Time passes strangely these days: in some ways it stands still and in other ways it moves quite quickly now. Although I listen to the last draft of my current piece daily, it’s been some months now since I really worked on the piece, with only a handful of sessions of real work happening in that time. My job has been extremely busy and has taken quite a lot of the my mental energy, the evenings often left too tired to continue to work any more on music or much of anything else but to watch a show or two before retiring for the night. Every company has busy and light periods and this is probably the busiest in the history of the company; I also had to learn quite a bit and was made responsible for a fair amount quickly which was a stressful. As much as I tell myself it is only temporary and that it is just the stress of joining a new company, I still find it hard to think that so much time has passed since last really working with sound and music. It does seem to have started to settle down, at least in my mind, as I have gotten much more acquainted with all of the work and the business, but there is still much I can do to keep focused.
Since starting this new job, because I am working from home and starting early at 8AM every day, I have found that I generally end my work day earlier than I ever did before. The days can feel quite long this way when one starts early and does not need to commute to and from work, something which I do rather like. This experience has been very interesting and in some ways is very natural to me when compared to my existence in Warsaw the year before this summer, though of course working a full-time job is a completely different experience than living and working on one’s own interests. On the whole though I can say I am enjoying telecommuting for a job very much at this time.
Before I came back from Warsaw I thought about how life would get when I returned; I have been thinking about how life is going now and seeing things which are good about my situation and seeing things I’d like to change to better support my more personal interests. I have been imagining what the ideal life for me would be, seeing images of myself reading, observing life, composing, writing, and just living quiet, timeless days. Something to actively think about and aspire towards…
The same thing happened to me quite a while ago, and now any progress I make on my own interests is a struggle.
I DO have a long commute; 1 hour each way. Fortunately I am able to take a commuter bus and let someone else do the driving. I listen to podcasts or music, and I do lots of reading. I don’t do as much writing as I would like; I prefer to write directly into a digital device, and this is laborious on my PDA. The laptop that should be arriving tomorrow may solve this problem for me. I hope to be able to do much more.
I don’t know how your day is structured other than what you’ve written. Are you required to put your hours in at certain times of the day or can you do it anytime? If the second is an option, you may want to time your most creative periods for yourself; the slightly less for your company, and the times when you’re completely wiped out for the DVD player.
Good luck adapting to the working world!
I like to keep a regular schedule and so far it is mostly working out. I remember when I lived in New York taking the subway to and from work I got a quite a bit of reading don a found that that was a nice way to buffer between personal time and work time.
Thanks for the well wishes!