Sometimes, you just have to laugh.
We had a team event organized for the last half of the today, with a dinner and drinks session after. This has been scheduled for about six months with a TBA on what the events will be. A couple weeks ago, we found out that we would spend it in a VR experience, where we would have few hours to explore 3D worlds and if we want, face some of our fears, like heights. We were all looking forward to it, especially after a couple of the team have already visited and really enjoyed it.
So, after working remotely, I turn up to the address and the door is locked and the windows are dark - since "brain fade" is my middle name now, I double-checked the invite and I was at the right place at the right time, so I waited. A few minutes later, half the team arrive walking together and my supervisor asks, "You didn't get my Teams message?"
Nope.
Then sheepishly he added - "I booked it for the wrong day."
Doh!
Thankfully, our team has no chill and he is going to hear about this for some time to come, but it is all in good fun, as we all know we make mistakes of various kinds and with all the things on people's plates (except mine), schedule mix-ups happen. I am actually pretty surprised they don't happen more to be honest.
But, when the virtual world is not available - it is always possible to get some real drinks instead, which is what we did, choosing to have one at a bar that overlooks the city. We then moved onto another ad hoc idea of visiting a museum displaying a history of Finnish gaming and then toward dinner, which was great.
The entry image was taken at the museum:
Not bad for a phone edit eh?
While we have a couple colleagues in the US who are "team-adjacent" the core team all reside in Finland, but are spread between two cities. Combined with Covid restrictions, this means that while we do talk to each other often, we don't get to spend much time as a team together. The team has also changed a lot this year, with some moving out to internal positions, some moving in and, a few new trainers to boot. This means that without a lot of face to face interaction, it has been hard to "connect" with people and hard to build a culture.
One of the best ways to build bonds, is shared experience, which is why we were having this team event in the first place. What is funny, the schedule cock-up today is one of the stories that will greatly improve team social unity (we work well together) as it is the kind of thing that is both memorable and funny - and as a bonus, it is also the fault of our supervisor, making it an even more effective tool for relationship building, at his expense. He is a good guy and a good supervisor - and he also has a good sense of humor and is able to laugh at himself, so all's well that ends well.
Team building challenge complete.
For me though, this was another kind of test, as I was able to spend some time with colleagues that don't know me well and some who do, but haven't seen me since my stroke. It is very hard to follow when there are multiple conversations across the dinner table, especially when many of them are in Finnish, which I do not speak well and never speak with my colleagues.
I got to have some spur of the moment and dynamic conversations that quickly broached many topics and came from different viewpoints that required some consideration. What I found was that while I still can't build the imagery needed to process quickly, I am able to participate well at least, though I tend to get lost at times, where I am unable to think faster than I speak, meaning that I run out of roads of thought before I have finished saying my piece. Then, it takes time to catch up and I sit there silent or stammering, like a doofus.
After dinner, I walked one of the colleagues I do know well, but haven't seen for ages, to where her bike was parked not far from my car. She is interested in many of the same things as I, including learning processes and understanding psychological process. She is far more academic than me in this, and I am near completely observational.
She asked about various sides of it and as I am very open with this, I told her what I could along the short walk, including that I don't really know what I will do if my ability to visualize information well, doesn't return, especially in regards to the value I am able to bring to the world.
She took this to mean my employment, which is of course a big part of my experience and I value greatly, but it is more than that. Adding value to the world doesn't just come through using skill to make money, it can come in other forms too. One of the things I am also considering is that because my mental visual ability is core to who I have been, without it I am forced to adapt and change. This is of course not necessarily a bad thing, but just think about all of the relationships you have and consider what happens when people change significantly - how many of those relationships are able to be maintained?
At the very least, the relationships themselves change and there is a lot of potential for them to fail completely, as even though we know and cold accept the change in people, we also tend to be attracted to or distance ourselves from certain kinds of people, regardless of our history together.
Shared experience only goes so far and if one party significantly diverges from their personality path, it is very common for the "You changed" or the "I changed" conversation to be had (even if in the head) and distance become the new norm. I know that my wife struggled heavily with this in the first few weeks after I came home from hospital and had to question for herself - "What if the Taraz I know never returns?"
And he won't.
The thing is, that regardless of how well the recovery goes, the fact is that I am forever different and potentially fundamentally so. Part of this comes form the physical affects of the stroke on my brain, which then translates into other aspects of my skills and personality. But, perhaps the larger part, will end up being the experience itself. Going through this is changing me in many ways daily and while some in time might be for the better, many are not, as I am painfully aware of my mental shortcomings whenever I am awake.
Every time I am thinking, reading or watching something, where the familiar images of my imagination were, there is now just dark space, my awareness notices. Search as I might, there is just an emptiness and my brain says "this is where you used to live" but it no longer feels like it was ever my home. It is quite surreal, but also frightening in ways I can't really express. While it is still early days and I am slowly improving in other areas, the irony is that it is very difficult for me to imagine an improved me in the future, as it is like "I am missing" in the present. As said, a little surreal perhaps.
But, at least the other areas are improving and one good sign came out of the evening too - I can still make my colleagues laugh, but now I am unsure if they are laughing because what I said is funny, or just out of pity.
As said, sometimes we just have to laugh at the experiences we have.
Virtually everything can be funny.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]
