I don’t know why, but occasionally I still dream of working on the trading floor. It is never a fun or pleasant dream. In fact, I’d categorize these as nightmares. Usually, it is about one of my old team leads looking for me, and either me being late, out of the office, or hiding somewhere.

I was thinking about it when I momentarily awoke from the dream. I was never really taught the systems we used; it was kind of trial by fire. I remember when I first got to the trading floor, they sent me to see a really senior, high-level executive named Boaz Weinstein. He was having a problem with Bloomberg, and though I don’t recall exactly what the issue was, I was new and unable to quickly resolve it. After that first visit, he preferred to have one of the other team members handle his issues instead of me. His concerns belonged to that specific team member and no one else.

As time passed, I became more familiar and better at the job. I was never as skilled as some of the other guys, but I improved. Over time, I became the person others turned to when they needed help. Whether I was working, off, at lunch, or whatever, if a managing director had an issue, I was their go-to person. That’s common in I.T. support; everyone has their favorites. There were people who were more skilled than me, but certain individuals liked me because of my personality and approach. Others preferred not to have me involved with their computers. That was just how it was.

I often say that I hated that job, but that isn’t entirely true. It was stressful and sometimes raised my blood pressure and gave me headaches. But it had its moments too. The trading floor had some really interesting and funny individuals, for sure. Stephanie Ruhle, who has since become a TV personality, sat on my global markets trading floor. She was in Sales and I still remember her yelling over the desks during those intense trading hours. Later, when I supported her on one of the non-trading floors, she was much calmer and easygoing. Like I said, the floor was really stressful. Time is money!

The I.T. team I worked with was phenomenal. They were really great and extremely intelligent people. I cannot emphasize enough how skilled they were and how much they helped me improve. Their expertise was always impressive. Despite the stress, I do miss the team a lot. In fact, I’ll admit that I miss some of the users I worked with, some of them. I wonder though, why do I only have stressful dreams about this former job?