Coming down with strep (throat) and being put on disability for two weeks was a fitting end to a really awful, stressful, emotional and disappointing year. Getting ill hit me suddenly too. I was having a decent weekend right up to the cusp of the Holiday/Shutdown week at Apple, then Bam! Biff! Pow! I hard an itchy, sore throat during the Kenny’s (Coffee Company) Christmas party that Sunday evening. By Monday, my day off, I had the chills, fever and every joint in my body ached.
Meanwhile, Somara was in the thick of culinary school. Let me rewind a bit. When I wrote about Christmas Break 2003, the new year (2004) was off to an alright start, namely attending Sonia’s wedding in Houston. By mid-January, things hit the fan. Somara’s father laid her off because his business was starting its inevitable decline. Matters for me at Apple were mediocre but we couldn’t afford to have one person completely unemployed. We weighed our options hastily. Somara decided that she wanted to go back to school, namely culinary. It seemed a logical idea with all the hours of Food TV she had watched. She was already a good cook, a formal education would cinch it. I went along since I knew not completing her college degree bugged her. I know it would bother me and the older one gets, the harder it is to regain the momentum to graduate. Today’s universities practically make it a moving target.
So Somara shopped around Austin. The two main choices were Texas Culinary Academy (TCA) and Austin Community College (ACC). The latter I’m a fan of. I took French I and II there plus Unix I and C++. How I want to go back for an entry-level English/Composition class to polish my skills and the Northridge Campus had a slew of Mac classes on Photoshop I’m itching to take.
When it comes to culinary classes, ACC is a nuisance. I was sold on the lower price tag but I didn’t want Somara to be in the usual mess college students experience through ACC and in spades at UT: her schedule would shift every semester, it could drag on if certain key classes aren’t available, etc. Culinary is just another trade ACC teaches anyway, right along with AC repair and welding, the AA/AS she earned wouldn’t carry much weight.
Then came TCA’s price tag, $45,000! I thought, we don’t need to buy the school, just attend. Hell, my undergraduate degree from Marquette ran that high but I got to be a student for over four years. This was only 15 months! Somara felt deflated by my reaction. We’d only been married for a few months so I pressed to ask why TCA was worth the hefty price tag. She explained how the the tuition covered everything in one swoop, none of the nickel-and-dime crap I endured at Marquette on textbooks or lab fees. Classes changed every six weeks but her schedule would never alter, school would be every weekday afternoon. Best of all, TCA was accredited as legitimate and was part of the Cordon Bleu program (where Julia Childs went yet never graduated). There were other possibilities of financial aid (which turned out to be only loans, we’re 41 % done with now). I gave the go-ahead knowing how much it really meant. Had I known how nasty the final bill would be, I’d still give Somara the green light. I just would’ve paid off some of the debt in advance.
Now why this digression? Well, Somara was only working part-time now (she and her father worked out a new arrangement) and my stress levels rose from it. I felt as if I had been put into a corner, an “I can’t fail” corner which was amplified by the 2004 election (we know how that went) and a series of bosses at Apple who were (I won’t mince words) terrible. In defense of the team manager I had though (Mark), once we really had a blunt, open discussion of my emotional state (I had lost my confidence to help customers with the server OS) and my pursuit to get assistance through Apple’s programs, the future looked better. The immediate future continued to be rocky. However, I told myself and the boss, I would not leave Apple under a cloud.
Then getting sick, being diagnosed by doctor (really a PA in America’s “superior” system) and told I wouldn’t be allowed to return to work for a week was a devastating blow. It made me look disingenuous on the deal I made with Mark. Strep is contagious for a couple days yet the following ones aren’t so I was then goldbricking (in my mind). To make it worse, the strep evolved into laryngitis which had the PA order me away from work another week! Going back to Apple only to be fired frequently crossed my mind.
Obviously, this is a Holiday Break I’d like to forget. All this overshadowed Christmas and New Year’s. Hell, I think I was stuck at home vegging out while Somara went to celebrate the gift giving in Georgetown.
Then a crazy idea flooded our heads. Some instructor Somara frequently spoke of had leads in Phoenix. I thought, why not move there, get a fresh start. My friend Rad lived there. We had visited a couple times. Somara lived there in the Nineties while working for Motorola and I really liked the scenery. Phoenix was similar to Austin in the “lack” of Winter, blistering hot Summers and the big selling point was their hockey team. Sure it was the Coyotes but it was an NHL franchise!
I drove over to the Stor place across 1825 and started a rental contract to put away our non-essential belongings as they were packed away. The therapist I was seeing (Judith) recommended I take control of the clutter issues bugging me in my office (at home). This dovetailed into the digitization of my entire CD collection then (completed in about six weeks). One thing which kept me going was imagining the drive across I-10 in a U-Haul/Ryder truck to a new home. Sometimes, the journey is more exciting the actual living in another city.
Needless to say, we didn’t move to Phoenix, I’ll save the explanation for later in 2010; I also wasn’t fired or in trouble at Apple. Somara and I did everything we were supposed to regarding the disability business. There was a debacle via payroll which I had to bear for three paychecks but it was better than giving back all the money in one fell swoop. Nah, my job was secured a tad since one of the problematic people transferred out and the group was on the verge of hiring a couple new managers, one of which I got assigned to, something I had been begging HR to do for weeks. Thankfully, being moved into Juan’s team vindicated me by the time I had my review near the end of 2005.
What about Christmas 2004 though? I’d like to have it removed from my memory. Then again, there was one incident between the holidays at Trudy’s North that raised my spirits.
Our friends Tom and Alaire invited us out to dinner. I was reluctant. Here I was on disability and what would I do if someone from Apple saw me? The only rebuttal I could think of in my defense was prove I wasn’t making money on the side during the time period. Somara probably cajole me into going. Again, I’m glad I did because during our meal, I spotted a little hand tugging on Tom’s sleeve. We turned to see who it was and it was this darling little girl thanking Santa for all the stuff he gave her. This made me realize Tom’s attire, a red shirt with black suspenders; he’s always had a white beard in the years I’ve known him. The little girl’s mother was seen scrambling to our table to apologize for her daughter’s behavior. Tom took it in good stride, told the mother not to worry about it, he said it happens often to him this time of year. Later on, Tom and Alaire shared their Santa on his skiing vacation anecdote! I love that incident. Thanks to them, I have an in with Santa when I talk to small children and I can loan their parents some (behavioral) assistance. Ask my friend Helen.
This concludes this year’s Six Days of Christmas series. I appreciate your patience, participation and I do hope everyone of you had a great Holiday Break season. Most of us return to the grind on Monday. I’m cool with it, there’s so much to work to do and I think 2010 will be filled with anticipation at Apple. MacWorld has been pushed back to February to compete with the CES show in Vegas. Outside of Apple, I’m excited over the new music releases due by SXSW or later, namely Goldfrapp and Scissor Sisters. The other variable the Maggi Republic is treating as a blessing and a curse, the purchase of our first new car in 14 years. Honda’s Fit is the current frontrunner.
Happy New Year. May 2010 be much better than 2009 but leave the politics at the virtual door please.