Not even if you were staying here

The smoke billowing out of his mouth obstructed the view of his face. It hung there in the frigid air. He waved his hand and shattered the cloud. As it dissipated, Amie studied him. He was looking at her timidly, as if he was afraid of what she was about to do.

"You know what I'm going to say," she prompted him.

His gaze shifted to the ground. He started to shrug his shoulders but it turned into an exaggerated shiver. Amie waited for him to speak.

"Yeah, but it doesn't have to be like that. I mean, we can talk on the phone after work and it should only take a few months to save up for me to visit."

Amie dropped her head into her gloved hands and sighed frustratedly. Lifting her head, she turned to look around her as if searching for something to help her explain. She let out a groan.

“Jeremy, I just can’t wait around like that. I don’t want to wait around like that.”

Jeremy stared into her eyes, his expression wilting as she continued to speak. She met his gaze confidently.

“Jesus, we haven’t even been together that long. We don’t talk that much as it is. What would we even talk about after work? All you do is watch movies and Netflix. I hate movies! I just don’t think… no, I know don’t want to keep dating you. Not even if you were staying here.” She looked away from him, realizing how sharp the words sounded.

Jeremy’s stare broke and blinking, he flicked his cigarette butt into the snow pile at the edge of the sidewalk. He took three backward steps, slowly moving toward the driver side door of the U-Haul parked in Amie’s driveway.

“I am sorry you’re upset,” she said quietly to him.

“I’m not upset, Amie,” he replied quickly. We haven’t even been together that long, right? It’s only been what, four weeks since Becky’s accident? Maybe five? My internship was only 6 weeks, so yeah. Probably five weeks.” He yanked open the truck door.

“It’s fine!” he said loudly. “I mean, whatever,” he said more evenly. “I’ll have fun in Columbus. If you’re ever in the main office, look me up I guess? Or don’t? ‘Bye, Amie.”

He climbed in the orange truck and slammed the door shut.

Amie turned around and stiffly walked back into her house. She didn’t wait to shut and lock the door, but she lingered silently in the entryway, listening to Jeremy back the truck out of her driveway and take off down the street. She gasped, realizing she had been holding her breath.

Library

Shh.

Quiet.

Creeping down the rows.

The heaviness of the books help me study -

I can feel their massive knowledge pressing in close.

Breath through my nose, smell the musty dusty scent.

Sinking into history; down and down it goes.

The library is losing fame.

Quietly it slows.

Shh.

Stairwell

"... and next time you need to try harder, Amie, because we can't get stuck in a situation like this again. I've told you before that we need to have the clients on board before we move forward!"

Becky had her face scrunched and turned back toward me as she slowly shuffled through the door of the conference room out into the hallway.

"I'm going to make sure this comes up with Donald, too. I don't know what you were thinking!"

She turned around to face forward, slouching along the corridor, still muttering and shaking her head slightly. Becky's cute cross-body bag bounced along behind her.

My face felt hot and sweaty, but cold at the same time. I couldn't believe she was saying these things to me! Me, Amie, the analyst-of-the-month Amie. The life-of-the-company-holiday-party Amie.

As we neared the end of the hall, Becky slowed and as she reached the stairwell door stopped completely. She turned around to face me and said with a scathing voice and flashing eyes, "I'll be surprised if you last another week here, Amie. You're going to have to get your shit together." After one last scowl, she turned around to push the door open and walk into the stairwell.

I briefly considered turning around and walking back down the hallway toward the room we'd just emptied. But in a defeated way, my shoulders slumped and I resigned to follow her down the stairs. This stairwell was closest to my car and I needed to get out of the building as soon as possible.

I followed Becky into the stairwell, eyes on her feet ahead of me as she neared the top stair and reached out to grab the hand rail on her right side. Simultaneously, she stretched out her left foot to begin descending the stairs.

--

I was shocked into consciousness by the sound of shrieking. It was my voice screaming the words.

"Becky! Becky!"

I was looking down the stairs at Becky sprawled haphazardly, unnaturally at the bottom. She let out a loud moan and used one arm to try lifting her torso from the ground. Slowly, watching my own footsteps carefully, I descended the stairs and said again, "Becky!"

