignment.) and I have another permanent employee on vacation through the middle of December (she is visiting her family in Mexico and I wish I was visiting my family in Cabo San Lucas...Yes, I know I have no family there but let's pretend).  I may also lose my agency temp unless I can get her extended long enough to hire two more people AND get them trained.

Does anyone wonder why my headaches are coming back?

Actually, I am doing fine with all this stuff.  Change is what fuels my brain cells and gets my creative juices flowing.  I am surrounded by good people.  We will do fine.

Tonight I am teaching on the Rediscover the Catechism Series ( I wanted to name it The School of The Rock or This is Not Your (Baltimore) Catechism but I was overruled).  Last time I was given a really easy topic - God the Father - so this time I was hoping to be given something simple.  Maybe I could explain Nuclear Fusion or describe what is inside a superball (does anyone remember superball?).  Instead, I have been handed the task of taking people through the section covering The Four Marks of the Church:

One
Holy
Catholic
Apostolic

What intrigues me about this section is the number of allusions to the sanctity of the priesthood within The Church.  Never having been one of those people who thinks women are missing out on power by not being ordained priests (I can think of nothing more difficult, nothing more frightening or nothing more murderous than being a Catholic Priest.  Talk about total self sacrifice...you can have it.), I have found this section thrilling in its explanation of Christ as Bridegroom and The Church as Bride.  I am hoping that I can get across to the faithful tonight how important each and every person is within The Body of Christ.  I hope they can hear how much they matter.

Meanwhile, I will be making the supreme sacrifice by being there to teach while my beloved Niners battle the Bears. 

St Bill Walsh, pray for us.

1 comment:

Robert said...

Leslie,


We got the notice for "voluntary" separation last week, and will probably lose ~160 people before April. The numbers for Livermore Lab are worse, 400-800 people. A lot of the young people have taken to wearing suits and ties in the last week. I get migraine headaches, but they are usually a combination of weather, food or a straight up inside job. Not many any more; after I quit coffee they went down by a factor of 10.


Thermonuclear fusion that occurs non-terrestrially is pretty simple, hydrogen plus lots of gravity. It gets more complicated here on earth.


I love the subject you were given to teach!


Robert