Updates All Around

1) Book club was weird. I was the only one who came. Well, me and the guy who set the whole thing up. So we chatted and hung out, talking about the book, life, other books, movies, TV, whatever. It was awkward, as it always is to meet somebody new. It felt kind of like a first date. Which seriously, I've been married for over 7 years. Before we got married, we dated for 6 years. Folks, I haven't been on a date with a new person since 1997. So I went on a book club date last night. It was weird. But I guess I'd go back next month, so that's good.

2) Our profile books were delivered to the agency yesterday. Now we're just waiting for our social worker to send the final copy of the home study, and that's completely out of our control, so we've done what we can do.

3) Out of the blue this morning, I got an e-mail from the personnel director in the town where I interviewed for the kindergarten job last summer. When I spoke with the principal in August, she recommended that I sign up to substitute, which I did, but no one ever called. But today, she did. She's going to send out the paperwork to me today, so maybe within the next few weeks, I'll be working again.

So that's what's new around here.

Malaise

This is a good word for this time of year. It is, at least, if last year was any indication. Last September was really hard for me. I expect this one will be less so, but still not easy. Last year at this time, I was unemployed, I was scared, I was lonely. All my friends were going back to school and I was not. And that was the first time in many years that I would not be in a classroom in September.

But... this is a different year. Yes, it's true that all my friends are going back to school within the next week or two. Yes, it's also true that I am not. But last year at this time, I lacked the perspective that when you're unemployed you get to do more things than you would if you were working.

Here are some things that I did in the last year (that I wouldn't have done if I were working...)

1) Went to France and Spain at Christmas with my whole family - I planned the whole trip. I conceived the entire idea, convinced everyone that we ought to do it, rented the apartment, found flights, made the itinerary for the whole trip. It was an incredible trip. Once in a lifetime, perhaps, but we did it!

2) Took a photography class - I had always wanted to learn how to take better pictures, and the adult education in my town had a photography class. I learned how to use the camera I had and eventually bought a better one. I know how to use that too.

3) Went to Ireland with my mother-in-law - This was funny. Mister's mother called me randomly on a Friday in May and told me that she was going to Ireland the next week for her work. She said that everyone in her group was bringing someone from their family and Mister's sister and dad were both working and couldn't get the time off. Obviously, time off was not a problem for me, so I said yes. I went to Ireland for a week on something like 8 days notice.

4) Rediscovered my love of baking - (Thanks for reading those PB&J cupcake posts, btw!) I tried to bake something every week for the people in Mister's office. Most of it got rave reviews, which always made me feel good. The good part was sending it off to the office in a container in the morning and just getting the container back at night. It's hard to feel guilty about eating one cupcake or brownie or cookie or whatever. I know that if I had the entire pan of brownies here, I'd eat them. So I'd eat one when I made it, pack it up and send it to the office with Mister. Win-win.

5) Move - Finally. We moved out of our crappy neighborhood and our crappy townhouse into a new house. We had been talking about it for most of the last 3 years, but I was always too busy. While Mister was at school and at work, I packed up our old house, drove boxes over to the new house, and unpacked the boxes at the new house. The movers really only brought the furniture over. I did most of the boxes and anything else that didn't go in a box but wouldn't be considered furniture. As a result, we lived in a neighborhood that didn't make our social worker roll her eyes when she came. It's important to make the right impression when you can, and our old neighborhood would not have helped. So now we're happy with where we live, and the "Our Home" page in the profile will be gorgeous instead of just OK.

So, since I'm not planning to be in the classroom for the 2010-2011 school year, I hope I will be as open to some other great stuff that couldn't happen while I was working. Here are some things that I hope will happen.

1) Profile - I hope to finish our profile book by Labor Day. I just want to get it out of the way. I plan to hole myself up next week and just bang out the first draft for our social worker to read. It doesn't matter that it won't be perfect, but I just want to get something down on paper. I can edit from there. Right now, I can't edit because there's nothing to edit!

2) Mister's graduation - Right now it is scheduled for December. I can't wait. I miss him so much when he's in class and it takes up so much of his brain space. I will be so happy for him when he's finished.

