I am lucky enough to really like my job a lot. It’s my third full-time job post-grad-school. The first was being a guidance counselor in a high school, which was precisely what I had gotten my master’s degree for in the first place. Turns out, I hated it. Two years later I moved up to higher education, and was an academic advisor for undegraduate business majors at a large university. A dramatic improvement, but I can’t tell you how little I know or care about finance courses. There were also some annoying personnel/management issues, so one day (after a particularly annoying meeting) I stormed down to my office and started looking at job postings. Much to my surprise, the little music school next door was hiring a combination academic advisor and admissions counselor. The job description looked like it was written with my resume in hand. I was hired a week later, and I’ve never looked back.

Not only do I enjoy the day-to-day tasks of my job, but I really love my bosses (I have two, and they even have the same first name). One in particular is really great. I always feel 100% supported and appreciated. We have a very laid-back work environment, no ridiculous clock-watching, and we all love to hang out and laugh when we aren’t doing other things. He’s a big fan of long lunches and “secret time off” in the summers when things are quiet. He said he was considering noting in my upcoming review how happy it made everyone when I brought my dog to work all last summer.

When it comes to this pregnancy and my upcoming leave, he has remained just as awesome. From the day I told him, not only was he excited for me, but he said “let me know if you want to try to figure out something part-time or whatever.” Because I’ll most definitely be gone for the vast majority of the fall semester (busiest time of year), he has already put in the budget money for a temporary replacement person.

Last week, we were chatting, and he said he wanted to talk to me about that. I knew we needed to figure out more details, but I had sort of been avoiding the conversation, mostly because I didn’t know how to diplomatically say “you might want to prepare for the idea of me not coming back.” He told me he had a lead on a temporary person, and wondered when would be a good start date. We chatted and decided July 1 would be good. I’m hoping to be able to stay at work until the end of July, but the twins could decide otherwise. I had done the math, and my 16 weeks of leave (thank you, Massachusetts!) would take me to Thanksgiving if I managed to stick around through late July. Not only was he unfazed by the ambiguity of my “last day” and my full 16 weeks of leave, but he then continued with “and I figure sometime in there you’ll decide what you want to do. I mean, I can’t imagine you’d be able to even know before you see what it’s like.”

A wave of relief washed over me. My suspicion is that I will not be returning to work this year. I’d long thought about being a stay-at-home-mom. Combined with the financial realities of my salary vs. double child care, I think that’s what I’ll try to do, at least for a while. However, it makes a huge difference financially between taking my maternity leave and just plain quitting. I also would like to have the option to go back, in case I find I’m just not cut out for the SAHM thing, or if I miss my job too much. That said, I don’t want to just leave my boss(es) hanging, thinking I’m going to come back when I likely won’t. Well, at least one of them has now absolved me from that worry. Whew!

Oh, and in the meantime, I’m trying to convince HR to let me start our “summer parking” two weeks earlier than normal. I get a summer parking pass, which usually wouldn’t start until the second week of June, but most of the faculty will be long gone after commencement this weekend. Public transit is getting a little rough on me, so I wanted to start driving. While this is all getting worked out? My boss gave me his parking permit. He usually takes the train, anyways.

I love my boss.