In the Beginning…

“It serves me right for putting all my eggs in one bastard. “  - Dorothy Parker

In the beginning, always seemed like a good place to start something. It feels so big. Maybe it seems so big when the real details of life are small in comparison. Life in Middle Europe taught me that everything is small in comparison. My decadent American lifestyle will never be the same. When this adventure began, my eyes were wide shut. Life is never so easy.

“I loved my job, hated my boss…” this is how I refer to my position at the university. It is a bit unfair to say that I hated him. Hated implies that I would actually dwell on my feelings about our relationship, but it does not really happen. I can probably only count on one hand the people for whom I hold more contempt.

Time and again, he made me feel small. As if there was little good I could contribute to his organization. Except my small contribution to the whole, “it works every day thing.” The best I can think of for him is that he will get his.

I wanted to buy a house or at least some real-estate. No, my life was not perfect, but this would have been a good investment and maybe a step in the right direction. I had saved almost half of the money I needed for the down payment. Just one more consulting contract and I would have been able to buy a nice place.

I know, I must have seemed a real piece of work to him. I know quite well I did all of the leg work and had simply generated a report that regurgitated the existing plans to the obvious contingencies and handed it back to him. That did make him look a bit incompetent. For my hard work, I got nothing. I guess, I should have understood when he took my part of the money. What I did not realize was how right the little bird on my shoulder was when it told me to fill out the conflict of interest forms before the project began.

Losing the house money in the consulting job was hard. Having my boss accuse me of stealing was the last straw. I was on the next plane after I received the opportunity to move abroad. It was not my best idea ever, but I am here. Maybe, it was worth the trip? Life has taught me more about myself than I would have learned dancing nights around a brass pole at the “Pinch and Tickle.”