You're Hired

The sweetest words in the English language are, 'I love you,' but two words that are almost as good: 'You're hired.'

Short and sweet but gosh they mean so much. It means my summer of unemployment is over. It means we can actually afford to do back-to-school shopping and give my daughter's room a much-needed-I'm-15-now makeover (on a small scale). It means getting the bills back up to date instead of doing my "creative financing" of our household.

In two years of blogging I've never named my places of employment while I actually worked there. Actually I've only named one place that I worked but that was long after I worked there. I know some may be feel it's a fear of being fired - in this day and age of people Google-ing or FaceBook-ing or MySpace-ing people before they hire them or even be college roomates- that's actually a healthy fear. For me it's less about fear than it is about how I would feel. I would want someone to ask me- or have sure facts about me- before blogging about me and I feel the same way about my employers.

Anyway, I'm back in the land of the employed. However being unemployed has given me some new perspective:

1. A job is just a job, not my whole life
I am capable of showing a high level of dedication to my job. I've proven that again and again. However, I've learned that no matter how hard I work, to always reserve my best efforts for my family, not the other way around.

2. I must find a way to start my own business
While I wasn't "working" I did some desktop publishing for a few friends who in turn referred me to their friends and before you could say "laser printer" I had a nice sideline going: Business cards and brochures, tickets and flyers, invitations for showers and such. Thus, Deborah's Desktop was born complete with an empty MySpace page and hope for the future. I think one day it would be nice to have my own desktop publishing business and maybe a copy shop. I must stop listening to naysayers who always try to sway me away from starting my own gig by saying, "Ah, starting your own business has it's own headaches."

Well, that may be so. But it'd still be my headache to have, not someone else's.

3. If I can help somebody as I pass along...
...then my living shall not be in vain. Being unemployed has given me the time to actually help people. Small errands for some elderly people at my church. Spending extra time with my mother and my daughter. Giving a lady walking in the blistering heat with a small crying child a ride. I had time to stop and smell the roses, but I also opened my eyes a bit wider to the world around me and saw that there is a world in need. Small things, but sometimes the small stuff needs sweating. I read somewhere once, "it's the small things that fret holes in life, like moths in cloth." I've always like sewing. If God is the tailor then we are thread. Blest be the ties that bind.