Time to Change the Changing Times

This coming weekend, Europe will adjust the clocks forward by one hour as part of daylight saving.
As much as I like the change of seasons, I recognize how much I am affected, typically when it comes to my sleep patterns. Like almost every year, during the last couple of weeks before we set the clocks forward, I find myself frequently waking up before my alarm clock.  Two weeks ago, I was opening my eyes each morning about 30 minutes before 6am.  Last week, I was waking up an hour before 6, and these past few days, almost 1 1/2 to 2 hours before the alarm.

Most of the time, I try to roll over and go back to sleep.  Frequently, this works without any incident.  Other times, I toss and turn for 15 minutes or so before ultimately deciding to just get up and get on with things: starting the coffee, switching on the laptop, or whatever.

This is a normal process, and my body gradually acclimates, much the way it does when going through jet lag. However, things get more complicated when additional factors come into play, namely mental stress, but I find that the overall mentality of how I adapt to change is also very significant.  I am very good at beating myself up when things don't go the way I would like them go, even if such things are far beyond my control.  That actually adds to the stress levels, and in no time at all you can find yourself well and truly out of whack.

Regular readers (thanks, ihr beide!) might recall that last year about this time, I went through a particular rough patch of my life as I was overwhelmed by extreme stress levels that were work related.  Despite spending a lot of time though the rest of the year searching for ways to get back on balance, I might make the argument that I was only partially successful. 

Last year, I was finally more interested in making a job change, but now almost one year later, I am still continuing on as before.  Sure, I made some personal changes that enable me to find a better balance for myself, but I still find myself irritated with my complacency, both in professional and personal daily life.

Again, back to the "beating myself up" bit: it is easy to go round in circles, but somehow I have to keep asking myself the right questions, to keep challenging myself.  What do I want?  Where do I want to go?  How am I going to get there?

As rewarding as this exercise of self reflection is, it can be both physically and mentally exhausting.  I am not a naturally selfish person, but sometimes I have to remind myself who needs to be number one.  Sometimes I remind myself at the inappropriate time, which can have a negative impact on those people close to me, ones that I particularly care about, and those consequences also have to be dealt with.  Other times (erm, most of the time, as some friends would say) I prioritize work, which tends to skew the life balance, and has a particularly tough toll on physical and mental strength.

I mention this because these past few weeks, I have not slept all that well, partially because of the season change, but also because of the overwhelming amounts of things I have going on with work.  The project that we started last October has been a complete rodeo, and here six months later, it has not really gotten any more stable.   At the beginning of the project, my boss told us to try and hold on (Halte durch!) and spent a lot of time and effort trying to explain to upper management that their decisions were going to wipe out the ops guys (us) on the grounds that we were stretched to the point of breaking.  Anyone who is familiar with my career over the last 20 years already knows that one in my profession has to have a certain strength in which to work in this kind of environment.  Most everything gets pushed to us to deal with, to handle, and this is just unfortunately how it is.  However, there are only so many times that one can run (knowingly) into a brick wall at full speed head first before something, usually bad, will happen.

I have never underestimated my mental strength and have always managed to persevere, albeit at great expense to me, who is supposed to be the hero of this story.  One of the things that has helped me over the past few years is knowing that my boss was fully aware of the situation and went to great lengths to support me, if not to try and protect me from getting completely annihilated as a result of company decisions.  I wasn't alone in this: my boss does this for everyone on the team.

At the end of February, I was dismayed to find out that as a result of his efforts to defend our team and by trying to bring some common sense to the upper management on how the business should be handled, he was forced out of the business.   Talk about a kick in the teeth.

I must say, I was most unsettled.  Suddenly, the guy that was giving me a glimmer of hope and helping to motivate me to keep getting up each day and give my best effort to the difficult job at hand was ousted.  In an instant, the wind got taken out of my sails.  One isn't always fortunate enough to work for someone who is always so supportive, but in my career, I have had the experience twice. The first time was many years ago, when a guy mentored me into the repair operations business and helped set me on the right path to a successful career (pause while I remind myself that I have accomplished a great deal in these first 25 years of my working life, in multiple countries, languages and cultures).

If my first great boss helped me get my start, then this second guy helped provide the reassurance that my career decisions have been the right ones.  The industry I am in is not the easiest to work in, but it sure helps when your manager understands that already, and finds ways to get the most out of the team despite the challenges.  I am lucky that I have had that support, and am very grateful.  Vielen Dank, der Herr.

