Midlife Jobhunter Decides Future

Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.

Confucius

A couple of weeks ago, my husband and I took a trip to celebrate getting all three of our sons to 18 without having to embrace any surprise grandchildren or post any bail. Little did I know that while celebrating, I'd also discover my calling.

Yes, this Midlife Jobhunter has decided what she wants to be when she grows up - a professional vacationer. I have no idea why I didn't think of it sooner. I'm so good at recess. I can even prove it.

See how well I sit at this table in an open window restaurant drinking my wine. I'm so happy.

And my toes - look how good they look after a wave swishes over them.

Look how comfortable I am on this beach. I have my cooler, my float, my hat, my book (although I must say this wasn't the best time to lend my only smut book to the Fragrant Liar. Those I brought were much too tame for vacation alone with my husband. )

Who, by the way, never said a word that even though I'd hauled my snorkel gear all that way, only used it for about ten minutes.

Besides, it was much more fun to look at views like this..

and this...

and this...

and this...

and this...

Yup! I think this is gonna work for me.

Why do we love the sea? It is because it has some potent power to make us think things we like to think.

Robert Henri

I'm thinking.

Progress on My List?

Tomatoes purchased and planted,

toes painted.

Excited for vacation. Will figure out the rest while lounging - maybe.

Those that say you can't take it with you never saw a car packed for a vacation trip.
Author Unknown

Coming Up For Sun

Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.

Carl G. Jung

In my late 20's, my husband and I lived in Salt Lake City, Utah. For one year, two months and five days. Yes, it wasn't my favorite place to live. Beautiful, though. Recreational haven summer and winter and my oldest son was born there, but not quite my cup of tea for various reasons that are unimportant to this tale.

For Salt Lake's role in this post is to merely provide a metaphor utilizing their temperature inversion that occurs each winter. That time of year when the ban goes up on wood burning fireplaces and the fog moved in. For months one would awake not only to not see across the street, but no view past the front door as well.

I worked for an oil and gas company and had finally attained an office with a window. Excited at the prospect of having my own place and view, I had to wait months for the air to clear and the view of the Salt Palace across the street to come into focus. Living in this blur became normal, I suppose. Wasn't like you arose each day, noses pushed to the window in anticipation of some one's arrival or the first snowflakes of winter. For you knew out there was just the norm. Life in the fog.

On weekends, my husband and I would drive the 20 miles up Little Cottonwood Canyon to ski at Alta or Snowbird. As we began our ascent up the mountain, the fog abated and above the black cloud cloaking our entire city, the sun shone intensely. I'd ride the ski lift to the top of the mountain and see all the way down to the hidden valley, as though a tent cover kept it isolated from the rest of the world. Like Truman's world in The Truman Show. (Probably some metaphor for my stint in Salt Lake in that as well, but another time.)

If we flew to Denver to visit family during the inversions, the return trip to Salt Lake took longer than scheduled. Often we circled above the city, waiting for a break in the clouds so the plane could dip into the abyss and land safely.

I doubt I need to tell you that happiness was Salt Lake City in my rear view mirror. Although 24 years have passed, seems I've returned to living in that fog most of this past year. Only this time the visual effects of Salt Lakes' inversion coveted my brain.

Time has offered a chance for the mist to begin its evaporation process. Lately, I often yearn for a schedule. Substitute teaching doesn't quite provide that as other than Thursdays and Fridays, I'm never certain what days I might work. Or when I may fall into a longer gig for a teacher with a sick child. Most of my sub work is based on request by the teachers, so simply saying I will work these three days and do such and such on the others is not a viable choice right now.

However, the work has provided an easy escape while biding this passage of time. There is no homework so my day is done when the school bell rings. With my youngest son gone, I don't have to keep my energy up to attend baseball games or school events. I can sink into my chair at home and watch Jeopardy and then decide what frozen entree we will eat for dinner.

