Picking up from yesterday (and whether I’d want a plaque that means nothing) –
This kind of makes me think of the time I volunteered for something with the Mayor’s Corps in Los Angeles. And they ended up not needing me.
I walked basically across the street and signed in, and they were like, “actually we’re overflowing. You can go home.”
But because I had signed up and showed up, I got this amazing, huge, beautiful certificate from the Mayor for my “work” that day. It was gorgeous, and I would’ve loved to have displayed this gorgeous praise from the Mayor, but ultimately, I threw it away because while it’s a nice decoration, there’s not a real story there to me.
I could see someone arguing to keep it – they blocked out their day, and did show up ready to work. And maybe they’re being thanked for doing that. But I didn’t want to hang up something just for showing up and walking away.
I didn’t mean to tangent us so much or randomly get into a tiny almost throwaway story, but basically, I was just thinking of that as an example of a time when I got a nice thing I didn’t feel I earned, so I threw it away. And if i keep going for this plaque in a year where I’m only even sort of making it by the skin of my teeth, how good am I gonna feel about that? Not good.
In addition to that, in order to get this plaque, you almost certainly have to do this China to LA trip in one weekend. And I was so proud that after hours of research, I found the flight that should work to get to LA with plenty of time to do the race. I was working on getting my visa to go to China. I was ready for this super awesome exciting feat!
But. I’m about to start a new job – a job that only goes for 8 weeks! It’s pretty hard to take a vacation during a job that’s only 8 weeks long. I miiiight be able to convince them to give me just that Friday. But even that would be hard to get, and I feel like it’d be annoying for them.
And also, what? I’m gonna go all the way to China for about 13-ish hours just to do a race and leave? I’d be on the plane longer (each way!) than I’d be actually in China.
And I’ll pick up here one more time tomorrow!