Alas, life without changes is impossible, and refusing to adapt to change is foolish and naive.  My new boss contacted us in early March to schedule some quick introductions via telephone.  When my time slot came up, we spoke for about 20 minutes about all the things you would expect to discuss in a brief initial conversation. We made plans to meet face to face during his upcoming trip to Munich, where our main offices are located.

As I mentioned in my last post, I was recently at the portrait studio to get an updated picture to use for my resume.  This was long overdue, and perhaps it was the change in bosses that prompted me to finally go and make the appointment.  The photo came out as good as you can expect when you have a face for radio, and last week I uploaded the digital version to my professional network profile.

During Kiosk Abend these past few Mondays, I have related the recent developments to the guys.  We regularly talk about various topics, including my trials and tribulations from work.  At the very least, it allows us to avoid talking about how shitty Arsenal and Eintracht seem to be playing in recent months.  This past Monday was no exception, despite the fact that two of the guys were away on holiday, leaving only Mono and me to contemplate the affairs of the world.  We chatted about complacency, change, goofy politics; in other words, just a normal Monday evening.  Suddenly, a rather attractive girl walked up to the kiosk and pulled a copy of Brigitte off the magazine rack hanging on the wall.   She held the magazine up to her face as her friend snapped a photo.  Turns out that the girl was on the cover of the recent issue.  (Brigitte is basically the German version of Cosmopolitan).  That was rather an interesting experience, and just goes to confirm that you never know what to expect in my little corner of Bornheim.  Very cool.

Of course, the girl hardly gave us a glance, but that was really no surprise.  Not all of us can be famous, even for a few minutes.

Mono and I finished up our beers around 10pm, like always, and as we headed off in our different directions, he wished me luck for my meeting on Wednesday morning with my new boss.

Tuesday evening, I tried to go to bed early, as I would have to get up at around 3h30 in order to take an early train down to Munich.   It was a good plan, but I had so much going on in my head that I could not sleep.  By the time I finally fell asleep, I was already worrying about oversleeping, or that maybe my alarm wouldn't go off and somehow I would miss my train.   From the beginning of this piece, you might remember that I have already been waking up about 4 or 4h30 these past mornings, but Wednesday I needed to be up even earlier.  Not only that, I had a head full of all the things I figured I would be discussing with my new boss, and that was on top of the all the other open "to-dos" I have sitting on my desk.

So, I did not sleep all that well Tuesday night, but I was up on time Wednesday morning.  The train ride is a little over 3 hours to Munich, and since I rather enjoy train travel, I was able to relax on the way down.  I scribbled some notes about what I wanted to talk about during my meeting, and enjoyed several coffees while I watched the countryside pass by.

I walked into the offices just before 9am, and was mildly surprised to find very few people already at work.  It has been almost two years since my last visit to our headquarters, and while part of me was looking forward to seeing some old colleagues, I was also a bit cautious and curious; there is a lot of new management (including my new boss) and I was not sure how they would react to me.

Fortunately, I knew my way around the place, and after getting a coffee, wandered around to see who was about the place.  Gradually, a few more employees arrived to work, and one or two did comment that they almost didn't recognize me.  Indeed, it had been awhile.

My appointment was at 10am, and when I found my boss (I had looked up his profile already, so I knew what he looked like) he remarked that he did not recognize me, saying that my own profile picture was different.   "Well, it was until about 3 days ago," I responded as I shook his hand.

Well, our discussion went ok, and I will remain as open and positive as possible in how things will play out next.   I did also get a chance to meet some of the upper management, including my boss's boss.  With nothing to lose, I certainly gave him the honest feedback when answering his question, "So, how are things going?"

One of the positives from the visit was simply being in contact with other colleagues.  This is something that I have missed over the years of home office.  That being said, I was still glad when I was packing up my laptop at 14h to head to the train station to return to Frankfurt.  Like always, I cut things a little bit fine, and had to sort of run to the U-Bahn stop around the corner from the office.

As I reached the platform, a local Bahn was approaching, and that was my train.  I did not have time to buy a ticket, so jumped on the train, hoping that I could buy a fare on board.  With Deutsche Bahn, there is a little feature for Bahncard holders which enables you to ride from your original destination to the final destination (effectively door to door, as far as public transportation is concerned).  However, there are some exceptions, including this particular train.

