I, with the help of my darling husband, just took 99% of the personal stuff out of my office and down to the car. My office looks a little bare and empty. My corkboard is filled with pins and shadows of the pictures and papers that used to hang there. I’ve worked here for just over two years, which seems improbably short (I planned to be here for much longer, but opportunity knocked and dangled more money and more challenge and so I go) but long enough for the corkboard to have faded around the edges of my photos. There are dusty spaces on my L shaped desk, marking the places where my name plate and coffee mug filled with pens have always rested.

I work here, in this good place, for three more days. I have some things to finish up, but not much. I have breakfast with my staff tomorrow morning and lunch with a friend tomorrow afternoon and then a little good-bye reception on my last day. A nice way to end things, even though I don’t think it has really sunk in yet that I’m leaving.

It is kind of strange when you leave a job that you were happy, content, just fine in. I don’t daydream about making some grand “Screw you all I AM OUT OF HERE” gesture. I genuinely hope things continue to go well for my program when I leave. I’ll miss some people a lot, a handful of people not at all, and will hopefully have all my bridges in tact and free from fire when I leave.

I don’t think I’ll talk much about my new job but I’ll say this: it is bigger in almost every sense. Bigger school, bigger campus, bigger (much) staff, bigger paycheck, bigger everything. I am certain it will demand more of me, of my time, my energy, my skills. I’ve been hired specifically to bring about change. I’d be a damn fool if I expected that change will be eagerly and graciously accepted by my new staff. I know I’ll have to put on my big girl panties and deal with the dreaded people not liking me thing (which is one of my less favorite things)(Who am I kidding? I’ve lived most of my life wanting everyone to like me all the time. Not at all unreasonable)(I’m almost over that)(But totally not over my love of the parenthetical comment, obvs)

This new job is bigger. I hope, fervently, that I am big enough for it.