3) Weight Loss - I'd like to lose about 15 more pounds. I started in July and have lost about 7 pounds so far. It kind of fluctuates depending on the day, but I'd feel great to weigh about 15 pounds less. It's really hard, but I'm doing it. Slowly, slowly, but I'll get there.

4) Travel - I don't really have any planned, but at this time last year, I never would have said I would go to France, Spain and Ireland within the year. So travel is always on my list and I keep myself open for any fun opportunities.

5) Last but not least, adoption - Obviously. I hope that we're matched quickly. I hope that it's a successful match and placement. I hope that we have a baby soon.

Bummer... But Hope Anyway

The principal e-mailed me last night - I didn't get the kindergarten job. She urged me to sign up to substitute in their district though, and hoped that she'd see me around. I haven't signed up to sub in that district, but I have in my town. I figure I'll add the other town as well, since it's only the next town over and not far away.

So I'll sub this year. It'll be OK. I'm kind of sad to not get a job for another year. (Because seriously?!? What the hell is wrong with me that I can't get a job for 2 years in a row?!?) It brings up all this self-doubt - should I be a teacher? Am I doing the right thing with my life? This job that I love and think I'm really good at, apparently no one else thinks I'm good enough. That kind of hurts.

So I'll sub and I'll continue to delude myself with thoughts that we'll have a quick adoption in the fall or winter and I'd have had to quit that job anyway.

I've had other times in my life when it was really hard to find a job, and looking back at them, I was fortunate to have had really precious non-job opportunities that I wouldn't have had if I had been working. When I first graduated, I couldn't find a job to save my life. Same kind of thing as now, I went on all these interviews and didn't get any jobs. Then my mom was diagnosed with cancer, and because I was not teaching, I had so much more time to spend with her. I wouldn't trade those last months with my mom for any job security or teaching experience in the world. And if I had been at work that year, I would have missed being with her.

Last year, with no job, it was kind of my hedonistic year. I really focused on doing things that I love. I tried new things I didn't even know I loved. I took a photography class, which was really awesome and I ended up buying myself a fabulous camera and I learned how to use it. I love to bake and cook (and eat, which is why I gained about 10 pounds too...) so I spent the year baking new things. Also, I traveled a lot last year. I went to France and Spain and Ireland during the school year, and California last summer. It's been a busy year, even without a job.

I'm open to taking full advantage of this time off. I had hoped I'd take advantage of a job this year. But if not, then hopefully I'll finally get to be a mother. I do recognize how those two things are not related, in theory. At least subbing this year will give me the opportunity to continue to travel and do fun things that I like, regardless of when (if) we are matched.

But really, I have this secret fantasy. I guess it's not going to be a secret fantasy anymore, since I'm about to say what it is. Basically, it goes like this - shortly after we're finished with our home study, we're matched quickly. This is the part where the fantasy gets fuzzy, but it ends with me buying a Baby's First Christmas 2010 ornament for our tree. Fantasy, I know. But it's fun to dream...

More Hope

Well, I'm back from my interview. I think it went well. It was for kindergarten, so that's always a good thing. How can you go wrong with a group of 5 year olds?! After we talked, as I was leaving, the principal said that my passion for teaching was evident to them.

Clearly that's a good thing for her to have said. On the other hand, I've been on so many interviews and received so many compliments and heard such nice things, only to not get the job in the end.

So my fingers are crossed and I'm waiting in joyful hope for the phone to ring!

Funny, one of my friends told me that she'd say a prayer to Saint Anthony for me. Saint Anthony, for those who don't know, is the patron saint of finding lost things. Of all the prayers I've said in the last year for a job, I never thought of telling Saint Anthony that I lost my job and I need help to find it!

Saint Anthony, I lost my job. I really need your help to find it. :)

He's never let me down, so there's that. Fingers crossed and whatnot.

Hope

I got called for an interview later this week. I was so excited that I forgot to ask the principal what grade it's for! I tried to call back, but no one answered, and then I figured that I'd feel really dumb to leave a voicemail saying that I forgot to ask and she forgot to say, so I am just going to hope that I'm interviewing for kindergarten or first grade. I just hope it's not for 4th or 5th, since I've never taught either. While there's a part of me that would really prefer to have a baby this fall, I also wouldn't mind cashing some paychecks first. May as well start socking away the money for Adoption #2 while we can, right?

