Nine 2 Five

Whether you love it or hate it, work is one of those unavoidable evil necessities. Without work you wouldn't be able to eat, or go shopping, or collect tiny smurfs. You may have a successful career that fulfills you, and it may be everything you have worked towards since leaving school. Or you may despise it and become bankrupt. Or you may have a nine to five dead end job that leaves you raggard and haggard. Or else you may love it. Or you could be a full time Mum. (and we all know this is the hardest position of employment going. With the lowest rate of pay). I am a full time Mum, but just last year I had the good fortune to be offered a couple of days employment. After nearly four years of not 'working', I suddenly felt readyish to return to the workplace. After all, my youngest daughter was 18 months old and SURELY a couple of days of adult interraction and actually forcing my brain to switch on, without the aid of 18 cups of coffee must be a good thing, right? And besides, its very rare these days to actually be asked to work for someone. So i accepted the position of Pharmacy Assistant in a brand new pharmacy and off I went to find some new shoes to wear to work.
I have always worked in pharmacy. My Mum got me my first job after school rotating stock and cleaning in a small chemist in the small town where I grew up. Everyone knew everyone, and being the immature teenager that I was it was extremely hard to hide my sniggers when one of my teachers would come in with their scripts for Viagra. But my boss was fantastic and trained me up to become a dispensary technician, dispensing scripts and counselling customers on their rashes and boils. Being a Pharmacy Assistant is a wonderful job, because if ANYTHING goes wrong you can shift the blame onto the Pharmacist. It is NEVER your fault.
And things DID go wrong...like one time our Pharmacist was away for a couple of years and we had to endure a string of locum Pharmacists throughout the duration...and what a bunch they were. There was one who used to wear a heavy woollen jumper in the middle of summer with a knitted stag on the front. I am not lying. He used to sit cross legged on the front counter (quite high) and play a banjo. When the locums arrived in town it was my duty to deliver the key to them at the shire house they were staying at. I met this same Pharmacist in the middle of the road. He was wearing a pair of red jocks, had a jumper tied around his neck and was running around 'flying like superman'....Once again, this is the honest truth. Then there was another one who was absolutely PHOBIC of ants. They terrified him. And of course the rental was full of tiny weeny little ants that would send him into a frenzy. He would arrive at work in the morning shaken and a bit pale, uttering insanities about the evil creepy crawlies. Another one that springs to mind was a real Hitler type. We called him 'Saint Bernard'. Yes his name was Bernard. He was one of the most arrogant men I have ever come across. His face was all pink and moist, a bit like raw sausage mince. One day I had some photos delivered of my friends and I at a party we had been to the weekend before. I had the photos in my work bag. Another staff member and I were stocktaking out the front of the shop, and I walked around to the back to get a drink and found the Saint with his pants on the floor (they had slipped apparently) and he was looking through my photos. I was so shocked I couldn't even say anything, and mumbled an excuse to get out of there. He carried on as he was.
And they were the more 'normal' ones.
Not long after I decided that all Pharmacists were morons and Med School must be one big drug fest,  and decided to study Beauty Therapy. It was a two year Tafe course and I loved every second of it. I was never that interested in the waxing and massage side of it. My main focus was Make-Up Artistry. It was during this course that I met my darling husband, found a new job at a local Beauty Salon and not long after fell pregnant. At Seven months I left work and began preparing for my hardest job yet.
After Lucy was born, people would say things to me like 'Now that you're a mum you know you're really alive don't you?' I have never understood this as I nearly always felt like I was only a few short steps away from death due to sleep deprivation and extreme anxiety. I suffered from post-natal depression which escalated to full-blown depression. And yet I was also the happiest I had ever been in my life. But still I managed to perform all the duties that were now expected of me and even managed to get out of the house once in a while in clean clothes. Without forgetting to pack the nappies, wipes, dummy, bottle, formula, spew rags, and the baby.
Then along came Alani two years later. By now I was much more comfortable and stress levels were much lower (thanks to Zoloft) and actually looked forward to starting this whole Mummy thing again. And from the beginning baby number two has been a breeze, sleeping and eating when she was meant to.
But it wasn't long before I once again began thinking that something was missing from my life. I began to think about returning to work. And pretty much the moment I began to question whether I could manage to complete a full nine hour shift after limited sleep, I was offered a job. I met with my future boss, decided straight away that he was one of the kindest people I had ever met, and thought ; "why not?".
So here I am. At the moment I am only working one day a week, but (and I know I shouldn't say this)  I absolutely relish that one blissful day a week where I don't have to listen to "Muuuuummmm....I have a blood nose again.."or "Mummy...I wanna chocowit bickit now!!.." every five minutes. My boss is still ridiculously understanding and nice beyond belief, completely 'normal' the other ladies there are brilliant. Even better, I get to finish an entire cup of coffee. Hot. And sometimes get to see some awesome rashes and boils.