1600 miles away from...

Id call it home, but it felt less and less like it as time slid by. Last week I moved from OK to the SF Bay Area in CA. A further step in the seperation/divorce process I suppose. All in all, after my last post, things went steadily down hill. Except for the last day or two and the conversations I had with my wife. But first, the bad news. Then the slightly-better-but-still-not-exactly-good news.

I was working for a video game retailer and I was fired. What?! Ive worked in retail damn near my entire working history, and never fired from a single job. Sweet Jesus! The bitch of it was that it wasnt a performance issue. It was a bogus claim that I was falsifying time records. Having been in retail management for the past few years, Ive had to let some people go for that myself, so I understand the importance. However, I was still asked to step into the back room of my store, and then accused of the aforementioned crime. Am I guilty? No. What I am guilty of is being overly considerate.

When the divorce talk started a few months ago, it seemed like things needed to happen quickly. I informed my boss that I may be leaving, as I was starting a job hunt due to a relocation that was a result of the impending divorcce. Then, the wife had a change of heart and decided that she wanted to work things out. Then she didnt. Needless to say, I had said too much to my employer about my impending departure. He couldnt count on me to be there and I cant blame him. I didnt know myself from one week to another how long I was going to be in OK. Sometimes it seemed like Id be there a few months. Others it felt like I should have been looking for work out of state since before the divorce was even mentioned.

In an effort to prepare my store for my departure, I had given my assistant manager the okay to submit the weekly payroll reports. ;; As a salaried manager, I was absolutely horrible about clocking in and out, but I would correct my punches when I submitted the payroll reports on Saturday nights. For my last four or five weeks with the company, my assistant manager had been putting in my time corrections. ;; My last three weeks of employment is the period of time in which I was accused of falsifying my time records.

Now, my assistant did me no wrong, Im not mad at him. He didnt set me up, it wasnt done with malicious intent. I was guilty of being late. The past few weeks in OK were rough. At one point, I didnt have a bed to sleep on (and a loveseat is a tight fight for a big guy like me as far as stretching out for sleep goes). I wasnt sleeping well anyway, as one might guess, and being bedless and emotionally drained, I was getting to work late, which I readily admitted. Now, me arriving to work late, and my assistant clocking me in on time does add up to time record falsification. ;; Was it knowingly? No. Was I stealing time? As a salaried employee, I was scheduled to work 45 hours per week. I normally worked that, or a little more. Our schedule was set up that I couldnt leave early from work, and I rarely ever got out on time.

My conversation with their LP (loss prevention) person was even worse, as she asked me how long it would be until I just up and stole something. When retail is what I do best, and all I really know how to do well, theft is not the way I will choose to end my career. I think that my attendence, if unacceptable, was coachable. ;; The training I had been privided as a manager-in-training from outside the company had not stressed the importance of accurate time tracking for salaried managers. Again, especially since someone else was doing the time punch corrections that I was accused of changing, coachable. ;; Instead, in a district that was consistantly around the last in the region, I think my district manager saw this as an opportunity to send a message that things need to change. He had told me before that there were going to be a lot of changes in the district, but that the managers who were being pressured to improve performance knew who they were. I had not been made aware of anything until I was put on the phone with LP. Since my termination, two other managers in the district have been fired, making my former DM look like a real badass.

So, there I was in OK. No job, no support from my spouse, no family or friends near by that didnt have ties to her family. Umbee is there, my brother-in-law, but it was weird to want to call him. Who knows what my wife had said, and it was hard to imagine having an evening of gaming or beers (or, better, both) while ignoring the divorce issue and my upcoming departure from their lives. He and my wifes family were (are) very supportive, but its still awkward. As much as I needed someone, I just couldnt get closer to people I was soon going to leave.

Two days before I moved to CA to take a job painting houses and such and live with family while I get back on my feet, I had a conversation with my wife that made it seem like the seperation is possibly temporary. There are things we both need to work on if were going to make our relationship work, and we can work on them or decide if we want to work on them while we work on getting our finances in order. I want to fix things, but at the same time I dont. I know there are things I need to improve about myself moving forward regardless of what happens, so Im focusing on that. I want my wife back because I love her and have missed her over the past few months since weve been apart. I dont want to fix things because I dont want to go back to a failing relationship, and I dont know if shes as serious about making changes to fix things as I am. ;; Time will tell, and whatever happens will likely be for the best.

Longest. Blog. Ever. My apologies.

Ag