After making it half way down the flight, the door at the bottom of the stairs burst open and Jeremy the intern's wide eyes fell on Becky's limbs strewn about and her bag tossed into the corner of the landing. She moaned again.

Jeremy glanced up at me and uttered "Oh my god!" before turning around and screaming to the hallway behind him "Someone call an ambulance! Call 9-1-1! Becky fell down the stairs! Becky?"

He bent down and gently touched her back. She was clearly hurt. Her left leg was curled under her body in an odd way and her left arm was stuck out at an angle suggesting that it might be broken. She tried again, feebly this time, to use her right arm to lift her torso. She moaned again, but this time more quietly than the others.

People from the offices on the lower floor began sticking their heads into the stairwell. The commotion was increasing steadily. People were crouched on the stairwell landing next to Becky, speaking to her as well as to each other

"Did someone call an ambulance?"
"Is she going to be okay?"
"Becky, someone is on the way."
"Does anyone know her husband's name?"
"So she fell down the stairs?"
"Who is calling 9-1-1?"

"Amie, are you okay?" Jeremy had noticed that I had slowly taken a seat on the stairs about half way up. I was breathing heavily and felt light-headed.

"Did you see what happened?" Jeremy asked me. Being athletic, he sort of jumped the railing to the side of Becky's body and slowly crawled up the stairs to sit beside me.

I didn't answer.

Because I didn't know what happened.

I told him, "I remember watching Becky's feet at the top of the stairs. I saw her reach out for the railing and then..." I went quiet.

Jeremy patiently waited.

"And then I remember shouting 'Becky'. And then you came through the door."

Jeremy didn't say anything.

We sat there together on the stairs, watching people patting Becky's back and stroking her hair. She flinched or moaned every few minutes. Finally an EMT entered through the stairwell door and took charge of the situation. We continued to sit there and watched the crew extract Becky from the stairwell on a stretcher.

Jeremy gently placed his arm around my shoulders. As he gave a slight squeeze, my mind burst with images, seemingly new, playing like a movie in my head of the minutes before that I'd somehow forgotten.

--

I followed Becky into the stairwell, eyes on her feet ahead of me as she neared the top stair and reached out to grab the hand rail on her right side. Simultaneously, she stretched out her left foot to begin descending the stairs.

Carefully watching her right foot, I reached my left shoe out and quickly hooked it around her right ankle. She propelled her weight forward onto her left foot, heading down the stairs but my shoe kept her right foot from moving forward to catch her momentum. As if in slow motion, I saw myself pick my foot up further and further as she tried to free her right foot to catch herself.

Becky's hand missed the rail and she fell freely down the stairs, landing partially on her left arm with a nasty crack and then flipping forward in a summersault motion to land with her left leg twisted underneath her, face down.

I spoke softly then to Becky, laying at the bottom of the stairs. "Get your shit together, Becky."

And then blinking, realizing what I'd done, I began screeching Becky's name.

Bedtime

Familiar sting of tiredness in my eyes
Against my chest, small breaths and sighs
Sleepy in the nightlight.

She's growing in my arms,
She's so little now.
Where does the time go, where? And how?

There it goes:
Rock after rock
Tick after tock.

Bedtime is fleeting
And when she's sleeping
The stinging turns to tears of exhaustion and joy.

So happy, so sad
To see the time slipping away.
Rock after rock
Tick after tock.

Recharge

Zap.

Boom.

This is how I wish I could recharge. But I don't know of anything that actually recharges like that. Instantly, boldly, without hesitation, boom. No longer tired, no longer weary, no longer void of energy, zapped to life.

Life: zest, passion, focus, laughter, purpose.

The sour truth is that I don't know how to recharge. My batteries are burnt. My soul is worn out like an old sock with a gaping hole in the heel. I cannot continue on.

Now begins my quest to discover: how do I recharge?

Am I A Bad Mom?

I'm not a bad mom ...right?

Today I am home with both of my kids. My oldest daughter is going to turn 4 this weekend and my youngest is 9 weeks old. The little one doesn't do a whole lot yet and the older one, while needing fairly constant supervision, can entertain herself for small periods of time.

