summer bouquet

so as you recover from the shock of actually seeing an update on here, i will also let you know that we promise to try to upload photos of buttercup as soon as possible for those of you who aren't on facebook. hopefully, that will be next week.

i'm usually so busy with the business and all that is going on b/w that and home that i find writing to be difficult. more difficult still is taking the time to think thoughts worth writing. with Ash being off work this summer, that alone thinking time has been even more minimal. not that i need to be alone to think, it's just that constant companionship usually results in seeing my thoughts/emotions about everything come at a distance. like maybe passing by a fields of flowers, but never stopping by to collect a few to take home with me. or a junk yard. y'know, whatever analogy works here.

This morning i was emailing a friend whom i rarely get to speak to and (though it was unnecessarily early to be up and thinking), it actually made me sit down and think about these last few months and about this season of life i find myself/us in. i think i've been so bad about catching up with dear friends that it's been easy to not catch up with myself.

i would never have said that it would be a good thing for my husband to get laid off in the last few months before we bring our first child into the world. how scary is that? what i didn't expect in these days is to fall in love with this man all over again. and to relish these last days together sans kiddo(s). being that we have only known each other in the daily grind of working life, we've never really had extended time to just hang out and BE with one another. we have been stripped of projects to do around the house like we had in Bhm. we have been stripped of income to do things we'd otherwise love to do. but there are a surprising amount of free/cheap things to do here in the summer. (i mean, hello beaches). i've been busy at times with the business and he's been studying for his ARE's all summer. i feel a little guilty saying that these past 2.5 months have been my favorite of our marriage b/c we've had time to just hang out with each other. and despite the other part of these kinds of circumstances, i DO feel God's kindness stripping away a lot of bitterness I hadn't realized had puddled in my heart. he is taking away my "AH-HA, i KNEW it! You aren't good after all..." thinking. though i know i'm not becoming any kind of pollyanna or anything, b/c it's hard not to think a dark and stormy cloud is approaching like i always do. it's really been a sweet time with him anticipating this baby. and i cannot WAIT to see him with our daughter.

as of now, we haven't heard anything from his old job yet about the possibility of rehiring, but have been living on the MA Dept. of Unemployment with our fingers crossed. Ash IS looking for work, but i think nationally, about 40% of architects are out of work, which makes the opps few and the pool of applicants large. which is another reason that finishing his tests could improve his chances of getting rehired somewhere sooner. it's interesting, the day he got laid off, I received a $1200 wholesale order (which is absolutely not the norm, in case you were wondering)...then more orders, and more re-orders...and it's been crazy unpredictable and busy for the business. all that to say, i feel like we are being taken care of and am more hopeful than i thought i would be at this point. asking me that post-partum make get you a different answer though. just putting that out there.

and so, holy crap. we are having a kid sometime this week. i think i will be holding her in total shock. i think she will be having her own kid one day and i will still be in shock that i have kids. pregnancy has been pretty good to me...this week is definitely getting a little uncomfortable though, especially after Ash and I decide to take 3 miles walks. i will say, i'm tired of people asking me, A.) Are you just ready to explode? and B.) Aren't you just SO miserable (b/c you LOOK miserable)? baby girl is measuring kind of large and my normally straight-faced doctor even used the phrase 'crimeny! this is a big baby!' when she inspected the belly a few weeks ago. it's okay though, b/c apparently, i have the pelvis for it, she assured me. nice...thanks doc.

so i hope that catches you up. you know i have to exhaust your ears/eyes (and my fingers) in this whole blogging process when I do it. i'm assuming i won't have the brain capacity to write one like this for awhile. hopefully our next update will include pictures of a cute baby girl! Squeeeeal!

~love from the bean.

Getting laid. off.

“As of May 20^th, 2009, your status as an employee has been terminated.”

That’s how my severance letter read. The actual meeting with HR went a bit differently. The HR director had a small wrinkled piece of paper on her hand that seemed like it had been working hard. You could tell it had been through a lot of these meetings. The piece of paper had bullet points on it. I couldn’t read what it said, but I’m sure it was her talking points and her key phrases.

• Hi, Ashley. I have _______ here in my office. We were just discussing your schedule. Could you come down so we could discuss it with you?

Pleasantries were exchanged. Three times I was asked how I was. Only two people in the room, but somehow they managed to ask that question three times.

I knew why I was there.

• I’m sorry to say that we’re going to have to let you go.

The words came abruptly. Even though I expected them, it was still sudden. The previous day, the day I returned to work from my vacation, I saw one person walking around the office crying. The person next to me received a phone call and never came back to his desk. Everyone knew what was going on – it was the third round this year.

• We just want to let you know this wasn’t a performance related decision.

That made me feel better, but I had heard this spill before when they talked about the previous people who had been selected to leave. I always assumed that they were being nice and polite in an effort not to further malign discarded employees. I mean, they had to make the decision somehow – who wouldn’t weed out the least fittest among us?

But then it was said to me.

