a place to meet, play & inspire

Is any job really pointless and meaningless though?  I don't think you'd be the EXACT same great guy you are today if you didn't have those experiences.  Besides, for me anyway, figuring out what I WANT has always begun with learning what I DON'T WANT.  I think a life learner learns from good/bad experiences.  Therefore my goal as of late has been to give M1 M2 and K  numerous and varied experiences, ranging from the

mundane: (returning books to library and checking out the ones on hold for us)

exciting: (planning our trip to California)

challenging (find their groove at a schooled kid weekend birthday party at Chuck E Cheese)

boring: (entertaining themselves at an Unschoolers support group)

angering (responding to/letting off steam regarding a piano classmates' comment on M1 and M2's piano playing

interesting (long drawn out conversations about time travel and playing out different scenarios after watching Back to the Future parts 1,2 and 3)

I used to shy away from putting my girls in situations that might be uncomfortable or awkward for them. As long as the situations are safe, I try to be a fly on the wall to watch their reactions to different situations.   I know it sounds borderline experimental/scientific, but it has made for excellent discussions about our different personalities, my belief system, hubby's belief system, their own thinking and ways of doing things.  'Conversation' has been an excellent learning vehicle for M1 and M2 both.  I'm enjoying my older girls now so much more than I ever have.  gotta go give them hugs and kisses now......

But being stuck in a crap job for years is still a waste.  My dream is that the kids be able to learn about themselves when they're younger to avoid soulsucking bullshit when they're older.  Or that they can make a choice for themselves rather than getting a job for insurance.  It's a lesser version of teaching them about the dangers of fire - I want them to know it's hot but I'm not sticking their hands in the flame to get the point across.

And wanting a job out of sheer curiosity is way different than taking a job just for money.  I've had my share of low paid, service-industry jobs.  At the time I never thought about looking for more interesting work, but let's see where life takes us.  afaik, kids in Costa Rica don't have jobs.  They can probably learn the same lessons by volunteering anyway - there's always plenty of work that most people don't want to do.

At 14 I had my first job for one summer at an elderly daycare service.  It ended up being touching and poignant and has given me memories all these years later.  When thinking about this topic, I realized that I don't look back on any job I've had with regret or dislike.  I've always been the type who worked really hard and did everything I could.  One boss described me as a work horse and that is true, albeit a bit of an unpleasant association. I had the usual jobs as a teenager: KFC, a laundermat, a grocery store, a Chinese restaurant, babysitting, a video store...but what was unusual about me was that I held all of these jobs simutaneously.  In high school I was on a work-study program that allowed me to leave school after lunch every day so I could go to work.  Every single day of the week I worked, sometimes two jobs in one day.  For the next ten years or so I maintained that sort of working mania until I met my husband.  Mainly I worked in offices as an office manager doing bookkeeping with data entry being my forte'.  During my early 20s I worked from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m.  every day and for countless hours on the weekends.  When I was pregnant and forced to stay in bed for 4 1/2 months, I worked from home, laying on my left side with a phone at my elbow.  When I had my first child, I didn't leave her at daycare but I did work two jobs around her naps and sleeping hours.  It was the equivalent of a full time job with overtime.  I used to take her with me to work.  I stayed up late, got up early, and worked!  worked!  worked!  But I never left her with a babysitter or a stranger!  When I became pregnant with child #2 I got stopped in my tracks.  The same week I found out about having rheumatoid arthritis, I found out I was pregnant.  That was that.  Working became something impossible for me to do with any regularity.  I struggled with it for a couple of years, with a boss who really backed me up and helped me.  In 2003 it just became beyond my means to be able to be relied upon for anything so I could no longer work.  Talk about a blow.  All my adult life I had been valued for my abilities to run businesses and make things happen.  My ego existed because of what I could do and the respect I had gotten from people because of those abilities.  It took me quite a while to not feel worthless and guilty when I stopped working.  It wasn't that I felt my job as a mama wasn't important because I know that is THE job I want to have.  It was more of an adjustment and a growth of trust to allow my husband to take care of us.  Now I don't miss working at all and would hate to have to leave my girls and go to work.

The term "work ethic" escaped me when I was rambling on and on with that.  Yes, I will give myself that - I do have a good work ethic.  It did serve me well during a time when I didn't have anything else in my life from which I could gain respect for myself.  I know I was a workaholic because it gave me a charge to handle so much and solve problems and be so needed by so many people.  Being a mommy is now far more difficult than being the boss of 35 employees and a 10 million dollar business.  I don't know how I did it.  My job as mommy is far more challenging!

One summer I had two part-time jobs and one week I worked 47 hours (I averaged around 30).  Somehow this felt like a LOT and I wasn't that inclined to work that much again until nowadays.  Even now, the only thing that keeps me working some 60-ish hours per week is the vision of seeing that drop to 10-15 in the future