What in the HELL am I doing hereeee??? Finally... Here starts my "recollection" of a 32 year old woman moving through life. Presently, I find myself living in Grand Cayman. How did I end up here? Well, let me backtrack for just a moment (or several) and explain, just a bit how I ended up spending the last 6wks at Comfort Suites with very little comfort. lol.
It's incredibly funny what you'll do under the circumstances of annoyance, misery, frustration and dissatisfaction...
So every year my mom & I go on a vacation together. In 2011 she asked me where we should go and I suggested the Cayman Islands. Several years earlier a friend & I stopped there on a cruise and I thought the beach was amazing. Fine. So that October we go visit. While driving along in Grand Cayman I noticed all of the financial firms (I'd been working in fund administration since 2004) and casually said to myself, "Hmm, I could work here for a few years to save money". A local had mentioned that salaries were higher than in the US bc of the higher cost of living on the island so I thought it could make financial sense and be a relaxing change of pace. All of this was just a passing thought that quickly fled my mind.
Fast forward to the Spring of 2012 as I find myself beyond frustrated and turned off by my current position of being overworked, underpaid and supremely aggravated with two besties as my superior and subordinate. Talk about a conflict of interest. Smh. I've never seen an AVP doing almost all of a supervisor's work (or sometimes passing it along to other members of the team including myself) so she could go home on time. It was unreal. Now individually both of these ladies were cool and in some unexplainable I liked them both. Don't get me wrong, I can respect anyone with a family and responsibilities but when it means I'm expected to pick up the slack, we have a damn problem Houston!! I seriously started to believe that maybe they were lovers bc I'd never seen anything like that before. It was to the point that I was expected to carry a heavier workload to facilitate my subordinate's special schedule. It was crazy! Whoa, I am getting pissed all over again thinking about it. But I digress... So when there was mention of my firm's acquisition of a business with offices located in Toronto and Grand Cayman, I immediately threw my name in the hat for Grand Cayman. I figured it couldn't hurt. (Now that I think of it, Toronto probably would have been a better deal but I'll revisit the reason I didn't consider Toronto an option at a later point in time). But by no means did I think it was an actual possibility - me going. Well, not one that I could realistically pull off. I sort of hoped to find a more fulfilling position in NYC to remove myself from the misery of the rat race of bills & my rental apartment (inclusive of my neighborhood & neighbors who had both become a real pain in my a**). Not to mention the BS of my job situation. But that 'better option' never came along. At least, not before I had to decide on whether or not to move out of the country. Instead, over the course of the summer I found myself sitting in periodic discussions with my manager and the managing director of my department, also the lead on this transition, regarding the possibilities of me taking on this assignment. Honestly, I wanted to do it nearly as much as I didn't want to do it. If that makes any sense. But deep down
I knew a decision would need to be made sooner than later regardless of how much I didn't want to really think about it. So as it turned out, I had to spend the eve of my 32nd birthday on the phone with my dad (mom never called me back to discuss the matter but I'll come back to that) & close friends trying to make one of the hardest decisions of my entire life. Some way to bring in a damn birthday, let alone my much needed week off. But after all of the stalling and non commitment I had given over the past few months no one cared that my birthday was approaching when I was told a decision was needed by noon the next day. Ughhh. Stressful and depressing! The ironic thing is that back when I was maybe 27 years old I always said, "When I'm 32 my life will be fulfilling and interesting." (I really have to stop saying things like this in my head.)
So after sitting in bed for a few hours, I said F*** it and settled on the idea that I would tell my boss it was a go and send my email in confirming my decision.
So here I am - trying to navigate thru my new life here on this foreign land and "connect with myself". Whatever the hell that really means...