I never had a negative performance review. I was pretty sure that I was going the extra mile for my project, at least a few extra hundred feet or so. But then, I wasn’t planning on leaving in a few months to go back to school. I had a billable project assignment. I was working overtime, and not being paid for it. Other people who were planning on leaving in a few months, did not have project assignments, and did not have enough work to keep them busy in overtime still had jobs.

So why me?

• We’ve met with 31 people regarding layoffs.

I know it was said in an effort to soften the blow. I assumed, as would be natural, that the two of these people had been in meetings with 31 different people the previous day and that morning. I felt sorry for them, to have to deliver this news to that many people in a short amount of time. I found out later that 31 was a total number, as in a total of all layoffs. The three rounds total. This round was only 10. You can’t soften the blow with 10.

So why me?

I did just return from a vacation. But it had been approved. I would assume that if they disapproved, they would have told me, instead of telling me to go on so they could let me go when I got back. When I came to the office Tuesday, I saw that there had been people who were higher up placed on the project. That’s when I really thought I might be in trouble. Apparently they didn’t have enough work to do, so they took my place.

Someone suggested maybe it was because the person making the decision didn’t know me. Possible, maybe even probable. Out of an office of 300+ people, it’s hard to have a personal relationship with everyone, and it may surprise you to know that I haven’t paraded myself around shaking hands and meetings people since I started there.

Who made this decision anyway? If it wasn’t performance related, what was it? The other two laid off architects were hired around the same time as me. Did they just work their way backwards from the most recent hires? Or did they pull my number out of a rotating hamster wheel? Is that what they want me to think?

• We hope to be able to hire you back in or around the first of September.

I took them as being sincere when they said that. I mean, they didn’t have to say it. Why would they lie? But what if they were kind of skirting the truth, like the 31 people thing? What if they meant, “We hope to hire you back in or around the first of September as a janitor?”

Based on my severance package, I think they’re being honest, but who knows.

I’ve been asked what I’m going to do. What am I going to do? I’ve filed for unemployment. It sounds nice to be a beach bum living off of the government. Hey – I’m just being honest. Summer really is the best time to be without a job.

Of course, I’ll be productive. I will help out with Olaria. Hopefully I can help that make some money. I will be studying for my ARE’s. Might as well get those over and done with. Getting things ready for buttercup will take up a good chunk of time. I will be doing some household stuff, kind of a househusband role, and, hopefully, I can have some time to do some things I’ve never taken time to do.

Oh yeah, and a job. Well, I have to agree to actively search for a job while on unemployment. So I’ll do that, too. I have some people that have already offered things to me, so that’s nice. Little things I think I can do from home. Even better. There are zero architecture jobs available in this country, so there’s nothing that would really help with my career. But there are several temporary positions available, and there’s always Starbucks. Or maybe I could get an outside job? It’s nice here in the summer… Whatever it is, I have to work out our budget before I make a decision there.

• We’re so sorry. This sucks.

I don’t remember if that was said, but I’m pretty sure it should have been.

Ashley

belly pics and baby at 19 weeks

For those of you who don't have facebook, these are for you. Which is probably only about 2 people, whose names are Tom and Paula. These are pics of little girl at 19 weeks and a couple of 22 week belly shots of me. The angle makes me look slimmer than I am...oh, the vanity shot. Enjoy!

Lady in the Street...

Neighbors--
To whomever recovered the air-brushed unmentionable in the laundry this week,

I'M SO SORRY

Also, I'm slightly embarrassed even though I'm laughing about it. And to explain myself, I must add that they were a gag bachelorette gift that referenced a Ludacris song and not a personal note about my behavior inside the proverbial sheets. They only come out when it's past time to do laundry, but they ARE comfortable nonetheless. I hope that your unfortunate find gave you more of a laugh than just reason to be awkward in the stairwell.

Sincerely,

Your non-freakish neighbor,

Amy

fun with photobooth, part 2

and now i have to change the blog login so ash can't delete this post...

fun with photobooth, part 1

enjoy...

Winter Wonderland

So Amy and I just moved (well, we're still in process) to Jamaica Plain, a neighborhood just to the south of Boston. We had grown tired of the Fenway because of Red Sox season, parking issues, landlord issues, parking issues, and Red Sox season. And landlord issues. It got to be too much.

But, we really liked JP - and it's really close to Amy's studio. There are a lot of people we like who live near here, too, so that's nice. We found an apartment on the second floor of this three story house. It's really awesome because it's right next to the Forest Hills Cemetery - I can see your face right now, but it's not like that. FH is a victorian cemetery, and it's really beautiful. (www.foresthillstrust.org) We can look out of our apartment and see woods and small gravestones in the distance. It's really quite nice. There are sculpture gardens, and a lot of people go for walks, run, there are concerts in the chapel, neighborhood events, etc.

We actually hired movers (a great thing) to move the heavy stuff. We had asked some friends to help us, but seeing as how the high Friday and Saturday was going to be somewhere between 6 and 13, we thought we'd keep our friends and hire movers.

It snowed today, so Amy and I took a break from unpacking boxes and went for a walk through the wintry cemetery. Here are some pics! The yellow house is where we live - second floor apt.