Another great week has come and gone. I almost can't believe July is almost halfway over, now. But as usual, this has been another week with some highs and some lows.
One of the harder thing this week was a learning moment at work, for me. I think I've mentioned, in months previous, that I have had the awesome opportunity to really jump into the scene of becoming a networking engineer, with setting up a new client at work. That itself has been both hard and fun, but there was a card I let slip through the gaps. When we were setting them up with Office365 licensing, the project manager at the time instructed me to set them up with a monthly subscription that is paid annually. I didn't think much of it, as just assumed that particular purchasing method gave us a discount or something. But that project manager has since left the company, and the new one for this client came up to me the other day and reprimanded me for what I did. It was evident that once I explained the situation, he understood a bit more, but he was still clearly upset at me.
In telling this story, I am well aware there are FAR worse situations somewhat similar to this that arise in other workplaces, and great injustices are done. While that could be its own topic, I mainly want to talk about how to deal with a situation of this caliber. I was temporarily removed of my login access to assign licenses, because of this situation. If you wanted to target down fault in me, the best you could get is that I didn't question authority, and actually look into the validity of what I was told. But honestly, at the end of the day, it was an issue that I think shouldn't have been assigned blame to me. I say that, because I am often very self-conscious about taking responsibility and going out of my way to not get in other people's way.
And even now, as I write down the account of this, I feel some of the frustration and even anger I felt in that encounter. But I know now, just like I did then, that sometimes Abraham Lincoln was right- it is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubts. I could probably have easily argued my out of that situation, but I don't think either of us would have walked away any less upset about the facts. Sometimes, it's best to just take the blow to the face and let the troubles pass on there way. Now, as I say that, I also recognize there are, in fact, times in which speaking up and being heard is not only necessary, but critically important. I will be the first to admit I have a hard time, sometimes, finding the right moments to do each of these things. As usual, it's never a matter of black and white, but seasons and times. I guess I mention this experience because, as many important change happen in this world, ask yourself how important your reasons are before blabbing on about things that really don't matter much in the grand scheme of things.
But that was the bad part of the week. The good part was hanging out and camping with my friends. I've become very aware now, that honestly, there are few things as nice as a small bunch of friends hanging out around a campfire in the woods, underneath the beautiful, starry sky above. And it's times like those, you know you can all just level, talk honest, and just talk about real challenges in life- now matter how awkward or personal they may be. So, it was nice to have that this week.
It was also nice to return to a sort of equilibrium-like state on my home network. For some weeks and even months, now, I have had to abandon my old Ubiquiti router, because it just wasn't powerful enough to handle the subnetting and routing I had it setup for. Recently, though, I came by a Sonicwall Firewall, and now I can subnet my home networks again into each their own network! And see, I just reread that sentence I just typed, and I am further realizing just how weird I am, considering the things that make me happy. But hey, let me have my fun, right?
This week, I'm going on a long trip with my wife and her family. We have a lot of adventures planned, so it should be fun! Until next week, see you all! (If anyone really reads these, anyway.)