Work

Work is sucking me dry right now. I teeter on the edge between bone-deep weariness and the verge of tears the whole time I'm there. I haven't even had much time to goof off and get online, so I'm busy straight through most days. Trying to figure out where someone who has absolutely zero financial resources can live. Trying to rearrange a court date for someone who got caught with stems in her purse (for the drug-dumb, I just learned stems aren't the shwaggy part of weed, but the pipes out of which you smoke). Trying to figure out the appropriate consequences for someone who lies and manipulates her way into tying me in knots. Honestly, the first two aren't that big of a deal, but the third stresses me out beyond belief. Plus, I'm worried that it's going to affect my six-month eval and raise.

And then I have to stop and think about something a co-worker told me today. She was at a baseball game with a family I help. The family were given tickets to the VIP box suite that the team owner was using that game. The children (teens and pre-teens) were enchanted with the game, the suite, the amazing spread of food. Towards the end of the game, the dessert tray was brought up. It was piled high with tantalizing desserts, manned by a ballpark employee. The twelve-year-old daughter took one look at it, and said rapturously to the employee, "how much do you love your job!?" The woman looked quizzically, and wearily, at the girl, and no one in the suite spoke, uncertain what was going on. Then the girl continued. "You get to make people happy every day!"

Later, as the family was thanking everyone at the end, the same girl said to my co-worker, "This was the best vacation ever!" When my co-worker was telling me the whole story, she couldn't keep the tears out of her eyes.

So I guess you just have to have perspective.

Except? Fuck perspective sometimes. This story, and this woman and family, make me happy, but work is still so hard these days.