Riding "Schwarz" is an offense that has a pretty hefty fine in Germany.  The public transport system generally follows the honor system, and maybe only once a month do I ever get asked to show my ticket to the ticket checking guy.  (note - on the distance trains, they always check.  I am speaking here only about the local city transportation).  However, I never have ridden without purchasing a fare.  A friend of mine tended to be the exact opposite, he never bought a fare, and took his chances.  His best story was the time that he got caught without a fare, which meant he had to pay a fine of 40 Euros.  As he exited the train at the next stop, he was approached by an interviewer who paid him 40 Euros to relate his experience.  In his view, he broke even.

At any rate, I wanted to avoid any bad situation, so when I jumped on the little train, I saw the conductor, and went to him to ask about buying a fare.  He commented that it was not possible to purchase a ticket on the train itself, and I pointed out that I had a Bahncard and was entitled to ride as part of my overall route.  Of course, this looked a little silly because I was not yet at the Bahnhof,so had not yet purchased my train ticket for the return journey to Frankfurt.

With a little luck, the conductor let me off the hook and told me he would allow me to ride to the Bahnhof without a ticket, but next time, there would be no exception: the penalty is now 60 Euro.

Feeling a bit sheepish but fortunate, I rode to the train station, then bought my ticket for home.  I found a seat in the Bordbistro, and spent the next three hours reflecting on the day's events.  I arrived back to Frankfurt around 18h, and made a quick beeline to the pub.  Sure, I was tired, but needed a little end of day refreshment.  I figured I would have a couple, then head home for an early night. Indeed, it had been a long day, and I was tired.

OK, I stayed for more than two beers, but still was home early and went to sleep almost immediately after a little dinner.

Sure enough, I woke at 4am yesterday morning, managed to go back to sleep for awhile, then eventually got up just past 6. Logged on to work by 6h15 (about normal) and made it through the day. Late in the afternoon, I felt the impact from the long day and lack of sleep on Wednesday.  Thus, I had a kind of quiet evening at home, but looked forward to this morning, as it a personal vacation day; my last remaining vacation day from 2016 (we have to use up all the days before end of March of the following year).

So, how did I start my morning today?  You guessed it.  Woke up at 4am.  Back to sleep for a bit, and then out of bed around 6.

Now, I am finishing my 6th espresso and finishing up this post.  Despite the day off, I will (already have, actually) be doing some work, if only to catch up on all the things that I have not been able to get done this week.  One of the nice things about putting the out of office notice on your email is that people tend to leave you alone.  That way, I can actually get a few things done that require a bit of quiet concentration without interruption. 

Yeah, I may be an idiot for spending my free time catching up on job stuff, but I still get off on accomplishing things, and if I can help clear my plate, at least I have a few seconds to try and catch my breath before the next pile comes my way.

Besides, we are about to lose an hour, or perhaps better said, spring forward.  I will psych it up, get motivated, and move along with the change.  Forward.

see you out there
bryan

It Was Only a Coat and Tie

I was speaking to a friend last month, and we got to talking about our CV's and business networking.  She suggested that I update my photo on my profile of one of the sites that I use.  I made a mental note to schedule a session at the photo studio, and finally got around to doing that early last week: an appointment for Friday afternoon at 17h30.

So, as the workday was starting to wind down on Friday afternoon, I started checking the clock to allow myself enough time to shower, dress, and make sure that I could still knot my tie.   One of the advantages of working home office is that business casual takes on a whole new level.  One tends to put on the comfy stuff, and that may or may not include threadbare Clash t-shirts from circa 1986.  That is all well and good, and does a fine job in keeping the more professional business or formal attire in really good nick. This is pretty much my case, since most of my "good" clothing is either brand new, or still fresh from the dry cleaners.

I identified the shirt and tie I wanted to wear, and was getting ready to jump in the shower when my mom skyped me.  I quickly mentioned that I was a little short on time, to which my mother responded with an "OK," then launched into a little summary of all the happenings since we last talked together.  We spoke (or rather, she spoke, I listened) for a further 10 minutes, and then I had to interrupt her, "Mom, I have an appointment in half an hour.  We will continue another day, OK?"

