The mission mattered. The wetlands mattered. The river mattered.
Recognition was not the point. Reginald encouraged that belief whenever it benefited him. “You’re not a team player,” he told me during my fourth-year evaluation.
My promotion had been denied despite exceeding every measurable standard. I had increased grant success rates, strengthened reporting procedures, and saved two delayed projects from losing funding. “You focus too much on individual recognition,” he said, “rather than organizational success.”
The irony was almost impressive.
The breaking point came six weeks before my resignation. The Lakeside Watershed Project, my most ambitious initiative, received national recognition. I had designed the methodology, developed the community-based monitoring framework, coordinated the early field data, and rewritten the grant narrative three times after funders requested clarification.
