Special Skills

A couple weeks ago at work we had an 'End of Summer Luau'.  It was just a potluck lunch, and some people wore Hawaiian shirts, and the breakroom was decorated with streamers.  They also had a hula hoop contest.  As a little history, during my year of job searching, one of the skills I decided to learn was hula hooping.  I researched it online, found a quality hoop, watched YouTube videos, and practiced until I could go nonstop while I watched entire tv shows.  Until now, I've never mentioned my hula hoop skills to anybody at work.  It's just never come up in the conversation.  And in general, nobody expects anybody from the finance team to have any kind of personality or talents outside of spreadsheeting and running reports.  The administrative assistants put the luau on (which explains why it was scheduled on the day finance was doing the month-end close, our busiest day of the month), and they're kind of used to finance just showing up for the food and then going back to work.  But I brought my hula hoop to work with me and just had it sitting quietly in my cubicle.  My boss noticed and asked me what it was for, and I told him I was a hooper.  Unfortunately, the contest started right when I was in the middle of running my first batch of month-end reports.  That's my busiest hour of the busiest day of the month.  But my boss was so excited at the prospect of somebody in finance showing up the rest of the company that he decided the reports could wait, and he let me go hula-hoop.  The only interaction I have with anybody outside of finance is to email them reports and answer questions.  I'm pretty sure they just see me as a lifeless drone who sits in the corner until they need something.  So they were shocked when I not only showed up to participate in the contest, but came with my own hoop.  It was me, three administrative assistants, and one guy from operations who was forced to play.  With about 40 people from the rest of the company watching and cheering.  Including all of finance thrilled that one of their own was finally representing.  When the referee said go, we started swinging our hips.  The operations guy lasted about half a second, a couple of the admins lasted a few seconds longer.  The last admin and I were in it for the real competition.  That's when they realized I meant business.  Eventually the other admin's hoop fell and I was the champion.  Finance cheered, the rest of the company stared in disbelief that finance can do something not related to numbers, and I went back to running my reports- after collecting my prize of an inflatable palm tree, inflatable flamingo, and a marraca (for shaking it).  The rest of the day, people throughout the building were talking about the upset, and my boss was bragging about the intense interview process he puts us through before he hires us, just so he can cover all his bases in these types of situations.

Warm Fuzzies

Last night I went to my 5 year MBA reunion.  I don't think anybody knows this, but I cried through most of my MBA graduation.  Not because the speeches were so great or I was terrified to tears of what lay beyond, but because I had grown so close to my classmates and I knew that we would never all be together in a group making memories again, and I just wasn't ready to let that go yet.  The two years of my MBA were the best I'd ever had.  Sure, I spent every minute from 7am til midnight during that first semester doing something school-related, and sure, I spent that first Christmas break looking for a job because I was certain I couldn't make it through another three semesters of that.  But after that Christmas break, when I found myself sitting in the MBA lounge greeting all my friends and comparing our new schedules, I knew I was home again.  We were friends because we'd all been through the same hell that first semester, we all knew each other's pain, and we all faced the same fears of what came next.  And it turned out the next three semesters were fun.  We were surrounded by friends, including our teachers, and we had fun in our classes.  We still spent inordinate amounts of time in the MBA lounge with study groups, writing papers, working on homework assignments together, etc, but it felt more like productive hang out sessions with friends than work. So when it came to an end and everybody scattered across the country (and, in some cases, across the world), I was none-too-excited.

Over the last five years, I've kept in contact with people through various social networking sites, but too often that's more like internet stalking than actual communication.  We all see each others' updates, but we don't actually talk to anyone.  So I wasn't really sure how it was going to be to see everyone at the reunion.  I was a little nervous to see if friendships would still be remembered, let alone be comfortable.  But as usual, my fears were for nothing.  When I walked into the garden court at the Wilk, it was just like old times, if not better.  We all greeted each other with handshakes or hugs, caught up on each others' lives, and talked as if we'd seen each other yesterday.  Even the people I'd only been casual friends with during school- we were hugging and talking like the best of friends, as if time has only strengthened our friendships. 

A couple of our professors spoke- one gave us a quick lecture on the current state of the economy (and for one of the first times, I understood what he was talking about and I remembered why I love finance!) and the other updated us on happenings and rankings of the Marriott School.  It was just great all around.  I don't consider myself a cheesy person in general, but when the evening ended, I was reluctant to say goodbye again and I drove home full of warm fuzzy feelings.  I'd been reminded of why I loved the MBA program so much, and it was just wonderful to spend a few hours surrounded by those memories again.