izmeina | Flesh, blood and bone

Yesssssss. The timing turned out to be everything. The past casts long shadows indeed. And what you don't learn from it you are condemned to repeat.
We had a new boss start on Tuesday Feb 6 back in 2001. Apart from the fact that within 3 weeks of her starting, the 30 hours I had per week for 6 years were suddenly cut back to 16 and she was a bad mannered arrogant blond blue eyed aryan BITCH, I just had.. aside from these perfectly legitimate reasons an absolute bad bad feeling about this woman - detestation on first sight.

Within three weeks of her appointment she went through the kitchen with a chainsaw slashing everything and everyone she could get her nasty little paws on. Everyone had their hours cut and she didn't even have the manners to tell us personally but just enclosed the new rosters with the payslips.
It sure was stressful trying to juggle my finances to cope with this sudden and drastic loss of income. Not to mention the persistent pettiness and 'divide and conquer' 'us and them' work culture that the keeper of the Chainsaw encouraged.
The atmosphere of the place had become really horrid and I became even more determined to do as well as possible in my accounting course which I had started 12 months previously so that I would no longer have to depend on such increasingly unpredictable house elf jobs to survive.

Soon the scabby claws of 1000 Dementors started scurrying around in my little green skull. I became agitated and irritable for the silliest of reasons..anxiety, panic attacks, gloom and doom - the works.

And just when I thought it couldn't possibly get any worse.. along came the Potter boy who found even more buttons to push. This all came to a creepy climax when Iz got to chapter 32 of Goblet at 3 in the morning one December day. It was not Cedric at all. The boy means nothing to me. But something else that scared the living daylights out of ickle Izzie. For nearly two three weeks I went around like a zombie in a state of.. well I guess 'shock' sounds rather dramatic. But I sure did wonder why the hell I was so affected by a so called simple story for kids. It was only when I started reading book 3 (naughty Iz.. reading out of order) that the pieces of the jigsaw slowly began to come together. With a lot of hesitation I forced myself to read the fourth book once again trying to look for clues and explanations. As Prof Lupin said "You have things in your past...."
It was the short phrase 'Rasende Vernichtung' as a description for Voldi that I found in the http://www.eulenfeder.de Potterkiste that turned out to provide the solution to this strange puzzle. It brought back memories of darker places and darker times.
Many years ago during those darkest days in Durmieland, I had got a kitchen job in Hamburg. Everyone seemed very nice but that was before I got introduced to the Boss. The very first day that I set eyes on her was Tuesday 6 Feb 1990. A blond blue eyed Aryan bitch oozing arrogance, superciliousness and utter ruthlessness. Even my fairy Godmother commented when she seen her "She looks like she will want her pound of flesh" (Most prophetic words they turned out to be indeed) Izzie also had equally bad vibes but being such a rational creature dismisses them thinking "Don't be so judgemental.You have only just met her. Give her a chance. Anyway you need the money. It is the only job you could find' " etc etc. (or rather the only job with money left over after paying the rent. Finding jobs was easy but getting a place to live once the wall came down was another matter entirely)
After the most miserable year of my life, I finally got out and swore that I would never ever be so poor again that I would have to ignore my instincts because I could not afford to listen to them.

It was in January 2002 when I made the connection between the incident in the graveyard and my departure from Heil Hilde's Hell's kitchen and most importantly herself and the boss I had mentioned earlier that everything fell in place. The whole problem was that I had been doing it subconsciously. (Even if I did not recognize at the time the significance of that date in February, the inner creatures certainly did notice it. Absolutely uncanny. They must have spent the whole year reliving all that stuff) While there was no doubt that this new boss was just as ruthless and nasty as Heil Hilde, other things were not the same and that made all the difference, once I consciously made the connection. I had a second job and accomodation that was independent of either of them so unlike Hilde's if I did lose my job I was not going to end up on the street or under the bridge or whatever. Since unlike Hilde she did not have control over where I lived and most of my time and I was not totally powerless, there was no longer any reason to fear and hate her and turn myself into a bitter twisted bitch in the process. (Another variant of the Dementor's Kiss I guess)

But the spell had been broken and only four weeks later the Boss announced there would be structural adjustments and redundancies for the house elves as the kitchen was going to be outsourced. (She loved her management doublespeak gobblydegook) The very thing I had feared had come to pass. But unlike the doom and gloom, 'Sturm und Drang' reaction of last time, I was amused and delighted! It came as a shock to most of the others but Izzie had been reading the signs and was not surprised at all. And the Bitch noticed it too! It gave me particular pleasure to congratulate her that day on her first anniversary as boss. (My God.... what else does this Izzie bitch remember?)
My parents were also astounded at my irrationally exuberant reaction to what should have been bad news. Especially as I became such a maniacal moaning Myrtle the previous year when I didn't lose my whole job but only half of it. But I did come ever so close to losing my mind.
Since then I have realized that the search for security is the root of all evil. Keep people afraid and they are so easy to control. And the strange thing is Hilde wasn't happy either. She lived in fear of her husband and took it out on everyone else beneath her in the pecking order. If she couldn't be happy she was going to be damned sure that everyone else would be just as miserable as her

But of course, once I realized there was nothing more to be afraid of and that the days of Hilde and her other earthly incarnations were well and truly over , this interest in money as a form of security was also no longer necessary. Fear is a poisonous emotion but a powerful force for motivation.
Of course, I am infinitely better off now and much happier but will have to find another way to get regain my interest in accounting.

At first, Iz was convinced that she was a fluffy furry black and yellow boring badger. But I soon realized the error of my ways. What self respecting badger would ever be in possession of ......sssssssh the Dark Mark?