Thursday 13

(Link in meme-roll)
People I Miss That Used to Work With Me
(the first 5 are from this list, but the rest are people at previous jobs)

1. Weight-and-Exercise Man. He now works as a branch manager of a library in the Los Angeles area. He's such a great guy. Work just hasn't been the same since he left 7 years ago.
2. ILL Tyrant. She's kind of the reason I came up with this list. She now works one state north and east of here, but her in-laws are still here in town. So she's back in town visiting this week and we all met her for dinner and drinks tonight after work.
3. Mrs. Kiddie Lit. She and ILL Tyrant are still good friends. I miss her organizational skills as well as her enthusiasm and love for all the kids, regardless of age.
4. V. She's been gone (i.e., dead) for three years now, but her desk is still referred to as "V's desk." She was an excellent role model, and just a lot of bawdy fun.
5. Irish Laughter. The previous children's librarian who only was with us a year. She was seriously funny and loud. I mean, she literally could make anything humorous. Just a joy to work with.
6. Kim (see below). She was a complete emotional train wreck: teenage parent whose first child didn't quite die of SIDS, but survived with tremendous brain damage that caused chronic, severe medical problems. She & her husband had no money, she'd been sexually abused by her father, and the last I knew about her, she was intent on destroying her marriage by dint of addiction. I would love to know what happened to her.
7. Naomi was my library mentor. I did an internship with her while I was in library school, and it was not at all her fault that I ended up running away from going down the children's librarian path. She introduced me to volunteering at at soup kitchen with probably changed my life and got me back on the God track--though that was not her goal.
8. Álvaro was one of my profs in college and also my boss at my campus job. He was just a really good man. What learned from him is rather hard to grasp; the only specific life-lesson I remember him trying to impart was not to wear the same clothes (including shoes) two days in a row or they'll wear out faster. They need to breathe for 3-4 days between wearings.
9. Pastor Dan. I worked for him for a couple of summers while in college. He was in charge of Christian Education at my church, and I was supposed to organize all the childcare/Sunday School/VBS plans. I survived, but I don't know how. He was a fun guy, not at all pastoral (and in fact he only lasted in the job another year or so after my last summer) and in the midst of a sad divorce the second summer I was there.
10. Rocky was one of the secretaries at church the summers I worked there. She was very kind and patient with me.
11. Nora was my assistant for VBS one summer. She was probably about 30, with two preschool children and expecting another. I don't remember the details, but I remember her calling me one night to say that she'd miscarried--I hadn't known she was pregnant--and my feeling of incomplete awareness that she was my first "grown-up" friend.
12. Shari was the sister of a boy I'd had a crush on most of my life. We both worked as shelvers at my public library. She helped me get through the crushingly dull parts of the job and made those parts even slightly fun.
13. Yvette (? I think) was the oldest of the candy-stripers at the hospital where I volunteered for a couple of years. We used to sit at the front desk on our shift--there were usually 3 or 4 of us there--and as she was a few years older than me, I and the other "baby stripers" would hang on her every word. Like having the coolest big sister ever, with none of the angst.

It is perhaps not very odd that the ONLY person from my first full-time job I could think of is Kim, who started working there about 6 months before Sparky was born. That place was so totally dysfunctional that by the time I left after 6 years there was, literally, no one else there I ever wanted to see again. I know I must have had fun there on occasion, but in general all I remember is endless insomnia and crying jags for the first four years, and then after Sparky was born, having a full-blown anxiety attack at the thought of going back. I did go back, but only for about 15 months.