Mommy, wow! I'm a big kid now.

A year ago, sick to death of retail, I was desperately considering two options: grad school or a desk job. I fantasized about sitting down most of the day. I thought about having my own phone extension and a business card. I thought about wearing all my pretty Ann Taylor clothes to work, but not to advertise them; just because that's what was in my wardrobe, and they're professional.

So I talked to a few of my Ann Taylor associates who, unlike me, also had full-time office jobs, and they promised to keep their eyes open for similar occupations for me. I allowed myself to go wild in my imagination of a future as a professional woman...but still thought of myself as being perhaps a receptionist, having no real experience in the business world apart from selling people clothes. I never bothered to daydream about my own office; I realistically decided not to shoot too high, but imagined a better life than fourteen-hour days in retail in constant terror of employment termination due to low sales.

And now I have an office job.

It's better than what I had allowed myself to dream. I have my own office. I am not a receptionist, but a director. I have my own phone extension, my own computer, and soon my own business cards (that will say Director of Events and Marketing on them!!). I've held the position for just over a week, and I've already started meeting important people in the community, and making contacts with area businesses in preparation for our most involved and productive fundraising event of the year, the Miracle Auction in March.

I love it. I report to the Sr. Director of the Development Team (Angie), and as I'm a complete rookie I'm relying heavily on everyone else's knowledge and experience (particularly as I'm still green to the South Bend area and don't know anyone -- right now there's a flurry of names being tossed around that I'm just scribbling down and hoping to learn as time goes by), but largely I'm responsible for myself. I'm in charge of getting done the daily tasks that need accomplishing. I'm in charge of keeping updated, complete, and accurate records of every call I make and every donation promise I receive.

It's awesome. My Virgo self is in love with all the recordkeeping and listmaking. My independent self is in love with the control I largely have over my own time management. My get-out-of-here self is in love with lunchbreaks and off-site meetings. My professional self is in love with making so many new contacts and meeting so many new people. My ambitious self is in love with the goal of improving upon the people who have held my position in the past and being the best Director of Events and Marketing ever. My social self is in love with being able to do things with people relatively late at night again, and with being able to get around and visit coworkers periodically during the day.

Last week I attended an off-site committe meeting which flowed freely with ideas, laughter, appetizers, and wine. Tuesday I went out to lunch with the fabulous MP and one of our friends in the area. Tomorrow for lunch I'm attending a meeting to taste-test the entrees for the Auction at the ritzy Palais Royale.

I feel like I've graduated to real life. Not that anything I've done since graduation wasn't real life -- it was very real life, being poor and overworked and uninsured, and then poor and overworked (but insured) with at-risk children -- but this, now, is real, settled, relatively secure professional life. Of course there is the small, familiar voice in me whispering, "But what if you screw it up and get fired?" but the larger, newer voice briskly answers, "You won't." And that's the voice I believe.

When I first accepted the promotion a couple of months ago, MP said, "Sarah, you're your own chicklit heroine!" And, funny, it's true. I have a decently-paying (though I won't by any stretch of the imagination be rich), high-powered, fulfilling job for a really worthy cause, I get three weeks paid vacation every year (THREE WEEKS!!!)...and at the end of the day I come home to a reheated dinner and my cat, change into casual clothes (usually pajamas), and sit alone on the couch to watch DVD collections of TV shows.

It's a really good thing the job is going so well, and that I wake up eager to go to work in the morning, and that I have such fun with my fabulous female and gregarious grad school friends, because the singleness aspect of my life has been wearing lately. Leigh Ann pointed out last night that, really, it isn't necessarily a boyfriend I want, but certain things (physical contact -- almost no one hugs me or touches me at all -- companionship, walks, dinner options) that usually come neatly and conveniently packaged in a boyfriend. So if I can't have that tidy package, I need to look for the broken-down elements in separate places. (Isn't she smart?)

And I'm feeling, after my long absence from and sudden ready presence among the graduate school community, sort of passed over (left out? forgotten? pick the least offensive word, since I'm sure no one does it consciously). Maybe it's that I'm too tired this week and lacking perspective, or that I can't expect to dive back in after keeping such limited hours for so long and expect to be effusively welcomed or expect things to go right back to where they were. Actually it's probably both. But the truth is that while I'm extraordinarily comfortable with my own company and certainly need a majority of quiet evenings and time alone, I'm also tired of being by myself. I don't work closely with any one person every day, so my social needs are no longer met through Meg (insert forlorn sad face). And after years of holding people off out of a fear of not being able to give them the right, agape sort of love, and out of the fear of being hurt and let down, I want to jump back in and cultivate a close group of good friends who love each other well and have a relaxed, good time together. But those things take time, and at the best of times I'm not very patient. So I need to dedicate myself to a gradual process, and wait. (Getting more involved with my church will help in this area, too...and so far I've attended church within my goal for the year: 3 Sundays a month.)

So yes -- wonderfully, thankfully, the job is going beautifully. I love it. And now I must go and continue checking off the items on today's priority list.