Welcome to the 40 Hour Work Week

The subtitle of this new life chapter could be How The Time-Space Continuum Is Relative. …

Or, maybe it should be a question? How Relative Is The Time-Space Continuum?

Or, maybe it should be declarative, as in The Time-Space Continuum IS relative!

Regardless, it could be a subtext if not a subtitle to the last 18 months.

I don’t think that I have worked a 40 hour work week… maybe ever? (I don’t know if I am bragging or ashamed!) If I did, it was so long ago that it doesn’t count. Or, maybe it counts, but since I can’t remember, it doesn’t really matter? Maybe it really really just doesn’t matter even now that I really am working 40 hours a week…?

Really!!! A solid, counting-the-minutes 40 hour work week. If you had asked me 6 months ago, I am sure that I would not have been able to come up with the work scenario I am living. It is a 180’ change from what I have lived for the last however whatever. What I’m doing is actually diametrically opposed to what a young therapist, a fluff-and-buff pooh-pooher from waaaaaaaaaay back could have imagined. Oh! How far I’ve come to come all the way back to nowhere I would have ever expected! Spa work?????!!? Egads! Even the thought was a visceral “NO!”

Fast forward…. I turned 57 a couple of days ago. A little late to be starting this business, yet right on time. And if not now, when? It’s really kinda sweet. I have managed to plop myself into a pretty nice situation where my transition is supported not only by fate, but by people like you and a new crew of characters on an island that either welcomes you with loving arms or spits you back to wherever you came from. ( I kid you not!)

I would bore you with the nitty-gritty details of how I spend the bulk of my work day doing grunt work, which might include such menial tasks as making sure that the towels are correctly rolled and the hemlines on the sheets match, that there are 2 flowers or one depending on the number of guests, that the linens are at “par”, but I won’t. I could tell you about how I have been doing around 2 sessions a shift and will begin working on my own today (!!!), but I won’t.

Weren’t we talking about time?

Time. Last year was a great training for the way time runs in this place and a lesson on how I run on my own timing. Before last year, I was wondering whether I could actually be retired, if I would get bored if I weren’t working… The answer is “yes” to the first question and “no” to the second. It just so happens that I am particularly suited to piddling and wondering where the time goes. Time is slippery for me, always has been, and this place is like living in a Las Vegas casino. I never have any idea what day it is (my weekend is a Friday and Saturday, my Monday is a Sunday), what time it is, if I’m where I’m supposed to be. Luckily my wrist watch will be here soon. Maybe that will be enough of a tether to keep me tied to someone’s schedule…

So, is time relative? Yes, I think so. And, I am happy to say that I am enjoying how I’m spending it these days whether on the clock or off. I recommend slowing down even or especially as things seem to be speeding up. Your time is yours and this ain’t your momma’s time anymore. Time to find your own rhythm. Time to make it your own!