The drive

And now, let's really zero in on what is making me tick these days: my awesome job.

It's the beginning of the holiday season, and the beginning of what looks to be an endless recession. This is when I find a job? Now this, Alanis, is ironic.

It's a good thing I found a job because my unemployment checks ran out the same week I started work. Then there would be nothing to fund my daily habit of eating candy bars in a lavishly-prepared bath until I emerged, hours later, pruney and still depressed. But I digress.

I'm ecstatic that I have a job! I used to cringe when people would ask me "what do you do?" Now that I have a job, though, I can say, "I am a Senior Marketing Research Manager for a small marketing research firm in Wherethehellisthat, Massachusetts, that caters to the semiconductor industry." Yeah!

I started work last week. The drive, all 50 miles of it (one way), is amazing. I am literally amazed with it every day. During the first half hour on my way to work, I take note as evidence of the city, of civilization itself, becomes increasingly thinner. At first, this was charming. I grew up in suburban Connecticut, and it reminded me of home.

But I moved out for a reason.

The natural charm of the wilderness grows in the last twenty miles, as all signs of human life disappear. Once I reach route 2, I drive under a bridge of icicle death that I am certain was built by the early settlers, then pass a forrest of birch trees, and finally see several open fields glistening with newly fallen snow and poc-marked with scores of animal tracks. I have stopped several times in this location to let wild turkeys cross the street. I swear, they're the same ones every morning; I always see a gimpy one with a pissed-off kind of limp hobbling towards the rear.

The first time I drove to work last week, I used my GPS, whom I affectionately refer to as Mandy. After we stopped for those charming, limping turkeys, she told me to take a right. I looked at the signs where I was to turn, however, and noticed that they said "CORRECTIONAL FACILITY: INSTITUTION USE ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT." Huh. Mandy, are you sure? She had led me astray before, telling me to turn left onto a “road” that ended up being a parking lot with no outlet. That was not a valid way to get to IHOP, and this couldn’t be the way to work.

But it was correct: Through this correctional facility was the only way for me to get to work. More fun on this later...

After passing a farm with some black cows (are those real? they're just so still!), a quaint cemetery older than time, and the suburban ghetto, I arrive at my office building.

And then the fun starts!