This afternoon, my husband came back from the doctor at around 3:30 pm. I'd expected him home earlier and was patiently waiting for him so that I could go take a shower to get some "me" time away from the girls. He's on call this week which means that he works from 5:00pm until 8:00am. Last night he was busy the entire time; he didn't eat supper with us, he didn't help with bath time, he didn't get to say goodnight to the girls, and he didn't even get to sleep. That's just how it is sometimes when he's on call.

I finally made it into the shower and just felt so sad. How pathetic that a much needed, haven't-had-one-in-three-days shower was what I considered "me" time. And how pathetic was I for feeling guilty for even taking a shower. I thought about all the things I'd rather be doing than staying home with my kids. I thought about how worried I was about being able to get by when I have to go back to work in 2 and a half weeks. How will I manage then? Then I thought: I'm a bad mom. What kind of mother dreams about days away from her kids?

And of course then I cried. Nay, I sobbed.

Am I a bad mom?

I love my kids SO MUCH. I do. But then how do I justify my sobbing in the shower about being their mother?

I confided in my husband that I am worried that I'm a bad mom. I told him that I don't want to be a mom today, and that sometimes I just hate it. All of it. My husband, being the best human I know, made me feel better and told me all the things I needed to hear even though I already knew them. We'll get through this time in our lives. It will get easier. And for heaven's sake - I'm not a bad mom. I'm now enjoying a treat of hiding out in our bedroom while he babysits until his shift starts at 5:00pm. I've got 21 minutes left!

I don't have any words of wisdom for you moms reading this. There really isn't even a conclusion. This is merely a window into what life is like for me sometimes. If you're feeling the way I am, I'm really sorry. But let's remember: we'll get through this, it will get easier and we aren't bad moms.

Cheers,
Erin

My Story: Waterfall Developer to Scrum Master

"Scrum Master is just a role. It's possible to be both a Scrum Master and developer at the same time."

At some point I'll need to write a post on why I disagree with this quote from no one and everyone. But for now, I'll settle to tell you about my transition from Developer to Scrum Master.

I started out as a traditional "waterfall" developer for a large corporation. One of my earliest memories as a new developer is of a conversation I had with my first manager wherein I asked him what I was supposed to be doing between releases. His response was puzzling to me. He tried to explain that with the way our release cycle went, we as developers would have "ups and downs" as we waited for the new requirements document to be released*. I left the conversation more confused than I was before. Was it okay that I had nothing to do for two to three weeks? What was happening with the project during that time? Surely there was something I could be doing to help prepare for the next release?

Not long after that conversation took place, my manager approached the team about "agile" and purchased a book for us to read in our spare time. It turned out this was a great idea because while we were waiting around in our cubicles for the next set of requirements, we were all studying Agile, slowly learning that maybe there was a better way to get work done.

In the meantime, I found that my favorite parts of my job were when I was directly interacting with other people. Time spent in my cube left me feeling alone and uninspired. So I began to greatly look forward to those meetings my teammates dreaded vehemently.

I wish I could say that our team eventually experienced a collective epiphany and that we immediately switched to Scrum. Unfortunately, I left that job before agile had the chance to sink in.

It was a few years later and with another employer that I finally tried "agile". We were experimenting with a bastardized version of Scrum including me, another developer and our manager. Our manager was wearing three hats: manager (of course), Scrum Master and Product Owner. Our Daily Scrums were status meetings, our Sprint Reviews were just demos and our Sprint Retrospectives were non-existent. But the one positive thing I can say about this time in my career is that my interest was officially piqued.

Later I helped participate in interviews and we brought on a third developer to work with our team which increased our Development Team size and we began to actually experiment with working together to get work accomplished. 

Meanwhile, across campus in another area of IT, there was a more robust and experienced team trying out Scrum and finding success. They were being coached by their Scrum Master, Millie.

My "team" staggered onward and seemed to be enjoying the experiment. As we learned more, we tried new things and eventually there was direction given from our upper-level management for our entire department to fully pursue "agile". We began to receive small bits of coaching from Millie, and I became even more intrigued.

During this transition time, teams were formed out of the few dozen staff in IT working as individuals. Some of those staff members immediately took other jobs. I, however, was excited by the change. We started using Jira to track our sprints and began attempting to work with client representatives as a precursor to proper Product Ownership.