It's funny to think how quickly things can change. I might have to prepare a classroom next week. I'm not holding my breath though, because I've been on a bazillion interviews already this summer (and all during last year too) and I haven't gotten those either. But it's sure fun to hope....

And, if nothing else, if I do get a job, I'll have a place to wear all those skirts and sweaters and boots I saw in the catalogs yesterday!

Big Brother Spurs Weight Loss

One thing to know about me is that I’m lazy. Lazy probably doesn’t even cover it. I may even stretch into the territory of slothful. I’m perfectly content to sit on the couch all day long and watch TV. Even if it’s bad TV, even if I don’t care about what’s on. Which is how I got into Big Brother in the first place. I think I watched one episode of one of the first seasons and I didn’t really get it. Then another year, someone whose blog I read really really liked it, so I tried to get into it, but I was not into the commitment of watching any show 3 times a week. That’s a lot of time to devote to one TV show. So I passed on it for many years.

Last year, I watched a whole season of Big Brother for the first time. It was kind of an accident that I watched it - I found it streaming on Netflix after the season had begun. In one day, I watched about 5 episodes. It was crazy, and I still hadn’t caught up with all the episodes there were. So the next day, I tried to be more disciplined about watching Big Brother. “Just one episode,” I’d tell myself, “and then you have to go do something. After one episode, unload the dishwasher. Then you can watch another episode.” I tricked myself into doing those household chores I hate by watching another episode of Big Brother. It worked. In that one day, I was able to do so many things that I had been putting off. And I loved that Netflix (and CBS too, I later discovered) streamed the episode the next day, so if we went out and weren’t home in time, I could just watch it later.

Going back to the laziness part of my story, it really bothered me in years past to admit that I just sat around all day watching TV. As a teacher with summers off, I always felt like I had to take good advantage of my time off. People think it’s 12 weeks of summer, and that you don’t do anything during that time, but my summer breaks had always only been about 8 weeks. 2 of those weeks in August are spent prepping the classroom, so I’m down to 6 weeks of vacation. Usually 1 or 2 of those weeks are spent in some professional development class, so now I’m down to about 4 weeks of vacation. Then if the Mister and I went anywhere for a week, that’s 3 weeks of lazy hazy days of vacation. 15 weekdays. Really, don’t get me wrong, because I’m not complaining that that’s a short amount of time at all. I always just felt like with 15 weekdays, that’s not much, so can I afford to waste several of them watching bad reality TV that I don’t even care about? No way.

Then at the end of the 2008-2009 school year, I got laid off. I was unemployed for the entire 2009-2010 school year. I’ve had a (thus far) 56 week summer vacation. And no end in sight. I have no job for 2010-2011 either, which can be addressed in a separate post.

So now, I have plenty of time this year for Big Brother. 3 hours of TV in a week? Pffft. That’s nothing. Well, when Mister and I moved in March, I called the cable company to renegotiate our package. I asked for more channels or to pay less. They were able to throw in a package that includes some movie channels, including Showtime.

Now I’m obsessed with Big Brother. 3 hours of TV in a week? Oh no, that’s just CBS. Every night, Showtime runs 3 hours of the live feeds from the Big Brother house for Big Brother After Dark. Big Brother now costs me 24 hours a week, and I’m kind of OK with that. Time is what I have, after all.

But the good news about watching 3 hours of Big Brother every day has awoken some part of me that has decided I can no longer be slothful. There is something disgusting about sitting on a couch watching 3 hours of other people sitting on couches. So now, instead of unloading the dishwasher, I try to tell myself that for every episode of Big Brother, I have to spend one hour exercising. Because there’s nothing slothful about people who exercise.

So there, Big Brother! I bet you never thought that because of your dumb show, people would get angry and start exercising and losing weight. Well, I don’t miss an episode of Big Brother, and I sure as heck don’t miss those 6 pounds.