I never like having to do that with anyone, and certainly not with my mother, but I was eagerto avoid showing up looking a little anxious and rushed when I got to the studio.   Fortunately, I took a speedy shower, dressed, and got the tie right on the first try.  My luck continued when I got to the U-Bahn, where the train arrived just as I was walking onto the platform.  Two quick stops later, I walked upstairs to Merianplatz and then the 100 meters to the studio. Right on time.

A friend of mine had suggested I use this studio for photos, and she actually accompanied me on my first visit some 7 years ago when I last had my CV photos done.  She brought along some helpers to make sure that I smiled during the photo session, and this is exactly what I was thinking about when sat down on the little stool.  A couple of years ago, I was at this same studio to get my passport photos done, but for those pictures, one has to look a bit more serious.   For CVs, one typically smiles, or at least looks more open and friendly.  I had to concentrate a little on not smiling too much, since the memory kept making me chuckle.

The photographer positioned  me and snapped a few dozen pictures, and then we sat down at the computer to finalize the photo.  We chatted a little bit about which photos looked the best, and then finally decided on a keeper.   She told me that she would have everything ready by Monday, I paid up, and that was that.  20 minutes total.

I had dinner plans with some folks, so headed back up the street, stopping off at the kiosk for a packet of ciggy.  The nice woman there gave me a smile and a bit of a compliment on my attire; I certainly don't normally dress like that when standing around at her kiosk on Monday evenings drinking beers with some friends.

As I approached the pub, I met some folks that I know sitting outside.  They, too, reacted a bit to my attire.  I quickly explained where I had just come from, then went on into the pub, where one of the staff immediately dropped a glass as she saw me.  She and I normally speak together in Spanish, and once again, I gave her the explanation I had given outside just a minute before, albeit in Spanish.

The working weeks so far in 2017 have not been particularly fantastic, but unlike in years past, I haven't been rushing into the pub as an escape from the unpleasantness of work, choosing rather to find other alternatives to simply pinting up to forget said troubles.   Thus, I am in the pub slightly less (if only just a smidge) than before. 

La chica got over her surprise at seeing me in different clothes and got me a beer, which I greatly enjoyed as an official start to my weekend.   A few minutes, my dinner companions arrived, and once they got over their shock at seeing me in a coat and tie, we walked down the street to the restaurant.

We sat down in the busy restaurant, and the waitress was particularly friendly to me, as pointed out by one of my friends at the table.  I tried to argue that it was only because I was being polite, and it had nothing to do with my attire, but the excuse sounded a bit feeble.

Dinner was quite tasty, but the restaurant had a second booking for our table, so at 20h, we paid for the meal, and headed back up to the pub for a usual couple of post-dinner drinks; our usual way of starting the weekend. 

The pub was much much fuller upon our return, due in part to the rugby match being shown on tv, but mainly simply because it was a Friday evening.   We had run into a few folks walking down the street as we made our way back to the pub, and I had assumed that the reason that the child who accidentally rode their scooter into a potted plant on the sidewalk did so not because of their surprise to see me dressed up, but rather because they were still somewhat new to scooter riding.  True, the child's parents paid me a compliment on how I was dressed, but beyond the father's raised eyebrows and the mother's "gosh, you look nice," I did not think it was that big of a deal.

However, the reception I got in the pub from not only the bar staff but everyone else I happened to know came as a surprise.  True, I was rather flattered, but felt a bit sheepish; perhaps I should have removed the tie and changed shirts prior to going to dinner.   On the other hand, it felt sort of good to be smartly dressed, and I was rather pleased that I had not gotten any duck sauce on my white shirt or my tie. 

Through the remainder of the evening, the compliments continued to come, but I was glad to be brought back down to earth when a late coming friend said, "what happened to you?" as he got his Äppler from the barmaid.  It wasn't an unfriendly thing to say, it was simply his way of noting that I was dressed out of character.   We laughed a little as we remembered the last time either one of us had actually dressed up; we had both been at a wedding a couple of summers ago.

Na ja.  As usual, the time came to pay up and go home and tumble into bed.  I carefully removed my coat and tie (as carefully as one can when things are bit fuzzy after several pints) and fell asleep with a little smile on my face. 

I will likely remember the evening every time I log on to my business networking account, but that isn't a bad thing at all.

See you out there, in whatever you happen to be wearing.

bryan