I do feel that with the promise of spring, the haze is beginning to lessen. I feel certain things awakening in my brain that I haven't felt in some time -- a yearning to put my pen in hand and write something. Anything. My half finished novel has begun a slow chug in my thoughts. Poor Lily, my main character that has been stuck in a wheat field in South Dakota suffering a panic attack most certainly deserves a change of scenery.

For whatever reason, perhaps time is what it takes to find a clearing for oneself when the fogs of life brings a burdensome weight. As this fog dissipates, the heaviness seems to lessen also. I see a few rays of sun seeping through the clouds.

Provides hope in this search for new beginnings. I'm starting a list--a list of things I want to do in my life. Nothing too grand, at first.

1. Buy tomato plants
2. Sign up for a writing conference this summer
3. Make a list of all the places I want to visit in my lifetime
4. Go get a pedicure
5. Get excited about the vacation coming up with my husband. Our celebration of getting all three sons to 18 and college, without any pregnancies or jail time.

Seems a good start. A fairly easy step to fumble my way into the sunshine.

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday

Speed, strength, and the inability to register pain immediately.
Reggie Williams, when asked his greatest strengths as a football player

A long awaited Sunday has arrived. The Green Bay Packers play in the Super Bowl today. Now I know that many of you could truly give a crap about that, but this is the big time at my house.

As many of you know, my parents moved to Green Bay 30 some years ago. I drove my kids up north every summer to stay for a few weeks and most often we hit the summer training camp for the Packers. We'd spend hours at Lambeau Field, watching the players.

During Packer Camp, the players walk with the kids, ride their bikes, and sign endless autographs. Bleachers are set up beside the outdoor practice field and rarely a seat opens. Lots of standing and through the years we watched the likes of Brett Favre, Aaron Rodgers, Reggie White, Sterling Sharpe, Robert Brooks, Gilbert Brown, James Lofton, Ty Detmer, William Henderson, and a mass of other men that took the time to thrill my young boys.

I remember many a moment where a very large player would reach over the crowd of adults or older kids to take up my young son's football to pen his name. I remember when Robert Brooks was engulfed in a sea of supporters shouting his name for an autograph. My oldest, Jacob, said, "Mr. Brooks, may I have your autograph?" The player stopped and reached back and signed Jacob's Wheaties box.

Perhaps one of the most memorable signings occured with a 5 year old Jordan, now 22. After Ty Detmer handed him back his autograph book, Jordan burst into tears. My mom and I gathered around him, worried as to the problem. "They're all writing in cursive," Jordan cried.

Downstairs at the lake house, youngest son Ian put together a collection of Packer memorabilia. Jerseys, newspaper clippings my mom sent him. The signed footballs and helmets. When he lived at home, each weekend he'd put the Packer banner next to the team they played that week. If it wasn't going well, he'd put the other team's banner into a closet and shut the door.

Today, we have a big pot of beer brats cooking.

Expecting a crowd of 10. Jacob's searching Austin for cheese curds. We've got potato chips and French Onion dip. Potato skins. Bob and I are deciding which jersey we'll pull off the wall to support the team.

Two things will be missing in this quest for Super Bowl greatness - Jordan and Ian. Jordan's up in Montana attending a job fair and that Ian boy, the creator of our basement decorum, is at the University of Alabama. Doesn't seem right that he can't be here with us today, but we plan to Skype him in for a little bit of time. Frequent calls to my mom in Green Bay and my brother, Jordan, in Sheboygan will have the phone lines rattling.

You are hereby welcomed to The Texas Green Bay Hall of Fame.
(We have no idea how that speed sign got there.)

To all you Steeler fans out there, Sorry. Just gotta believe about the Pack. Come join us in the Texas Packer Hall of Fame.

Happy Super Bowl Sunday everybody.

What Color Is Your Car?

The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.

Dorothy Parker

Next time you're sitting at a stop light, notice the cars around you. How many different colors do you see?

