The early signs of fatherhood

Last summer, my wife got pregnant with our first baby, my reception of the event was as crude as it can get, crudeness apparently became a practice really; yes I was happy about it, I didn't necessarily applaud the occasion, I was mostly overwhelmed with the feeling of yet another no-turning-back moment, like the death of my father, my marriage and some other events and decisions that I've made.

Honestly, the death of my father is where every event seems to be referred back to, like the date of birth of Christ may peace & blessing be upon him with the annotation of Anno Domini (AD) that postfixes any date, I note things to have happened either before or after his death. To come and think about it; I tend to romanticize the things that fall in the former category, and somehow cast the intrusive shadow of his absence onto the events that falls in the latter.

But another development partially disrupted this practice of mine, in fact not only did it change the way I tend to remember things, its impact was so overwhelming that I can only explain it by it being a divine intervention, and this is the story:

Back in October, during a failed returning-home-for-good attempt of mine, my wife visited her doctor for the regular check, and called telling me the baby was a girl...

no suspense or surreal turn of events here, just an overwhelming (I'll be over using this word from now on) surge of joy; laterally my mind couldn't keep up with my heart as to why I was so much happy about my knowledge of my coming baby's sex.

Until now, I'm clueless to what happened from that moment onward, I'm oozing with happiness for what God have blessed us with and anticipating every moment until she joins us, as my disruptive and fun-spoiling mind-set got incapacitated in front of this new state of mind, I can only think that God instilled in me those feelings because I know that I'm incapable of not being crude or taking things for what they're worth at face-value.

Even the perpetual gap left by my father's departure seemed suddenly ancient history in front of the momentous event of my girl's nearing arrival, yes I do dwell upon the idea of what would it be like if he was around, and what name he would've favored (though he wouldn't have favored any, he was subtle with his personal opinions), but such thoughts were lacking the tear-drops squeezing & distressful emotions they come with, his departure was sad, but the soon to join baby girl is a happy event without any if(s).

Suddenly I started rationalizing one of my uncle's exaggerated obsession with his eldest daughter beyond anyone's comprehension, now -I think- I know what will it be like to father & feel proud of a wonderful daughter.

Before, I used to view my older friends with kids to be somewhat unfortunate to have chosen/dragged-into the unstoppable contemporary cycle of life; where one is rushed to pass his high-school, get a university degree, build a career, get married, have kids and grow a sizable belly and numbness while at it, never did I appreciate the heavenly feelings & tranquility they must've felt every time they were around their kids.

Until recently, I've constantly mistaken their obvious happiness when in the company of their kids to be merely a getting-used-to subconscious routine that they got themselves into in order to accept the fact that they're responsible for bringing those poor little things to this cruel world, and they're responsible for their welfare indefinitely.

But that's no longer; Since the moment I knew she was a girl, I never seize to carefully examine all father-son (or daughter) interactions that I happen to witness, including all the boring accounts of my friends on what their 2 year old son (or daughter) did or spoke!

I did always consider kids to be cute, all kids that is, no one was particularly special, for me it was like as if all the kids in the block were cool B-boys who knew how to break-dance, it no longer catches my attention if someone just made a 360 spin upside down, would it now? a far fetched metaphor I guess...

But after this sudden enlightenment, my friend's daughter was no longer annoying when she kept interrupting us in our get-together; displaying her latest (horrible; I must add) singing abilities, she was no longer the 6 year old in the midst of what's better known as "سن الزناخه" when she slowly turns from someone who's 1st words are much anticipated with cheers and celebrations (usually quoted after) and turns into an unstoppable word sprinter; now she's just the chatty little girl, "I like…".

As I turn a new page in my professional life; I find myself extremely motivated by all of this, in the midst of my fears and weariness of leaving a very good and rewarding career to start a new venture in a field abandoned by most of who invested in it, in a country everyone is relentlessly trying to exit; I find myself irrationally charge-boosted with zealous belief in what I'm about to do, and I still fail to spot the link, but it doesn't really matters no more.

As a closing note; I pray to the sustainer of the seven heaven, to make it easy for my beloved wife (and all the pregnant women out there) and make their delivery a silk smooth one, my imaginative mind can't withstand or comprehend how this must be physically and emotionally intense… May Allah be your keeper.

A year without blogging, OR: The Sheikh is back

It's been well over a year since I wrote for my deserted blog, I can't help but maintain a continues awe of the way time lapses, however; it's not how time passes that made me return to my dear-diary equivalent, but rather the yet another set of momentous events and things that I've witnessed and was intriguing enough that I wanted to capture "somewhere" other than the volatile memory of mine.

You see, I have been writing for the most part of my adult life, never in a regular basis like when I was actually maintaining a blog (more or less), but I used to capture the "high times" with a written or typed notes of that specific moment, trying to reserve it by illustrating what is it and how it did or did not impact me or the people around me.

But as life went on, and I started leading a professional life led by a increased responsibilities and faced by new realities (eventualities really) that made me what I'm today, all this led to less frequent notes and writings, with the exception of the year I did actually wrote for my blog in.

That year (2006) was not necessarily less significant than any other, if any thing (to come and think about it); it was fairly significant, but beside that fact, the year I blogged in was unique in the fact that I managed to capture many aspects of it, from pseudo-political stances, to emotional dwells and the usual uncontrolled bashing of our oblivious society, the very same things that I experience every day and mostly forget the day after, but when when captured on this blog; I create a reference pointer; pointing right back at them, with some meta data around for the sheer entertainment of myself really, and perhaps some avid audience who can be counted on one's right hand (the left if you will).

