Sorry for the lack of posting but believe it or not, I've been working the past few weeks. I've been freelancing, getting temp work in something I actually do for a living (that is when I'm actually doing something for a living). The job is supposed to last for the month of September and is to fill in for somebody who took a month-long leave of absence for various reasons that are still unclear.

Now here's the twist on everything and something that I have never, ever said on this blog about a temp assignment-- I really like it there. A lot. It's one of the nicest places I've worked and it feels right, like I just fit there. So much so that even though I've been there for only two and a half weeks, I feel like I've been there for months and here's the kicker- I think my coworkers feel the same way. I'm already joking around with my really fun cubicle neighbors, making snarky comments to other coworkers over clients with whom I pretty easily figured out deserve snarky comments, and march into my higher ups office as if it's no big deal.

And despite the fact this all happened very suddenly and I got about two days of training, I'm ON it-- I get everything to the point that on my first day solo I was able to do the job and answer questions that I shouldn't have been able to do or answer because I never got trained on it. Right now, the place is starting up with their biggest campaign of the year, a monsterous project involving about thirty different components that all have to be done at the same time and while I was pretty intimidated about it when I started because everybody told me how hellish it is (it's the reason, I think, why the person who I'm replacing took a break), I figured out the whole thing in a couple of days. The result of which is that I'm already treated like one of the team and being thrown all the responsibility of someone who's done the job for years. Nobody blinks twice about asking me to do things that nobody who has been on the job for just two weeks should do.

But here's the thing, technically the job is supposed to end at the end of the month, when the person with whom I'm replacing is supposed to come back. There's some vagueness to what's going to happen-- nobody's said anything definitive and an occasional comment is made that there might be a slight-- very very slight-- chance that I could stay. Among other things, today I heard something that had been rumored, that the person who left might not come back or might take more time off.

Now, as somebody who has done this plenty of times, I know better than anyone that when temping, it's best to keep your head down, not be super-friendly, and try not to get emotionally attached to it. This isn't happening with this job-- I want to stay there and stay there forever. I don't think I've ever felt this comfortable and had such an easy time in a job than this one. All of which is causing a problem. The whole thing is like meeting someone and thinking you really hit it off and that they could possibly be the love of their life but you find out they're leaving the country or something in a month and as hard and as hard as you try not to get too emotionally attached, you can't help it. Sadly, we all know how these things end-- either there's either going to be some cheesy moment at the airport or there won't be and it's back to unemployment while trying not to pay attention to the fact we're headed to the next Great Depression.

The problem is that as hard as it is to get emotionally attached, it's darn near impossible. The people think so highly of me that my amazingly awesome art director took time out of her amazingly busy schedule to make some personalized job sheets for me, one with my name. She also took some time out of her amazingly busy schedule to email my boss to tell her how good of a job I'm doing and how much she loves me being there. Other employees come up to me and thank me for helping them with something.

So here's hoping there's a cheesy moment at the airport. I want to be Natalie Portman to the job's Zach Braff. Sadly, without the great CD soundtrack.