In Reflection: A Long Long Week

Last week, I had been keeping track of interesting interactions with guests. However, on Wednesday, I learned that my family's dog, Flip Flop, had a complication with their planned surgery - the removal of 5 teeth. Since I was already in downtown, I returned to MOXI for the craft night and started looking for covers. Flip Flop came out of surgery fairly loopy and missing not 5, but 10 teeth, and over the course of the next 36 hours, became more and more paralyzed until trouble breathing forced my parents to take him back to the pet hospital. He was there for a long time, but eventually emerged healthier than before. He was able to move his rear legs, but was still in a precarious position. 

The week became not a reflection on individual reactions, but an exercise of working with this issue at the back of my mind. I scrambled to find covers and tried to get to San Diego as quickly as possible, from where I currently write this post. 

Regardless of the type of shift, the friendliness of the guests, or other distractions, for the first time since I started, working the floor felt like counting minutes - watching the proverbial pot boil. Though not intentional, my conversations leaned more into guests' connections with my own background. I had extensive conversations with people about the Children's Discovery Museum in San Jose (a group that gained entrance to MOXI with the Museum Passport! and was a taking a road trip all the way to Palm Springs), about a mutual relationship with a college professor in Merced, about a shared Puerto Rican ancestry, and more. 

Is this run back to my past a coping mechanism? A way for me to connect to our dog without actually being there for him? As much as we tell others that work is a refuge where you can leave personal matters at the door, those personal matters still influence the way we work. In my case, the perception of time, the types of interactions I had with others, and even the frequent conversations with coworkers about finding covers and trades. It's not something I'd like to do again, and I truly hope that soon my mind is put at ease and I can rest easier at night and be done with this melancholy chapter of my work at MOXI.

Comments

  1. KJWOctober 8, 2021 at 9:55 AM

    So sorry to hear about your dog, Julian. Sounds like it lead to more personal conversations, but also wondering how dealing with personal life affected facilitation with guests at exhibits? Do you think your presence impacted learning in any way?

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