Earlier this week, I returned to the Googleplex as a contracted employee. It was kind of weird to be back, yet nice. These are the highlights and lowlights. After an hour or so of work, I stepped into the microkitchen to get some breakfast. Ooh, endless bowl of cherries. I snagged a bowl of those, some cherries. Saw that they now have Smartfood, Chex Mix and Pop Chips. Their siren song already calling, I made a mental note to find those a home in my stomach later that day.
Working at the laptop, I could notice a lot of jaw, back, neck pain creeping back in. Similar to how it was when I was there full-time. It’s my bad posture so I can’t really blame the company – I just need to fix how I sit so close that I’m almost diving into the laptop screen. The place I sit in is nice and open. And I’m surrounded by people!
Eventually it was off to the bathrooms where I rediscovered my love for heated Japanese toilet seats. How I’ve missed those. Then somehow the bathroom perks reminded me of how used to the pampering you get when you’ve been there long enough. I remember countless times walking into a non-Google bathroom, putting my hands under the faucet and wondering why water wasn’t automatically coming out. It eventually dawned on me that not everyone has auto-sensors installed.
Had lunch with two good friends and former colleagues. I stepped away for a minute to get some chocolate covered strawberries. Upon return, they decided, “You look so much happier and more confident than when you used to work here full time.”
Had meetings with my old team which was cool yet strange. Most people understood my decision not to return full time. My old supervisor was curious too. It simply came down to the realization that I wouldn’t've been passionate about the work. Or more importantly, I wouldn’t've learned anything new and that would have bored me to tears. Well, likely to anger and resentment and that’s not a place I need to visit 5 days a week.On the drive back from that meeting (yes, the buildings are kind of that far) I grab a bag of Chex Mix.
The afternoon sped by or, rather, I made it speed by because I wanted to get out of there by 3:30 to not deal with rush hour. 60 minutes to get home which isn’t really bad, but still a lot of time.
I think I’ll need to speed up this transition so that sooner rather than later, I can spend hours at Google instead as a visitor than a contractor.
