May 25, 2023, Thursday morning, 6:21am, pacific standard time, hotel in Bakersfield, California, USA. The final interview for my new job is today at 11am. I am meeting with the district VP of operations and Human Resources. I wasn’t looking forward to the appointment. Things have been busy and stressful at work. However, I spent the morning preparing. Now I am eager for the interview. I wrote out my failures, my successes, times working with difficult people, my background, strengths, weaknesses, and leadership style. I feel confident and excited.

May 24, 2023, Wednesday morning, 6:46am, pacific standard time, hotel in Bakersfield, California, USA. I am enjoying a rare time of being in the moment. Last night I felt stress but woke up at peace. The trick is to have something to look forward to. For the rest of the summer I am focusing on self-care. Plotting out time off, not staying at one site too long and not trying to fix everything all at once. I basically burned out two months ago and have been going on fumes. I need to take time to re-charge. I plan on staying at this job for the remainder of my daughters high school career. I need to find a way to pace myself for all our benefit.

May 23, 2023, Tuesday night, 6:51pm, pacific standard time, hotel in Bakersfield, California, USA. Felt good this morning. Started planning days off for the summer. Labor Day, a two day trip back to Arizona, Fourth of July, then a week to visit mom in Wyoming with my daughter. I also announced to the Palm Desert team we hired a permanent replacement. Those things put together made the morning fun. Of course the work day was still exhausting. I am tired of the monotony. Memorial Day weekend can’t get here soon enough.

May 22, Monday night, 11:25pm, pacific standard time, hotel in Bakersfield, California, USA. Walked the dog this morning, took my daughter to school, did payroll and ran meetings. I got out of Orange County at noon, drove to Bakersfield, Spent an hour in the office, checked in to the hotel, then grabbed dinner. My corporate credit card is maxed out. I have to see about getting a limit increase or I will be incurring expenses on my personal card.

May 21, 2023, Sunday evening, 6:23pm, pacific standard time, apartment in Dana Point, California, USA. A good day. Usual Sunday anxiety, but enjoyable overall. I slept in past 8am, which is something I rarely do. Didn’t go for a walk or workout. Picked my daughter up at 10am and grabbed breakfast. Went and got a haircut at noon. Drank coffee at the coffee shop for a little while afterwards. Took a nap, went shopping, then dropped my daughter off at the softball fields so she could work the concession stand with her friend. Now I am doing laundry. On another note; my daughter’s mom found a check from a recently closed bank account. I had been looking for that check for months. Odd that I closed the account, but the bank sent the check to her solely in her name. I told her to keep the money. I am just happy the mystery is solved.

May 30, 2023, Saturday night, 9:03pm, apartment in Dana Point, California, USA. Walked this morning, grabbed coffee, worked out. Later, I picked up breakfast for my daughter. When I got to Aliso Viejo she wanted to drive around and listen to music so we ran errands. In the afternoon we went out to get dinner at her favorite burger place. Later, her mom came home from spending time with friends. I fed the dog then came back to Dana Point at 8:15pm. The sky was misty and overcast today. Yet, the air was warm with a puffing cool breeze. The kind of weather you only get in Southern California.

May 19, 2023, Friday morning, 11:03, office in Palm Desert, California, USA. Internal stress is the same as physical stress. There comes a point where exerting effort is counter productive. If I am working out and my muscles are fatigued there is no benefit continuing. The only remedy to heal is rest. The only way to get stronger is to take a break. I need to take time off from work to recuperate. I have been going too hard and too long without rest and it is no longer beneficial. We will see if I take that advice. I have a tendency to see the solution long before I act on it.

May 18, 2023, Thursday evening, 6:27pm, hotel in Palm Desert, California, USA. They extended an offer today to a Director candidate. He accepted. Thank god. I burned out on this place a long time ago. Not everything was bad. I have good memories and am proud of what we accomplished. It’s just that I expended so much energy turning this site around I ran out of energy. Now it is time to hand it off and let someone else run it. I feel relieved.

May 17, 2023, Wednesday afternoon, 4:27pm, office in Palm Desert, California,USA. Had a second interview for the area director position today. I was apprehensive to take on more responsibility at first. Now I am excited. The key to success will be hiring and retaining qualified directors. That is a skill I possess. The job would also offer more flexibility of schedule. Technically, I would be working from home and traveling 75% of the time. Right now I travel 100%. It would be nice to be home a little more, at least a couple times a month.

May 16, 2023, Tuesday morning, 6:39am, hotel in Palm Desert, California,USA. I remember back to working Tuesdays as a chaplain. They were typically good days. After a busy Monday catching up from the weekend things would settle down on Tuesday. I could set my schedule for the week and have plenty of free time built in. With this job Tuesdays are the worst. It is the first day back in the office and issues have been piling up since the weekend. My to do list is already long before I walk in the door. I find it interesting how every job has certain good days and bad days. Depending on the situation, what once was cherished can quickly become tedious.