After 11 years, I’ve formed a comfortable truce with my job. Over the years it’s been very frustrating, with a sometimes extremely heavy work load and on-again, off-again assistance.
But I’ve been here long enough that I can generally set my own hours — handy since our office move to a more distant location from home — and I have pretty much free reign on what I do… after all, I’m the only creative director here. As a non-profit organization, we rarely have enough money to accomplish what I want, but I’ve become a master of creativity for pennies.
My pay is low, comparatively speaking, but I am a single guy and only have to support myself and a few obsessions with gadgets, so things are okay; and the benefits are great — I’ll take lower than average pay with no-cost-to-me health insurance any day.
One of the newer benefits we’ve gotten took place today. For the last few years, just before our big annual conference, Gail the massage therapist comes in for the day. I just had my massage, and it feels like I’ve lost 20 pounds of stress. It comes at just the right time, what with the stress piling up from the election and the coming conference which we all run around insanely trying to get ready for.
Why do I only get a massage once a year? I’ve got to put this on my list, because I’d like to feel this loose and relaxed more often. Of course, it would mean less vociferous blog entries, but hey — it’s all about me, you know?