I know what I see. A sea of white, black, silver, gray, beige. An occasional red. Maybe a blue one here and there. Used to be black, white, brown, gray, and silver weren't even colors. The color wheel I remember had blue, yellow, red, green, purple, orange.

Are our cars a sign of how boring we've become? Sort of like how boring this post is?

Often when my husband and I are driving somewhere, he'll ask what I think of some car he sees on the road. I don't know why he does this, because cars really don't do a lot for me. (Air conditioning, heat, radio, starts--works for me. I can't tell the difference between a Cadillac and a Datsun. And a truck is a truck.)

I never display much enthusiasm in my reply, hoping he'll discuss something more interesting to me. Surely he knows what those things might be.

His next line? "What do you think of that new Z2000375A?"

"Coupe or sedan?" I reply, and in my mind bang my head against the dashboard.

So goes our exciting rides in the car. Sort of like when he's flipping channels between American Chopper, some war show on the history channel, and some obscure football game between Nimrod College and Shinola State. He'll make a comment and I'll look up from my book and nod my head. I think he truly believes I'm following the changing of the channels every 30 seconds. That I enjoy watching snippets of all those shows, too.

Okay, so I was talking about boring colors and boring posts.

I have six drafts of posts sitting in my Post queue. I have topics on minivans, children's play, my cat coming to the lake for the first time, night owls, creativity, jobs. Each of those has notes on it with a worthwhile list of ideas to make a fine essay. Do I have interest in writing any of them this week? No.

Perhaps it is a reflection of my personality at the moment. Perhaps it is the time of year and everything outside is brown, so I feel brown, too. Perhaps, perhaps.

I think I'll go get in my silver car and go to the grocery store. Nothing mundane and boring about that. I'll even, like normal, forget where I parked and search for my car in the sea of boring color in the lot.

Oh, wait. Sometimes there is a rainbow. The produce section. Surely I can find some real color there. I'm off!

Onward to the New Year

For last year's words belong to last year's language
And next year's words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning.

T.S. Eliot, "Little Gidding"

My oldest son took the above photo down at Zilker Park in Austin. The city has put up this tree of lights for as long as we've lived here, probably longer. When my kids were little, my husband and I would take them down to the park and we'd stand underneath and twirl.

When my son sent this photo he took this past Christmas season, I recalled those nights of twirling with my little boys. Those recollections brought me joy and I closed my eyes and whirled in my mind, the events of the past year swirling with me. After a year of extreme highs and lows, I welcome the new year in hope of a steadier stream of events.

Alas, rather than further lament over how to write my first post of the year, I've decided to "butt in chair" and type away. If this lands all over the place, so it goes. The new year has arrived; I'm happy about it.

Of course, I don't know if life this year will accommodate a level stream, but I can hope.

This morning, I have the house to myself. No teaching job today. Middle son and husband off at work. Youngest son safely ensconced in his dorm room at the University of Alabama after sliding in between the South's snow storm and freezing cold. He left yesterday morning at 5:30 taking the southern route through Baton Rouge and arrived in Tuscaloosa in 12 hours. Proud of that boy doing that all by himself.

Seems odd to have him gone again although I didn't see him much while home. He worked landscape and made his money for books and expenses this next semester. Had a good lesson on how if he were to depend on that income to live, he'd have to give up certain things like electricity, entertainment, and food. (Great fodder for school success.)

Middle son currently living at home substitute teaching in the day and painting the YMCA at night. Decided that working on a for profit trophy deer hunting ranch argued with his sense of wildlife preservation and conservation. Eagerly pursuing a wildlife job anywhere in the country, but employed in the meantime.

Still his presence here means my husband and I are not empty nesters. That transition has been put on the back burner. We still can't run around naked.

But today, no one is home and I won't tell you what I'm wearing. Instead, I'll begin my first blog of this wonderful new year with some photos from our holiday. Get this first one going and hopefully the ideas and words for getting back on track will arrive.

