New Job?

Date: 4/4/2022

We're at the dinner table with my Mom, siblings and kids. Kids are making announcements about plans and work. When everyone's done I tell my mother: "I may also be getting a new job." She raises her eyebrows. I smile, "Probably not a job you will be happy with." She shakes her head and warns us about the tanking economy and how it will hurt workers in our province hardest because so much subsidy money has already been spent here. "That's actually what I'll be working on," I tell her. A look of hope flashes in her eyes but is quickly replaced with obligatory frustration at me and head shaking. Alas. I will be making more money, which should please her. I worry about who is available to replace me in my current role. Maybe I should stay. At work, I ask for a five or ten minute break, and we are allowed to leave our tables. I am expected in Room 3 for a discussion of the new opportunity. I walk around the crowded square hallway of offices and lecture halls (Residence) looking for Room 3. Most rooms are numbered in the hundreds. The single-digit rooms are special. There are rowdy young men around the door pushing people inside, where I sit down at a class desk. The teacher says the class will be 35 min, but I have to get back to work. Can I slip out? She is explaining what readings and assignments are past due but I haven't done any of it, and have no time right now.