Beside that, I've been through equally interesting "things" in the course of this passing year that intrigued me to write about them, I honestly missed writing and editing what I write for the purpose of publishing on this blog rather than leaving them lingering on the edges of my brain; although its tiresome and time consuming, but it does pay off when looked at after a while.

So what's behind this enthusiasm after a prolonged silence? Well, I'll leave this to serve as a come back post, and save the ranting (sorry Hamada, you know it was eventual that I'll use this over used term :) for the next post(s).

Until then I'd like to thank Gradly who for some reason I'm not sure of; was kind and gracious enough to add my blog to his blogroll despite the fact that I was inactive for so long, I feel humbled by his kind gesture.

I got promoted, so where's my partitioned office?

Apparently, at our sick and unprofessional work environment, if you don't have a walled or partitioned office, it doesn't matter if you're a manager or not, what's important is to have the latter and then command the blunt acknowledgment and attention usually associated with being one (a manager), and I happen to experience both, being an office-less manager and just recently added another key to my key-chain, having my very own office!

So after a year working for our marketing department, doing geo-marketing research and liaison-work between the technical and marketing departments; I finally went back to my career routes, crude engineering work, were dust, sweat, informal (yet practical) attire & cluttered work spaces among other things are all a token of pride and love of the work in hand, to everyone's expectation, I seem much lively and sport a much more enthusiastic face instead of the lame and pale one while suited inside a cubical.

When I used to be a manager at the technical department, we had some sort of an open-space office policy at the time, were the whole hierarchy of staff set together without any obstacles except for the director/chief of the department, who's walled inside his own partition, so I really never knew how it feel to have your own, not that I never thought of it, but in general I was in favour of open-space offices policy and the positive synergy it trickles throughout the organization, but with the recent change I had, I was assigned with my very own office…

I've been with my current company for two years now, I was the 10th person to join, so I'm fairly old in the organization, and I fairly know everyone around, and everyone knows me as one of them "old" faces around, but really I only knew the extent of how ill treated non-senior staff get until I was walled-in, were you get far more than what you bargained for, as you seem to get some of the respect reserved for those behind partitions instead of it being the tandem of all interactions with all employees!

Although I was a senior manager from day one in the company, I was never treated as such, partially because I never sought such distinction, I view the mere act of baring the responsibilities of a manager as the ultimate reward for being one, but as I was relocated to the office, suddenly the word "Mr." became a prefix to my name, the IT trouble-tickets that aged for a couple of weeks at the help desk were now seen-into promptly, and colleagues who never spent the effort to know me beyond my name are now congratulating me for my new office(or was it my assumed new position, it doesn't matter by now)!!!

What did change? I'm the same smiley and down-to-earth person i always strive to be, I wasn't promoted per-se, just a simple change in capacity that eventually led into having my own office… what a sick sea of deluded mentalities do i work in.

I personally envisage the perfect organization to value each and every employee as its greatest asset, not simply rhetorical slogans but rather in practice, were all of them get equal distribution of benefits and privileges, for everyone to feel being invested in and appreciated beyond any titles and organizational hierarchies, everyone must be rewarded on a transparent scale.

The most destructive of forces in an organization is the negative sentiments induced by feeling unappreciated or unprivileged in comparison to the privileged few who're usually managers closer to the upper management and their side-kicks, forcing one to set his/her mind and expectations to such that will turn him/her to an executive-freak oozing with blunt requests and wasting valuable work time ensuring that his/her business cards are in print hours after being seated in the new post.

For instance, we have a limited underground parking space that fits 40-50 cars depending how tactful we –managers- were, the remainder of the company have to find their spot in the alley ways of the neighborhood behind us, a nuisance task considering the 200 staff competing every day for the scarce lots.

With such a pretext, the underground parking becomes some sort of a privilege that's offered to senior staff, to the point that one of them who lives in a walking distance from the company not to abandon his "privilege" in the parking lot out of courtasy as he feels its his "right"... flippin heck, i'll fire'em right up if it was my call.

But in my utopian vision of the company, I'd pool the parking lot among all employees, perhaps reserving a couple for the top-management and their guests, but otherwise on a first-come-first-serve basis, and what I'll get in return: a positive synergy from having all employees equally "privileged", and those who thrive to come early on time will be rewarded by finding a convenient spot right under their offices and the late one's can endure the pain of finding space in the scorching heat outside.

Back to my private office, I can't say that part of my sick psyche is dripping with ego and happy about it, you must admit that having your office translates into less intrusions and dealing with nuisance interruptions from people whom least of thier concerns is being productive while being paid for his time. But really I'd like to see myself outside of it with my staff, more – platonically- interment and face-to-face.

Investing in one's employees from the bottom of the organizational chart and up while valuing each and every staff member is crucial for a productive and homogeneous workforce and will ultimately change the sick attitudes and perceptions about becoming a manager or taking a senior post, humbleness must be the core of the corporate culture, by understanding that some people's job are to manage others, but it's no different than doing any other job in the team, just like a football team, were you have a captain & a goal-keeper along with 9 others, the former two may have a special role, but they're all part of the team of equal members.

Truly nothing like an open-space and open-door office policies.

Related DCMS reads:
I've been promoted; so where's my laptop?