The Christmas card I sent this year, ala A Christmas Story. I want that lamp.
The other card I sent.
One of my favorites that I received.
The mushroom crab cakes I made up. No recipe, but to die for.
My granddog getting intimate with our splurge for dinner.
The dinner table filled with Swedish meatballs and potato sausage, lefsa, cucumber salad, and the lobster. A white dinner.
Me with the kids. Husband had to take the picture.
Chelsea's new socks.

Happy New Year everybody. I'd like to share my list for the new year, but, I don't have one. However, do cheer for the Green Bay Packers Saturday night. Go Pack!

May You Have...

May you have the gladness of Christmas which is hope;
The spirit of Christmas which is peace;
The Heart of Christmas which is love.

Ada V Hendricks

From my trees to yours,
Merry Christmas
(Thank you to all the elves who put these trees together for me.)

On the Hunt for a Tree

Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson: you find the present tense, but the past perfect!

Owens Lee Pomeroy

Tis the time of year to get Christmas up in the house. Before us, the annual trek out to the tree farm, family in tow. Riding the haycart out to the fields, wandering the aisles of growing firs. "How about this one?" "Hey! Come see this one." and the inevitable "Just pick one for cripe's sake."

Then a stop at a small town BBQ joint before returning home to open the numerous boxes from the attic accompanied by exclamations of "Oh, isn't this fun?" and "Remember when you made this? When you were two?" "Put on some Christmas carols" followed by rearranging the furniture, getting the tree straight, the lights and ornaments placed. All the remaining decorations spread throughout the house and Bingo, the house transformed into an enchanted winter wonderland, Christmas on the horizon.

Back in the 70's when I met my husband and visited his house at Christmas, I was appalled to discover a tree similar to this in his parent's living room -

What kind of people would have THAT for a tree? Who didn't endure the family hunt for the perfect real tree? No smell of true pine in your house? No handpicking of prickling pine needles at tree's end?

Of course, that was just the beginning of the "fake tree" boom. Suddenly families could simply grab their tree out of the box in the attic and have it up in few moments. No wrangling the pine through the front door and hallway. No arguments on its best side, whether it was straight or not, the husband lying on the floor, twirling the trunk, losing patience while the decision made.

Alas, back to the present tense. I had hoped others in the family might garner interest in doing as always. That as my kids drifted in from jobs and college far away, they, too, might welcome the norm and perhaps generate some interest for me. Funny thing, they don't really seem to have the enthusiasm either.

Gives me pause for relief, and guilt. Relief because my kids are older now. I don't need to put on a perfect Christmas with all the baking, music, festivities. That I, as they, do want the family dinner on Christmas Eve, but maybe we don't need all the decoration hoopla. Guilt, because my husband, under protest, already put up the lights outside.

Perchance my apathy presides because it has been a very full year and I'm tired. Just plain tired.

I awoke four hours ago. I'm still sitting in bed, deciding on the process to come. I've perused via my laptop the shops in Austin with trees for sale. Not a normally barren lot with dry trees cut in October, but a store with real fake trees with the lights already on them. When I find one that arrives on wheels, completely decorated, and can be pushed back into its box and automatically lifted into the attic like magic, I'm buying it.

As to that silver tree of my in-laws, I want it.

May Your Blessings Be Bountiful, Your Day Filled with Love

May your stuffing be tasty
May your turkey plump,
May your potatoes and gravy
Have nary a lump.
May your yams be delicious
And your pies take the prize,
And may your Thanksgiving dinner
Stay off your thighs!

Author Unknown

If given the choice between Thanksgiving and Christmas as a favorite holiday, hands down the former gets the prize.

The day before finds me lolling in bed at 9am. No school today. I've done my grocery shopping, Ian has driven the 12 hours home from Alabama, my mom asleep in the next room. The rest of the kids are due to arrive later today and we'll begin the prep work while gathered around the kitchen table - pies made, celery and onion chopped, bread broken to dry for stuffing, conversations shared.

