Music: Above and Beyond's "We Are All We Need"
11:20a
I've said it before and I'll say it again: I really hate Mondays. Mondays are not my friend. I don't get that after-three-days-of-working-sleep anymore. I might as well stay up all night for all the good it does me. I'm never in the best mood on Mondays. So why today? In what can only be described as the weirdest weekend I've ever experienced in the three years I've been at this warehouse, I should be....happier. I got my first real feel of what my new boss expects from us. As long as you're current on your tasks, that's all he asks for. Friday left me in charge of three docks, running full speed. Flow had 5 doors, B shipping had 8, B receiving had 17. If I hadn't been allowed to have an RR, or if I didn't have that lady helping me verify labels, I don't see how I'd have kept my numbers down. Top that with setting primes and running to the office every 5 minutes for people running out of slots, and it was a full plate. Running three docks, and it never came to a point to where I had to ask for backup (which we had none anyway). I wasn't as tired at the end of the day as I should have been. So I decided to keep tabs on everything going on the next couple of days.
Saturday was more or less laid back. Two docks running this time, and by three that afternoon, everything was pretty much shut down. Not a lot to do. Boring.
Peaceful.
Yesterday was slow. By slow, I mean wanna-gouge-your-eyeballs-out boring. And those that know me know that I hate not having anything to do. Makes for a long day, and that's exactly what it was. I had only one dock (see a pattern here?), and by lunch time most of receiving was gone. Only 20 trucks, which meant a quick day for them. Once I had every door shut down, I took off on my lift, looking all over the warehouse in various slots, trying to find lost freight. I came up empty. I took a late break, then took off to help Mr. John try to find his missing labels. I hid myself on D dock, and I didn't really need to. I even got to talk to my boss for a bit. Gave me some wise advice anyone can use: sometimes you have to sift through the dirt to find the gold. Meaning, if you want something, you have to dig for it, work hard for it. And don't give up. I could tell anyone what I learned, but I know who would and who wouldn't take that advice.
After hanging out with Mr. John and having some good laughs, we decided we'd done all we can do, and after everything that happened with the last boss, can you blame us for our hesitation to go down to the office?? I REALLY didn't feel like doing strays, RR or not. So once we finally got down there, my boss takes our reports and says perfect, not to worry, he's got it. Wow. Old boss would have yelled and demanded we get our asses back out there and look harder. All verifiers were then turned loose for the night. And I finally figured out the answer to my question. So why wasn't I so tired? Answer: no stress. You take stress out of the equation, and you'd be amazed by how fast things change. I wasn't under any stress this weekend. I had no idea just how much it was dragging me down, why I'd felt as if I'd been run over by an 18-wheeler after every week. I'm not saying it's going to last: things are changing fast, and come February, everything will be different. I'll worry about it when the time comes.
So I'm happy I'm getting to leave early, it's still daylight outside! I go up front and I'm talking to my friend in AP, and saying have a good night. Once out the door and I see the car and I'm thinking oh my God poor thing is caked in mud but who cares I'm free!- and I hear my name. It's my friend from AP. The same guy who cut me a break when I was testing for my PE license two years ago. He took me aside and said how proud of me he was, how I'd kinda moved up now that I had my RR. He told me he was glad I'd made it as far as I had, and how I should maybe consider moving up, like AP. I did say I was keeping all options open at this point, and said how it'll be three years in a couple of weeks. He told me keep it up, and he even shook my hand. He brought back memories of when I was trying to get a handle on driving a PE (and the times I crashed into a pole, the firewall, the tier racks..).
I guess what I'm trying to say is that the past three years have been up and down; difficult at times, even impossible, but I'm still standing. There's been fun times, too, of course. Times I never would have had, had I stayed at that store. I'm not planning on going anywhere anytime soon. I'll be free soon, to move and explore other options if I wish, or just stick to my original plan and go back to hauling. I have only a few weeks left to really think about it, then I have to make my move.
For now, I'm proud of how far I've come and what I've accomplished.
Only time will tell the rest....
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