Day 16 – What is your typical day like?

Most of the days of my last seven years are spent at work. Nothing is really unique and extraordinary.  I’m your typical rank and file employee who works 8 hours a day and 5 times a week. Before, after or during my breaks, I juggle as a college instructor. Office-colleagues-boss-students, they form my typical work week.

I report to a small office, literally and figuratively. It’s just me and my boss in a teeny tiny space everyday. Except for my boss, I don’t have teammates. However, this doesn’t mean that I don’t have interaction with my colleagues. Much of our tasks require coordination with other departments. Hence, I also have my equal share of adventures and misadventures with my colleagues.

Our office is directly reporting to the Office of the President.  Having the President’s prestige, I should feel privileged with that structure. Not everyone could see the Company’s President everyday. In real practice though, I can count the situations when I had a direct encounter with the President.  It’s only my boss who has access to the President. Me? I’m settled in my small yet productive niche.

My work is quite far from home. It would take more than an hour of travel, traffic and transfer to different forms of transportation before I reach the workplace. As much as I want to drive myself to work, my screaming savings account couldn’t afford to acquire even a previously owned car. Hence, I have to endure commuting everyday.  Commuting brings me some unnecessary stress. However,  I admit that there are days when I enjoy my commuting in the company of the different faces I encounter each day. Call me weird, but I love observing my fellow train passengers.

On regular work days, I spent hours in front of my computer. It’s an everyday struggle to be productive, despite the presence of a fast internet connection.  Most of my tasks evolve on reviewing of accomplishment reports of each department. Sometimes I write reports and do whatever the boss assigns. One thing that differentiates our office is the absence of the routine tasks. I cannot predict my work on the next weeks to months.  Whatever projects the President desires, it’s passed on to my boss and I later have my share of the work pie.

I used to report at 8 am but my habitual tardiness caused to shift my schedule to 8:30. Years after, I found myself battling the 8:30 am schedule.  And no, I will no longer adjust to 9:00 am. I’m off at 5:30 pm but most of the time, I extend hours to compensate for my lousy tardiness.

When I have classes, my schedule becomes a bit rattled. On the past semesters, I teach either before or after office hours. This school year was different because I was asked to teach in between office hours. I forgo my lunch break to accommodate a class that can no longer be handled by a full time faculty. This has always been how my teaching assignments are determined. After all the full time faculty members are given their respective classes, whatever is left is given to me. And honestly, I don’t have problems with this system. They are still teaching opportunities.

Three to five years from now, I would like to believe that my work will still be the same. The nearest situation that can change my monotonous work life is when we have a new president or my boss is given another job. Perhaps, when I finally get terminated from my punctuality issues or I’m forced to take in a new job, everything will definitely change. But to be honest, stability was something I never observed in my job. It’s not impossible that I’ll wake up tomorrow and a whole new saga of my life is just waiting to be written.