Big Change

Every couple of years, my work does a partial-day staff retreat during which time people take a personality test and find out their colors. People are categorized into blue, gold, green, and orange based on which "color" shows up most in their test. I'm not entirely sure what sort of system the test is based upon, but I do know that over the 6+ years I've worked here, my results have come up the same: equally blue and green, some orange, almost no gold. Blue = people person, empathy Green = science, data, results Gold = neat, organized Orange = change, excitement

Or some shit like that.

Anyhow, last year I took the test for probably the 4th time and orange had jumped up to be just about equal with blue and green in my results. Which meant that the part of me that craves change and challenges was crying out to be heard.

Or some shit like that.

I sat with the miniscule "orange" group that day though 2 other colors were equally represented in my results (it's apparently rare for orange people to stay long in the type of organization I work for) and thought to myself that it had been far, far too long since there had been any sort of change, positive or negative, in my life. "I need to fix that, some time in the next year," I thought to myself.


* * * * *


Today is my last day at a job at which I have worked for more than six years, at a place of employment at which I have worked for 7 years.

I'm equally gleeful, terrified, sad, and hopeful (about the future). There are some people who work at my job whom I will miss, but I'm really looking forward to doing something else now, thanks. Change is good, and because I've worked here so long my vacation and sick time payout means we'll have some money to live on until we both get fabulous jobs in California. Right?

I haven't done anything this seat-of-the-pants crazy since I up and moved to Colorado back in January of 2003, so it's about damn time.

So, to recap:

Last day of work
We move on Thursday. To California. To the house in which I grew up. We have no jobs lined up, though we do have a couple of good leads (plus I've got a wedding I'm doing mid-October).

The last month has brought enormous change to our lives. We went basically a whole year in which nothing of note happened (other than Petra dying and acquiring Robin). Then, we made the decision to move and after that things started happening. Dan's grandma died. I heard from several people from whom I've not heard in years. Plus some other stuff that I'm not ready just yet to write about.

Dear orange part of me, it's your time to shine. Make it count.