Farewell working life - what a summer!

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Admittedly it was never my intention to work over the summer. Having returned to my old Burnham stomping ground from Poole, I decided that I would enjoy a carefree summer, with no burden of work responsibility, before beginning my world travels in October. What I hadn't expected was the chance meeting at the football club that would change the course of the summer's events significantly for the better...

I hadn't intended to go to the football club that Saturday. My very lovely friend Bette * (*note, not real name - pseudonym given to protect identity, and chosen due to my friend's legendary karaoke tributes to Bette Midler) decided we were going to support her husband and other friends playing in a charity match. Having successfully traversed a rhyne, complete with buggy, baby and 2 year old, just to save walking a couple of hundred yards to the nearest 'official' crossing, I bumped into so many people that I hadn't seen since I returned from Poole. One of them - Kathy - is one of life's lovely people, who I know through being friends with her son. We got talking and she mentioned that there might be a receptionist job going at the holiday park where she worked. Now as I've mentioned, I had no intention of working - in my head, the summer was going to be filled with lazy summer days sitting outside pubs with my friends, leisurely supping Fosters from bottles at £1 a time....

And then reality kicked back in - the last time any bottle of lager was £1 in a pub was about 1997. A time of being carefree, responsibility-free and more often than not, even in the face of severe alcohol consumption, hangover-free. Now admittedly, not much has changed in my world (with the exception of the hangover-free bit - hangovers are now truly evil, often 2-day events), but life has changed a lot for my 'gang'. Married, children, mortgages - all had taken their toll on my friends' ability to help me relive my 1997 dream. I looked around the football club again, turned to Kathy and found myself abandoning the fantasy, saying, ' I'd love to work this summer'.

Within a week I joined the holiday park, and what a decision that turned out to be. I loved the job - to see so many people enjoying themselves on their holiday and to feel that, in some small way, you've had a positive impact on that experience for them, can't be beaten. I'd say that I've loved every single minute of it however that would be a lie. One day a little sparrow flew into reception and, being uber-phobic of our feathered friends, they were 5 long minutes of work I'd like to forget...

I also met the loveliest group of people - just as Kathy had described. My girls on reception welcomed me so well and seemed to get me down to a tee - within a couple of weeks they'd force-fed me copious amounts of red wine, and introduced me to the crazy world of fishbowls full of cocktails. You also realise that it makes a world of difference to be thanked for doing your job every day - putting my HR consultant hat on, there are a lot of companies that could learn huge amounts on creating a positive employee culture from the management team there.

From the chance meeting at the football club, I've made some great friends for life and learned that you don't need to have a huge corporate job to be happy. There's a lot to be said for not being stressed from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep, dreading the flashing red light of a Blackberry 24/7 for fear that it would mean dropping anything to solve a problem or complete an urgent task. It's also allowed me time to be me - time to work out exactly what I want to do with my tomorrow, without the constant heavy pressure of having to deal with the problems of today.

Not that I've actually decided what I want to do tomorrow - other than play my last skittles game for my team for this year and finish my packing for the world trip. One thing's for sure though - as soon as I come back, I'll be down to that lovely holiday park in a flash because I won't be able to wait to share all the photos/experiences of the six month trip with them. Oh, and I'm desperate to see the sparkly new reception that's being built over the winter... ;-)

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