Culture shock

So for the first time in several years, I'm working again. For the first time in even longer, I'm working for a hotel again. Culture shock is the only way I can really describe it, to be honest. Even at my busiest at Alyeska, I never worked this hard, or this long. My life has changed dramatically in the past two weeks, and I've yet to decide if this is a great thing, or a terrible thing.

Lets start with the fact that I'm now only a weekend wife. My job has me living in a different state from my husband, and he makes the two hour drive every weekend to see me. Once he gets here, I find myself working through half of the time he's here, leaving him to his own devices, or to hang around my office and feel like he's in the way. Let's not forget, that for at least the next month, I'm living in one of the hotel rooms until the owner vacates the apartment his family is in next month, and I can move in there. When he leaves on Sunday evening, it feels like he's leaving on deployment again, and I'm a weeping wreck for the rest of the night. Well, at least it's been like that the first two times he left...we'll have to see if saying goodbye every week gets any easier.

I've been working twelve to fifteen hour days, nearly every day of the week since I got here. No day off yet. Compare this to the unemployed, I'll-clean-the-house-at-my-own-pace-thank-you-very-much life I led just two weeks ago, and you'll probably get an idea of just how tired I am. I come to my room every night, too tired to eat dinner, too tired to walk the dogs, too tired attempt any meaningful school work (yes I'm still attending college classes online), too tired to clean my room, or do anything but sit there and rub my aching feet. I want to call my husband, and talk to him a little before I pass out, but good Lord, I'm almost too tired to carry on a conversation at this point. We talk for a few minutes, or we just text each other good-night and hope to find time to talk about each other's days and lives tomorrow. I miss him a lot, especially at night. But I do this for our future. So that we can save money to buy a home and live comfortably before I get too old to do jack-all.

Then there is the atmosphere at the hotel itself, which is another kind of culture shock. My boss is great. We get along, I respect her a lot, and she's a fair, no-nonsense type of lady. Aside from that, everything seems to be in chaos all the time. No matter how well planned something might be, something unexpected makes a mess. It's enough to make me crave a cigarette for the first time in years, and that makes me a sad panda.

Well, I've worn myself out just talking about work. It's 7 a.m. Sunday morning, my husband is fast asleep in bed, while I'm drinking coffee number two, and obsessing about work. I think I'll go crawl back in with him for a little while.

America...sigh

I'm an American, born and bred. As time marches by however, I'm less and less inclined to feel proud of that fact. All over the media outlets of the country, the political rhetoric is heating up and people are being pulled in different directions. America has become one giant Jerry Springer show - we're just waiting for the chair-throwing to start and we all have ringside seats.

I think it's totally preposterous that multi-billion dollar corporations such as General Electric, Verizon, and Federal Express should not pay taxes, because, as their CEO's claim, "it's perfectly legal" not to. Meanwhile, our wonderful Republican base has decreed that tax breaks to these big corporations will help to keep them hiring people.

Except they're not hiring. They just give bonuses to all their already high-paid executives for getting the job done and making a profit with the staff they already have. Why take on new employees when they can make a metric crap-ton of money without them? I've worked for big companies before. That's what they do. They continually, year after year, brainstorm ways to make more money than the previous year. When there are no fresh ideas forthcoming, they start eliminating positions and paying one person to do two other people's jobs, thereby still showing a profit.

Then the oil companies, which is a whole issue all by itself...

But I digress. Right now, my husband and I are thinking about making use of his dual citizenship with Canada and heading north when the Army spits him out for good. Some people might say the grass is no greener on the other side of the border. Sure, every country has it's issues, but Canada seems to have no problem with making sure their poor don't starve to death, or live in a cardboard box under a bridge, or die of some hideous disease because they're poor. Canada's rich are still rich, and the poor are still poor. But everyone has a place to live, food, and some semblance of health care. Not sure why that's so hard to do on this side of the fence, but hey....at least the rich over here don't have to look at us poor folk and have their consciences nudged.