So I turn 30.

Today I kiss goodbye to my twenties and embracing a new chapter of my life.

For the past 5 years I’ve been working as a Customer Relations in one of the branches of a leading automotive company in Surabaya. I graduated from university back in 2012 as a Bachelor of Communication, in which I took a mass media major. I worked briefly as a copywriter and research assistant in a branding & design agency before I got accepted in the company.

At first glance, I thought being a Customer Relation was a meager front liner non-managerial occupation. A no-brainer: I had to wear a designated uniform every day, greeting and smiling to the customers while also accepting their complaint reports & inquiries. I was going to be stationed in a new branch, during which it was still under a construction plan. I spent my first year in the company as a fill-in in 4 branches because the Customer Relations in those branches were simultaneously taking a maternal leave. I made new friends & learned about the job during the fill-in period.

Indeed, it is half front liner duty but also half managerial job. My primary roles are to ensure that customers are given services according to the standard operating procedure thru the employees and branch facilities, to maintain a good relationship with our customers, following thru complaint reports and inquiries, and giving insights/trends from the customers’ perspective. The end result will be satisfied customers giving advocates for the company.

My other roles are varied from creating marketing communication tools for my branch, managing my branch’s social media, to arranging schedules, meetings and sometimes itineraries for my branch manager. Also what I do is organizing events, be it regular customer’s events in our branch, as well as monthly gathering event for our company in Surabaya area (There are 9 branches in Surabaya).

What I thought was a meager front liner non-managerial occupation turned out the other way around. At a certain scale, my current position comprises the things I love doing: people, event management, and throwing a little touch of creativity here and there.

And yes, being a part of a big corporation is a hard work. It takes a lot of thinking, time, and off course energy since we work in a tight six-day working schedule (Yes, I work on weekends too). It is no strange that we used to go home late, physically burned out due to lack of exercise and rest. I personally have been hospitalized three times. 😉

But don’t get me wrong, there is also much to love about it.

The people are nice, very intelligent and are willing to teach, guide and share their knowledge to the younger and less experienced colleagues. The relationship among the employees—be it horizontally or vertically—are nice too albeit all the competitions.

When I started working here, the primary thing I wanted was to make my own money and be and independent woman. Yes, I still live with my parents since it is a commonly practiced culture in Indonesia but other than that, Alhamdulillah I am able to fulfill my own needs. Trust me, this appearance may fool you, but I don’t come from a family of wealth. Yes, my parents and families have friends in places but other than that, we just have to work hard on things. Also, there were years where my parents had some financial problems and those years taught me well to grow up to be diligent and financially responsible person.

In a way, working in this company act as a medium for me to accomplish my goals/dreams and I am very grateful for that. Things would have been turned out very differently hadn’t I worked here.

Back then it was all work, much less play and almost no time for doing my hobbies. I was that one friend who were absent from hang outs because I was still busy working and because, financially calculating it, catering to all the hang out invitations would have meant that I got almost nothing to save up. Before, I used to draw sketches, be visually creative, and I used to write. If I’m not mistaken, this blog was the one that got me my first job as a copywriter and research assistant. Now, by the end of the week, I tend to sleep all day exhausted and running out of inspirations for creative ideas.

Therefore, after 5 years, it is time for me to arrange my ducks in a row. 

Reorganize and start living.

It’s time for me to reorganize my priorities and schedule, because as much as I enjoy the busy working, somewhere deep down I feel there are things missing. Things I have not pursued and accomplished yet.

Being a 30 year-old single woman in this culture means that the wedding bells are already ringing hard and loud, literally my parents are pushing me to get married. Oh believe me; I DO want to get married. I DO want to share my life with the love of my life: the idea of us being the complementary of each other just like the sensible lion hearted Booth to the dominant overly logical Brennan, or oddly the sappy Fitz to the hard hearted ambition driven Olivia (minus all the crazy drama but spare me the sex pleaseee).

Yes, I went out with some… but off course none of them worked out. Either the guy was the unfaithful type, the shallow type, or the ones who expected me to only be a housewife and a mother. The way people (my colleagues, friends, families) see it, I am a picky woman, that I am expecting too much of a man. Honestly, the more I think about it, it’s not that I am being picky. It’s just that I haven’t found the one that—when he and I combined—will be complementary to each other.

Yes, I may have fished in the wrong pond, all the way attracting the wrong fishes.

But in other hand, the main reason I deliberately seem to be stalling is deep down I have not yet become the person I want myself to be. I have to be my own person before I can be somebody’s wife, somebody’s mother. And for that, I have to do the reorganize and start living it.

Besides all the working, now I must make time to listen to my calling. I can’t just sit well and be pretty like some people perceive me to be. I want to do things that matter. I want to do what I have deflected myself from: writing again, pursuing some creative ideas projects and causes I believe in, reaching out to my contacts once again, rekindling old friendships, expanding my areas of networking so that I will be able to explore things more and off course meet more people. Finally doing things I am longing to do. Only then I will be able to become my own person: a thriving, intelligent, independent woman who gets her life together. Be many things but ordinary. Be a woman with her own identity and personality who can’t simply be reduced to only be somebody’s wife and somebody’s mother standing in the shadow, looking pretty.

And I hope, somewhere along the way very soon I may find that one person. 
The Booth to my Brennan, the Fitz to my Olivia.

It’s time for me to take back the steering wheel, reorganize, and start living.