Sylvia's Journal

I have started to slack off on my daily writing habit. I am adjusting (still) to the unsettled feeling of not knowing what is next. As there is no fall back full time position to catch me between assignments – only small HQ pieces of work, the substance (and I admit the joy) of the job will require plane rides to faraway places.

In Afghanistan there was another kind of ‘not knowing what is next,’ related more to the political situation and wondering where the next attack would be. But I had full time work and my travel schedule was very predictable with trips roughly 10 to 12 weeks apart.

Now that word has gone out that I am available, the tricky task of scheduling has commenced big time. One month ago when people asked me whether I was available my answer was always yes. I would gladly hop on a plane and get to my next assignment.

There are now several next assignments and requests in the hopper that have to be molded around my vacation to Holland, the holidays and my next assignment to Japan. Maybe ‘shoe-horned’ in is a better expression. Could I come to Kenya, to South Africa, before December 15 or early January? That sort of shoehorning.

Afghanistan is missing from the queue and I fear that by the time a request for the first visit (1 of 4 budgeted trips before august 2012) comes to help set up the new team for management and leadership (something I would like to do very much) I am booked for the year. I already see that four trips won’t fit if I don’t want to live in airports.

I am rediscovering how this travel will mess up my social life, not to speak of my marital life as Axel, watching this shoe-horn kind of scheduling from the sidelines. Another overseas position is becoming more and more attractive to him (and somewhat less to me but that might change soon), even if it were to be Nigeria where an opportunity is now presenting itself.