A picture is worth… words

I was reading a blog post by Mary Jaksch at www.WritetoDone.com  titled “10 Ways to Refuel Your Creativity.” One suggestion was to look at lovely pictures. “When you muse on images, you brain can make new connections,” she wrote and that’s what happened when I followed the link to www.morguefile.com.  My imagination was stirred immediately as my eyes feasted on some of the images. It’s fun to do even if you just like looking at interesting pictures.

This photo (below) jumped out at me, not only because it was colourful and visually pleasing, but because it seemed to capture what I was feeling and thinking and experiencing in a vivid way. Like twisting a kaleidoscope and stopping when all the bits of shape and colour combine to form a pleasing picture.

Here’s what I see in this picture:

The beauty of creation, this world in which we dwell. It draws me… I could lose myself in the blue skies and drift happily atop the cottony clouds. Or hike the grassy hills, winding among the trees dressed in their red gold autumn finery. How clean the air… how cool the breeze … how warm the sun. This is a photo of a beautiful day.

And yet… it is a day that will end, in a season that will change. Leaves will fall, snow will cover the shivering branches. And when it melts, and blues skies and warm sun will coax tender shoots from sap-tilled branches. Where will I be?

We all end up like those beneath tombstones that weather and fade, like the ones in the picture. Year in year out, season after season, changing yet timeless.

From Romance to Reality

These ephemeral musings led me back to the root of my kaleidoscope reality: change. Constant, ongoing, imminent and immanent. In my earlier blog post “What is Change?” I mentioned 3 big changes that are happening in my life. Two involve family relocations (my parents, and my aunt and uncle, will be moving into condo apartments in buildings in my complex) and the third is taking place at work even as I write this.

My boss is retiring after 30 years on the job, 9 of them working with me. After the initial shock of the news wore off, everyone got down to the business of doing what needs to be done. There are steps; and each of the people involved have multi-faceted roles to play.

My soon-to-be ex boss Dave – needs to wrap things up. Impart vital information to his successor; introduce him to contacts; direct him to resources; answer questions that arise, trying to foresee issues that will face his successor early in the new year.

My already-in-place new boss Steve – needs to wrap things up from his previous role. He has assumed supervision of 4 staff members even as he hands over supervision of 8 others to his own successor. He needs to job-shadow my ex-boss to learn the job (his new job); ask questions; find information and organize it into his own system.

My role is a tricky one; I need to support Dave while learning how to support Steve. I won’t bore you with the minutiae of what an executive assistant to a senior vice president in corporate real estate portfolio management does. Suffice it to say – there’s a lot of work to do. Some is merely more of what I already do, and is familiar and routine; but some of that is different because I’m doing it for a new person. Some is unknowable, as it won’t crop up until January when Dave is gone and that one-man treasure trove of knowledge is lost to us.

Add to that the fact that November is my busiest month every year, with annual meetings for 3 big clients to arrange… On top of that, my parents will be getting ready to move in November – yikes! Let’s not even go there now…

OK, back to work I go, hi ho, hi ho..