My second job working abroad was with a big corporation. The
first one didn’t really count, it was a start-up, and the company went bankrupt
in less than a year. However, it gave me some credentials to apply for
permanent residency in that country. This second job in this corporation was
somewhat related to my field, but I wasn’t very good at it yet (It was a new
skill). I had no idea why they hired me after multiple interviews, maybe
because it wasn’t a common skill back then, and I was a fresh graduate, just
obtained my Permanent Residency; therefore, they could pay me peanuts.
I lasted five years there, but my first year was torturous.
I felt anxious; I had no one to ask, and the internet was not that
common/readily available yet, so I couldn’t just google what I didn’t
understand. I had to be able to do what they paid me to do. I acted confident,
but behind that, I struggled like a duck paddling underwater while pretending
to be calm and collected. I learned, practiced, and worked late on my own so
that I could deliver results and survive another paycheck to pay for rent in
the foreign land, or I would die!
Fortunately, I improved as time passed, and most of my
colleagues and my boss were decent. However, there were nightmarish times
and restless days. Unhappy boss, unreasonable deadline that I wasn’t good
enough to tackle, and uncooperative hardware and software.
Then, I noticed one peculiar thing.
I had to take the subway every morning. Just like that daily
montage in mind-numbing movies, I would take the same-timing train, board the
same car, and alight at the same station through the same door in the middle of
the train. It was as mundane as it sounds. After alighting, before me was a
wide stair that would branch into two sides, right and left, because there was
a lift core in the middle. Both sides of the stairs led to the same exit
platform, so it shouldn’t be a problem whichever side I took right?
Wrong!
Every time I took the left staircase, my day would be
horrible. I wasn’t happy with my work, anxious time, had imposter syndrome,
high stress level, computer crashing, unsaved work, my mug looking at me funny,
my colleague trying to kill me, something along those lines. I started to
notice and didn’t believe it at first, and of course, it must have been a
coincidence, with a splash of logic. The left staircase was closer to the exit,
which I chose whenever I was in a hurry. Sometimes, when we were in project
competition season, the schedule would be very tight, so I wanted to get to the
office faster. The irony! Those were the times when the stress level and demand
were high; therefore, it linked to horrible days.
Still, why would I risk it? I started taking only the right
stairs, and for some reason, my days were better. The logic was that I was
getting better at my work and was able to juggle the tasks, schedule, and
expectations better. But hey, the stair theory worked!
Am I a superstitious person? I don’t think so. I am not
superstitious, but I am a little stitious. However, I grew up in a family
that respected tradition, including ‘good days.’ This belief exists in many
cultures, there are good days to do important things. My mom uses this practice
as needed. She picked our wedding dates (it works well!). She doesn’t just open
up the calendar and select a good-looking number (just like all volume levels
should be even numbers or dividable by five or the world will end!), but there
is a ‘calculation.’ Date of birth, time of birth, type of thing to do, etc.
I have been asking her to pick my book publishing dates. So
far, it doesn’t work well because I could never get the dates right (yeah, that
is the reason, not because I suck at marketing) because of the time zones.
Amazon’s time zone was in a twilight zone because I swear, on my last book
release, I stayed up late to sync the timing, the one I am alive in and the one
in Amazon’s universe so they both would fall on the same date that Mom had
picked for me. It still didn’t work and the date was still wrong!
This time, hopefully, I will get it right, although I have
no idea how to do that since I did everything right the last time. Yes, all
these rambles are just a long-winded way to let you know that I’m happy to
announce that my new book is coming out soon. It was supposed to come out in
2024, but my and my dog’s operations occupied us too much. Yeah, I’m stubborn
and will continue to write if there is another person who likes it.
