Today I will return to the world of the employed. I always get such a strange feeling in my stomach when I get to this point. Once again, I'm entering into something completely new. Uncharted territory so to speak. I've had such a strange collection of jobs to file away on my resume, and today I enter the world of retail.
It's really not surprising that I've found it hard to get a job over the past couple of months. Besides the fact that all my work experience comes from different states of countries, it also all covers different fields. I have service jobs in both janitorial and housecleaning fields. I have manual labor experience from the mill as well as farther back when I worked in Italy in High School. I have child care experience at Mother's Choice, food service experience from Great Harvest, and a bit of a professional turn with my teaching jobs. It's a pretty mismatched collection, and with the exception of my ESL job, most of it has nothing to do with my college English degree.
As I think back over my career history I really am in awe of all I've been able to do. I've worked with so many different kinds of people. Let me tell you that the people in the mill and those cleaning toilets are a far cry from the fresh young university grads that seek to teach English on foreign soil, or the European gap year girls who want to hold babies in Hong Kong. I've been so blessed to learn from all of these people, to get a glimpse into their hearts and their worlds.
Of course, I file all these experiences away with the hope that they will serve to bolster my writing career as well. I've collected instances, stories, characters, scenery, etc from around the world that I hope will one day allow me to speak to more than my little blog or e-mail following. While I won't allow myself to be deluded, to believe that the world is going to be so interested in what I have to say that I'll suddenly find myself the next big literary star, but I have a voice, I have some vision, and a unique selection of life experiences to draw from.
I'm curious to see what this new job will add to what I've learned already. I'm curious to see how it will shape and form me, how it will educate me in yet another facet of life. The future is still a misty veiled question, but at least I have a little security for the moment, a chance to throw myself back into the world of productive citizens and to support my little family. Strange that I'm no longer dependent solely on and for myself. My time is no longer just my own, nor are my interests.
It's funny to look briefly ahead, to know there will be those learning curve days soon to come, those days when I can still count how long I've been there, and then slowly watch them turn into a line of predictability and routine. I'm starting off part-time, so I should still be able to focus on things at home as well as the writing I've been trying to do. But at least it's a start, a move in the right direction.
Now if I can just keep my "teacher voice," in check and learn to take instruction, criticism and direction all should be well :)
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