it's my first year of work

(and oh, i feel like i'm back in kindergarten)

i sent this text to a friend several months after starting my first job. when i first started working, i thought that i would feel ready, equipped. but most days, i feel severely under-educated to take on my work. i feel so unprepared, so clueless. because i might know the difference between glucose and sucrose, but i don't know the difference between an invoice and a quotation. i might know how to take an exam, but i don't know how to talk to clients. i might have a bachelor's degree, but there is still so much i don't understand. i am awkward and clumsy and confused, all the time.

and the people at work have been kind, so kind. they have been patient in answering my unending questions. they have sat with me at lunch and offered me food. any time i have messed up, they have helped me clean it up. and yet, and yet, most days i still feel so lost, so anxious, so young. there is so much i don't know, and i have such a long way to go. the thought itself is overwhelming.

it's barely past 6am. i got home well past 9pm yesterday, and i've been awake since half past 4. i'm on my way to work to prepare for a big event. i'm sleepy and tired, and it's not until i'm 10 minutes away from the office that i look out the car window and up at the sky.

and the sky, the sky, it's so blue. it's dotted with clouds, like someone has dabbed white paint on a blue canvas. all messy and uneven. i think, in my half-awake state, of angels. still in kindergarten, still in their first year of school. still learning how to paint the skies with clouds. still learning how to rustle leaves with the wind. still learning how to make waves. i think of their small hands, wet with paint. i think of their gleeful smiles as they decorate the morning sky. i think of a young angel, cheeks stained with tears, hiccupping as he joins his classmates in creating clouds.

i think of the time i was four and crying before kindergarten. i think of the way i didn't want to let go of my mother's hand. i think of the fear of stepping out of safety, and into the great unknown. and i realize none of that is too different from 21-year old me. i, too, am stepping into a new place, with new people and new rules and new activities. all of this is not too different from being four, and realizing that the world is so much bigger than you could have ever imagined. i think to myself, maybe it's normal to feel a little scared and a little teary. maybe it's okay to cling a little harder to my blanket in the morning. maybe it's okay to feel so overwhelmed.

and here, looking up at the bright blue sky, i think of crooked trees and half-bloomed roses. i think of barely-there rainbows and melting snowflakes. i think of angels at work for the first time. still learning, still growing, still young. i think of wide-eyed wonder, of budding confidence when they see what their hands can do. i think of potential, how it is as empowering as it is overwhelming. i think of new discoveries and new friends. i think of clumsy hands creating something messy and uneven and beautiful.

and i think to myself, perhaps a beginner is not such a bad thing to be.