I passed the one year mark with my current job three days ago. It’s rather hard to believe it has been a year already. When you look back at a year, you tend to compress the time into a much smaller frame of mind, making it seem like it went by quickly. But in fact, a lot has changed. Even looking back ten years ago, in this same date range, my old Pontiac’s alternator died coming back from Holyoke Mall when I lived in Massachusetts while hanging out with my high school friends. It’s interesting to look back at those years, thinking about what you could have done, should have done, would have done. If I had one glimpse of the future back then, I would have changed a lot of things. Perhaps that is what makes the future scary, because in another ten years, lord knows what else will have happened. In the span of ten years, I’ve gone to hell and back, through rough jobs, rough relationship issues, apartments, marriage, buying a house, and more. The next ten will likely be filled with children, more jobs, and whatever else.

I guess that is why I am always nervous about a great deal many things. It’s easy to sit in meetings and listen to your co-workers talk about projections, goals, and the sort of work we hope to accomplish in the company, because the people pitching it are talented individuals who have put their years in and know their stuff. I’ve been involved with computers since I was a kid, but only professionally for maybe five or six years now. I feel like I can accomplish more, but at the same time I am afraid to step forward. Even when I try to speak up and talk about things, I feel the weight of the room shift to me so as to say “You’ve only been here a year. You cannot possibly know what you’re talking about.” That’s probably a gross over-reaction, but I’m used to working in places where I get little to no feedback about my job performance, what I am doing, and where I am going. This company is, however, one of the first that actually discloses where it is going, and breaks down the financials to actually show me how we’re doing. It’s a stark contrast to my last job that hid its true financial status until it was too late for us. I like who I work for, and I sincerely hope I can be here next year, and the year after that, and three more years after that. I haven’t been with a company longer than six years, the last longest-running tally from when I worked for Highland Park in high school.

I know I’ve made many mistakes in the past, but I am trying to push forward. I am trying to climb alongside everyone else, and it can be tough, with so many other things to do, emotions to balance, and other people to watch for. At the same time I am slowly trying to change who I am. I don’t want to be who I am now, but change is difficult, and not something I can handle easily. I don’t have many friends and not much of a social life. I burned the most strategic years of my life making up for my lack of a social life in high school, and it’s something I regret often. I don’t want to go back to nights at Denny’s and road trips, but I want to be able to have adult friendships with people, without pretense. Maybe that comes easier with kids, no idea.

The climb is hard. 🙁