At exactly this time last semester, I lost my maternal grandmother. I made a flying trip to Homestate to see her. I abandoned my classes, and stuck my colleagues with the responsibility. Read more here and here.
Today I heard that my paternal grandmother passed. Another trip to go to the funeral, and yet another sticking of the colleagues with the responsibility of covering classes for me. I have NO problem leaving my work to be with my family in these situations, but my IOU list is getting pretty long.
I am so sorry for your loss.
ReplyDeleteUnless your colleagues are total jerks, don't worry about the IOUs. Everything ends up balancing out.
Thanks for your condolences. They certainly aren't jerks. I still hate owing favors.
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean. Sorry about your grandmothers. I have one left and she's going downhill. I'm going to see her again soon but mostly I'm in denial. I think our whole family is.
ReplyDeletere: IOUs, I hate owing favors too. I've got no money coming in right now, and I'm struggling with how to properly thank the people who have helped me out in various ways, wrote me recommendations for job applications, etc. Life was so much simpler when I didn't think twice about buying them bottles of wine, or food, or flowers, etc. But I just can't afford to do that, and then I feel like it looks tacky if I just send them a note and a $5 starbucks gift card. And there's no way I'm going to bake a bunch of brownies. But at this point it looks like I may never be in a position to return most of the favors these people did for me.
I'm very sorry for your loss. It's good that you can go and be with your family. My grandmother died this week, but with the volcanic difficulties of flying in Europe, I couldn't go to the funeral.
ReplyDelete