reflection

If you haven't already heard, I'm leaving Cleveland at the beginning of December for the greener pastures of Atlanta so that I can aimlessly pursue happiness in whatever form I can find it. This past weekend in Birmingham was my last trade show as part of the FHI Heat team, which led me to do some reflecting on my time with the company. I realized that I've been too focused on the broader, more negative perspective that came from knowing that I've spent the last year and change in a situation and an industry that I strongly believe I have no future in. Despite all of that, the people I worked with and the ways in which I found brief moments of happiness made my day to day life not only bearable, but even enjoyable on most days. I spent the better part of my plane ride home making a list of the things that I'll miss when I leave. Here it is, in no particular order...

• the man cave
• Shirley's unwavering, steadfast, but hilarious negativity
• Ralph's spot-on impression of Shirley's unwavering, steadfast, but hilarious negativity
• Flashing Lights by Kanye West
  
• trying to trick Carl Massouh into thinking I'm gay
• Sherry talking my ear off about Devon
• "It's good."
• Jeff's proclivity for quickly turning a key word in a sentence that I just uttered into some unrelated but hilarious pun.
• the ride back to the hotel after trade show booth tear down is finished
  
• lunch meetings with Brian to discuss important fantasy football business
• keeping Michael Lee on his toes with gray areas of office conduct
• communal yumyums
• yumyums that someone else bought with their money
  
• trips to KeyBank, which I usually spent eating ice cream (Thanks, Debbie!)
  
• hearing Les laugh from the opposite side of the building
• disrupting other people's conference calls
• Melissa's soft-spoken way of charming me into doing her favors
  
• everyone's impersonations of everyone else
• the overwhelming sense of satisfaction, relief and unmitigated ecstasy I feel when I watch Tran do something computer-related that I used to have to do
  
• inappropriately making fun of Chinese people after hearing Paul spit Chinese on the phone with some Chinese Chinaman
• kicking the skidwrap soccer ball