HE GOES OR I GO - AND WHY I HAVE TO GO

I have spent the last few hours in my house watching a movie and drinking coffee. Life is too slow for me! I cannot concentrate on work, and earlier I tried to post but couldn’t find any inspiration!! Is this how people get completely fed up with their lives they have to force a change??

This week it became clearer why I want out of my current job!! It’s an old song I know, but everyone has sang it at one point! Anyway, mine goes like this:

A while back, we were taken over by one of those copy cat types, who has somehow perfected the art of covering up his inadequacies and sound like a pioneer. This is a guy who took our workplace and turned it on its head, then sat by like the rest of us waiting to see what would follow.. You know when you are going along happily enough (sure, things could be better) when some guy comes along and shouts

‘God, how can you guys take this? '

You think ‘How dare he? Who does he think he is??!!?’

‘You are really not serious!!’ Is he sneering??

You think ‘Now look here a minute...’

’Infact, if I were you, I would never stand for this!!’ he interrupts

You are stunned into silence. This guy is too obnoxious for words. Where does he get off?

Weeks and weeks and many replays later:

‘I know a better way’

Resigned. Worn down. Cowed.

‘Fine… What do you suggest’ you mumble.

Enough encouragement!

In he sweeps with changes, reforms, overturnings, turnarounds, can he pull it off? Wait for it – waiiit, stalling, stalling, revs, revving, can he do it, can he??

WAIIIT

AAAND

HE DOES!! Ululating!! Loud cheering. Applause all around.. Was that a cat call? Wow. The entire staff united as one undulating organism behind him. The man of the moment! What a visionary! What a guy!!

Ohhhhhh...

So, the morning after.

Still trying to recover from the triumph of the day before, we all slowly get back to work. We step into a new life. The students turn to us. We turn to the man. Expectant.

Wait. Rewind and come again.

We turn to the man. We wait. We expect. We -

Where is he?

He has left me a little note:

Hi, have to dash to Austria, then I’ll be on to Australia. You can handle things while I’m away can’t you? I am looking so forward to my trip. 10 WHOLE days!! (I hear gushing) Do you know that I am booked into one of the oldest hotels in Vienna – TOOO cool.

Anyway, see you! :-)

HUH? HUH??

But what shall I do?? I don’t know what your plan was!! You didn’t tell me. YOU were going to do it. To finish it. To see it through!! To -

The students look to us. We look to ME!

‘Why are you looking at me???’

Well, he left you in charge!!

You are the one with the fancy education degree!!

You always know what to do…

Ok, Ok, hang on, wait.. I rifle through all the papers on his desk; I try his cell phone. I run around the building.

They wait. They expect.

Noooooo!!!

ANYWAY,

When my voice was hoarse from shouting no, no, no, no, I found myself whimpering why, why, why, and then finally whispering, ok. fine. Louder. Fine. Chin squared. Fine! Eye gleaming. FINE! Back straightened – anyway, you get the picture.

Cut to present, things haven’t gotten any better. Later I found out the guy had basically cut and paste some programme from his previous school, simply because he felt it (and by extension he) was better than ours. us. No effort to contextualise, no effort to even re-word!! Anyway, this might not have been such a disaster, if only he'd had a plan! But NO! The guy's song (which is also tired by the way) is that we should all innovate, own the progamme (own the programme??? Is this when he tells us??) In short, this is a guy that does not know how to spell ‘follow through’. He has basically disengaged, any attempts to get him to specify what he planned to do next produces waffling and longwinded treatises and circular arguments, accompanied by pseudo intellectual chin stroking and far away looks interupted by sudden eye narrowing (which is how he walks away from you mid-sentence - like he has been struck by some brilliant idea!)

You probably hear the bitterness in my voice, well, you hear right. But anyway, I can’t blame all my woes on the man. It is up to me to live in this day dream of his and struggle with all the details while he floats off to wherever, or to up and leave...

Why am I even wasting all this energy on him?