Tomorrow, a half hour of raw turkey wrestling ensues which only means when the big bird makes it into the oven, I can sigh and say "That task done for another year." I can then methodically peel my potatoes or recruit a son happening to walk by.

Then, we wait, and play, and talk, watch football. Not being a fan of early large dinners, we'll eat around 5. Will finish just in time to lie about and, hopefully, watch the Aggies kick the Longhorns across their own field.

Oh, yes, so much easier than putting Christmas together.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I hope you have many blessings to recount.

And lets not forget the Crimson Tide on Friday!

The Blogger's Joy

Praise the bridge that carried you over.

George Colman

Why do I blog? Why do I wonder how those I've met in the blog world fare in their days? Why do I write to those who have not posted in some time to see how life goes?

Perhaps because they have continual faith in me, despite my absences and often lack of individual thankfulness for their comments. Despite my inconsistent visits to their home pages.

Why do I blog? Because when I have a totally crappy day and the audacity to write about it, YOU all write to me. You reassure me. You let me know you are out there. (Even though you may have had an equally or completely worse day.)

That's why I blog. Not for what I get, but what I might give when I'm able to do that. Not to mention I find it fascinating how others live their lives. Also, how fun to read when bloggers get together from afar.

Several of my blogger friends gathered in the photo above. Lovely women, all of them, in attendance at my son's wedding last April.

On the left, Kimber, The Fragrant Liar, the "You picked a fine time to leave me, Lucille" friend of mine who relocated to Florida in June. On my other side, Bernie, that old broad from Wisconsin at Old?Who? Me? and then Beth at The Busy Traveler, the talented chemical engineer turned writer who travels much too much and sends my jealous meter off the chart.

As for that old broad in Wisconsin, I'm headed up there on Saturday to celebrate her 85th birthday. Feel free to wish her a happy day. I'll be freezing my big Texas butt off in the frigid cold that has descended on that state, because I'm visiting, I'm sure. Believe it or not, there is no Packer game this weekend. Is there no mercy for a long-time fan?

Next post should arrive upon my return, Old? Who? Me? accompanying me for a Texas stay.

Hence, let us not underestimate ourselves. I have followed many of you for almost two years. Community. I thank you for responding when in my dumps and in my highs and middling. I appreciate your comments and suggestions.

You will have that backing with me, also. More important, as a reader for your most lovely essays of norm, and adventure. This roadtrip of the Midlife Jobhunter has been most interesting even though I'm not certain I've metered much mileage yet.

Grumble, Grumble

Oh, wouldn't the world seem dull and flat with nothing whatever to grumble at?

W.S. Gilbert

Tis one of those rare days when I don't have to get out of bed. Coming off a day of substitute teaching hell, I awoke to the perfect morning for recovery -- a gray sky complete with a drizzling rain.

With the blinds closed in my bedroom and the back patio door bringing in the only light, I'm furrowing deep into the covers. Such sinful pleasure to lie here. I awakened early, but have decided to warm myself and shake off the remnants of yesterday's bad day.

One of those days where I find myself policing and thinking that if any of these kids were mine, I'd beat the shit out of them for their behavior. However, these days, I'm not up for a fight. Causes me to step back and wonder what the hell I'm doing with my time. Or not doing.

I've known for some time I don't want to return to secondary school teaching or secretarial work. Substituting offers flexibility, but nothing in the way of contributing to any one's life, least of all mine. I can certainly do it and do it well as most of my work is by request. But the pay is pathetic. I've never enjoyed babysitting and it takes me all day to make what most can make in few hours or less.

Late last night, when neither a teacher request nor an open job for the next day had shown up by midnight, I took myself off the morning call queue. I keep telling myself that for right now, this job works -- until I figure out what I'm going to do with the rest of my life. I mean, really, it's a Wednesday and here I am, nestled in bed at 8:30am.

And if I don't get out of bed, I won't have to think about what else I might could do.

Ah, the disgruntled Midlife Jobhunter. Guess I'll go soak my head in a pail of water. After all, tomorrow is another day.