At the end of December, I was going to be reassigned to a new country and trained for a different position.
At the beginning of January, I was going to wait a month before getting reassigned and retrained.
In the middle of January, I was going to be assigned to a short-term (six month) tour in DC.
Now, at the end of January, it seems like perhaps I'll be going to Mali sometime in February, to do the job I've already been trained for.
But... maybe not.
This is the foreign service life: a roller-coaster of not knowing what's next, or ever what the next couple weeks might look like. And I have to say, it's hard. Oh sure, I'm still working, and getting paid; my health is decent, and I get to see family more. But getting all wound up to move, planning how the next few weeks might look, and then having to put it all on hold again... every month... is exhausting.
Now granted, I'm in a relatively unusual situation; this shouldn't be my life from now on, throughout whatever career I may have in the Foreign Service. But at the moment, it seems all-encompassing. I'm working on trying to deal with in a mature, calm, and logical fashion. Sometimes I giggle about it. Other times I rage.
Out of a class of seventy-six Foreign Service Officers, I will be number seventy-six to actually go to post and start my first assignment. On the other hand, I'll be one of the first to get DC experience. Pros and cons.
Luckily, I have some great mentors and friends to help me through all of this, not to mention superb parents who are supportive and excited and invested in experiencing it right along with me.
So despite the frustration of not knowing, and aside from often feeling like I've just stepped off a roller coaster that was a bit too much for me... I'm a pretty lucky lady.
--Z
At the beginning of January, I was going to wait a month before getting reassigned and retrained.
In the middle of January, I was going to be assigned to a short-term (six month) tour in DC.
Now, at the end of January, it seems like perhaps I'll be going to Mali sometime in February, to do the job I've already been trained for.
But... maybe not.
This is the foreign service life: a roller-coaster of not knowing what's next, or ever what the next couple weeks might look like. And I have to say, it's hard. Oh sure, I'm still working, and getting paid; my health is decent, and I get to see family more. But getting all wound up to move, planning how the next few weeks might look, and then having to put it all on hold again... every month... is exhausting.
Now granted, I'm in a relatively unusual situation; this shouldn't be my life from now on, throughout whatever career I may have in the Foreign Service. But at the moment, it seems all-encompassing. I'm working on trying to deal with in a mature, calm, and logical fashion. Sometimes I giggle about it. Other times I rage.
Out of a class of seventy-six Foreign Service Officers, I will be number seventy-six to actually go to post and start my first assignment. On the other hand, I'll be one of the first to get DC experience. Pros and cons.
Luckily, I have some great mentors and friends to help me through all of this, not to mention superb parents who are supportive and excited and invested in experiencing it right along with me.
So despite the frustration of not knowing, and aside from often feeling like I've just stepped off a roller coaster that was a bit too much for me... I'm a pretty lucky lady.
--Z
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