Over the next few years, our organization slowly started to change and I found myself usually on board with all things agile. Occasionally, I rebelled against constructs I found to be personally unnecessary like keeping project timelines. We continued to struggle as an organization (and still do) because we organize our work by projects which almost always confuses our attempts at successfully running Scrum teams.

I began to slowly pull back from development as I recognized the need for a broader perspective of my team. Members came and went, but I always found myself drawn to teaching and mentoring my team members. I did this starting from a technical perspective considering that I'd been promoted to a senior developer. But then I found myself hanging back a little on the development tasks and I spent more time coaching the team on things like the purpose of the Daily Scrum and working with our Product Owners to better understand what the development team needed from them.

I also began to work more closely with Millie and even met to specifically talk about my career in a mentor/mentee capacity. We discussed my potential as a Scrum Master and how I might be able to influence change in the organization if I were able to put down my development responsibilities.

I'd be remiss if I didn't give a shoutout to the Superwoman Summit in this next part of my story. At this point in my career I was a wife, mother and experienced developer and I was questioning the personal fulfillment I was getting from my work. I needed to feel like the time I was spending away from my child was really worth it. After attending the first Summit in 2017, I made a decision to take a risk and began keeping my eyes peeled for any opportunity to begin to move away from the technical space where I worked. Eventually it happened, and about 8 months later I took a position as a "Project Management Specialist" with a focus on Agile coaching and Scrum Mastering.

Props to you if you've made it this far in the story of my journey! To wrap up, I'm now PSM I and PSM II certified and I'm working on building a network of Scrum Masters to rely on from coast to coast. I work closely with Millie now on a daily basis and we are teamed up with one other coach to work together on the agile transformation at our organization. I am the most fulfilled I've ever been as a professional.

I'll save my personal views and epiphanies on Agile and Scrum for another post. If you have any questions about my journey, please leave a comment.


* My manager accompanied this explanation with the wavy hand gesture like you do when your hand is hanging out the window of a car.

Santa Claus or Santa Pause?

Presents are awesome.  Christmas is awesome!  I remember the avid anticipation of Christmas morning when I was a kid.  Sometimes on the night before Christmas, my brother would sneak into my room and we'd play quietly because we just couldn't sleep through the excitement.  And if it didn't keep us up all night, we'd be up early.  Way too early.  One year we were up at 4am, sitting on my bed whispering excitedly about what we thought we'd find under the tree.

I think back on those memories fondly, but guess what?  I have no recollection of what we actually received from our parents or Santa.  To me, that is what Christmas is about.  And I don't think that really sunk in until I was old enough to look back on the holidays and realize what I've just explained: the parts that are special to me are most definitely not the presents.

Now I've got my own child and I'm observing Christmas from the other side, if you will.  Since becoming an adult I've grown to really enjoy the giving of presents more than receiving them.  It's fun to guess at what someone might want and then to browse expectantly for something that fits them just perfectly.  It's an interesting challenge, one that is often influenced by social pressures and finding a balance between good will, budgeting and extravagance.  It's easy to see why some don't enjoy that challenge.  I'm giddy with excitement to give our daughter the presents we've got for her.  But where does Santa fit into all of this?

It wasn't long after I learned to read that I realized Santa's handwriting looked exactly like Mom's. The next year, after having pointed this out to her, Santa's writing changed to a tidy cursive.  But I could still tell it was my Mom's writing.  She always signed cards in cursive, duh.  What is the point in the Santa hoodwink?  The magic?  What are we trying to accomplish by writing "From Santa" on our gift tags?

I left a draft of this much sitting open on my computer for a few hours and now I'm back to it and this topic suddenly strikes me as a bona fide #firstWorldProblem.  Just be thankful that we even have the means to write gift tags at all.  And that we have presents to stick them on.

Happy holidays everyone.  Don't have too many eggnogs.  (Or maybe do?)  And enjoy the memories you're making.  Because that's what you'll come back for.

My Hero

A few months ago I started a project that involves me responding to journal prompts that are intended for elementary/middle school aged children.  The exercise has been fun and enlightening and I've decided I want to share one of my responses.

Prompt: Describe someone who is a hero to you and explain why.

