Friday was a tough one.
My final clearance arrived last Saturday, and on Tuesday I agreed a start date for my new job with the National Archive. I've been sitting on this for the last month, waiting for the clearances to go through, and it's not always been easy carrying on like nothing was happening, making plans that won't ever be realised, at least not by me.
It took a couple more days for the stars to fall in to alignment, at least, for my manager to be back in the office, and then the deed could be done. I handed my notice in. After 8 years in STM publishing (science-technical-medical), and 3 and a half at BMC (give or take a sabatical), I'm off and out in to the rest of the really real world.
It's a great job, great prospects, a huge challenge. It's not so much a step out of my comfort zone, more taking it apart with a Polaris missile. And yet I know this is the right move because at no time have I ever experienced any hesitation about taking it on. I have more trouble deciding what pants to wear in the morning.
None of which made telling either my team, or my friends there any easier. Judging from the looks on their faces, this was not expected. I've been on the flip side too many times not to know the score, smiley congratulations on the outside, feeling righteously pissed off on the in. Still, as Bryan said, there's never a good time to leave, but at least this is the least bad time. I still felt a little guilty though.
OR has been my baby. I may not have been there at conception, but I carried it, gave birth to it, nurtured it, and watched it grow. I was there when it took its first steps, when it said its first words, and watched it blossom into something none of us ever expected, beautiful and amazing.
But now, I'm afraid, mummy and daddy don't love each other any more, even though we still love the children. We'll remember Christmas and birthdays and we'll still talk, we just won't be seeing each other as much.
And if that duck outside keeps on quacking like it's doing, it's going to end up in a fucking sandwich.
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