My brother.  His name is Corey Eugene Arnett and at this exact moment he is 21* years old and in Jacksonville, North Carolina being a bad-ass Marine.  Why is Corey a hero to me?  He may be my little brother but he is not a little part of my life.  He is the second most important person in my life.  Corey is the person I identify most with, and it is for this reason that his accomplishments sometimes feel like my own.  His decision to become a Marine would be enough to qualify him as a hero of mine but that is only one small part of his hero-ness.  He has become an outstanding person.  And I feel that I am the only person who knows just how far he has come from the ashes of our childhood.  He is a good person.  He is a moral person.  He is a flawed person.  He is a loyal partner in his relationship.  He is selfless and humble.  He is hilarious and spontaneous.  He is full of hope and love.  He is giving.  He is thoughtful.  He is an inspiration.  He is my brother.  He is my hero.

One of the best and most inspiring things about him is how he has taken in the same things I have as a kid (our parents teachings and flaws, our environment) and selected the best ones to use as a mold for his character.  I think that takes gumption and a shitload of will.  Love you, bud.

* I wrote this reaponse a while ago; he is no longer 21.

Windows

*

Let me start this post with a quote which is relevant to my topic: 

"By nature, you now and then set aside time to appreciate the loveliness and splendor of your surroundings."

A while back, in early 2012 my handsome, then-fiance got a job with a company that requires their employees to take the Strengths Finder 2.0 Assessment.  Through this assessment he found out what his top 5 strengths are, how they relate to each other, and what it should mean to him.  After about a year of listening to how he could relate his actions back to his strengths and our combined curiosity of what my strengths were, he purchased the book and assessment for me to take.

What I found out was a personal revelation.  In previous brain-assessing exercises I'd learned that I was emotionally oriented, but for some reason I didn't expect my top strength to be Empathy.  The other four are Developer, Maximizer, Adaptability and Connectedness.  The best part about taking this assessment wasn't the knowledge of those five words; it was the paragraphs describing how those strengths present themselves in my life.  The above quote is taken directly from one of those paragraphs.  They were meant to describe me and my behaviors based on this set of strengths gleaned from my assessment.

And so now we are to the windows.

What does a window do for a us?  Silly question, right?  It lets us see.  What does it let us see?  Could be a lot of things, but for the most part it lets us see outside.  So what is the relevance in this?  Are you sick of me asking you questions yet?  The relevance may present it self in different ways to different people - different strokes for different folks.  And that's cool, but what I want to tell you about is how windows are relevant to me.

Some of the most beautiful things in the world to me are the emotion I see in my family's faces and the emotion I see in the world around me.  I think this is why I've made some scary yet eye-opening attempts at nature painting.  I love looking outside.  If I can't look outside, I feel like life is literally going on without me.  I need windows.  Even if it is raining or dark outside.  I feel better because seeing through a window lets me feel.

I've always enjoyed and needed to be able to see outside, but until I read these descriptive paragraphs about my strengths, it never clicked for me.  Now I can appreciate why I love to look outside and it makes more sense why I need to.

This is so weird to write about.  These ideas are kind of abstract, and in truth, I don't think I've explained what I feel correctly.  But it is the best I can do for now.

Let me know - does this make any sense?

* This post was directly inspired by the simple comment given by my dear soon-to-be-sister, Kari Cottingim, on one of my earlier posts.  I'll always be thankful for these small comments she makes about my writing and the way they make me want to do more of it; to try harder to express the words that are locked inside me.

My World

My world is red with emotion.  Everything I do, everything I see, everything I hear, everywhere I am there is emotion.  And with varying degrees of intensity.  Its almost like I see exclusively in emotion sometimes, and my eyes are my heart, the very middle of my chest.  I can feel the emotion in objects.  In people, places and moments.  It’s electrifying and astonishing in depth and breadth.  Sometimes I wish to crumble to my knees with the emotion of it all.  And sometimes there is so much emotion that I can’t tell which kind it is.  Anger or fear, happiness or relief.  But I think most times it is so many emotions all together and at such high intensities that my heart would explode.  A balloon in my chest cavity expanding with the warmth of the colors of emotion in my world.  I wouldn't have it any other way.