Oh, the Lazy Photo Catch-Up

So, how was your entire summer and early fall? We did lots of stuff, but not any blogging, for some reason. Maybe it's because I dreaded the thought of scrolling through my photos, waiting for blogger to upload, and then realizing I'd forgotten to do it all backwards and would have to start over. Like, for instance, this is the last paragraph I'm writing. Backwards, like I've already downloaded all the pictures and written the captions, see? Does anybody else have this problem or am I doing something wrong? Argh.

So, here's what we did. Hope it won't be so long before the next one!

Some of us went on vacation to the Outer Banks, saw some dunes, and captured some awesome sunsets.









Some of us stayed here and looked for a job, painted the dining room, and slept in. No pictures of that, although I guess I could go snap one of the dining room. Nah.

We lost even more teeth, and posed in our froggy pajamas, just because.



We started school. First grade and first year of preschool!



We played winter even when it was still hot, hot, hot.


We played soccer and splashed around downtown.








We celebrated birthdays. One happy 4-year-old cousin.



Finally, we played "babies" in the magazine basket.

Well, only one of us could fit.

Sea World! (yes, this is from 3 weeks ago)

3 weeks ago, when I still had a job, blah, blah, blah. We piled into the minivan "which has more room so the kids won't be two feet from our ears as they talk nonstop all the way up there". Also, the van which apparently could have used a little autobody shop check up because the water pump blew. On I-4, approximately 15 minutes from downtown Orlando. Oh, and we'd passed an fresh accident with a flipped car and a woman being extricated, prior to emergency services' arrival, about 5 minutes before the pump blew. So we waited a little extry time on the interstate waiting for the tow. Like an hour. Have I mentioned it was hot? It was.

Although I can say: Thank God for AAA. And for the tow truck driver who drove us almost all the way to the gates of Sea World, to the closest possible AAA-approved body shop, from which it was possible (although not pleasant) to WALK to Sea World. (See below, because I can't seem to remember to load my pictures backward, darn linear/chronological mind.) The tow truck ride MIGHT have been the highlight of the trip for Emily. And as I said, not believing it even a little bit, at the time, It is actually kind of funny now.

And we had fun. This is day two.



And here was Sea World Day One, the day we'd WALKED at least a couple of miles from the car shop, no stroller, 88 degrees, no shade, into the park. The parking lot itself, the final leg of the epic journey, seemed like the Sahara, except with a lot more people and, um, cars. But endless, hot, with no water fountains.




In case anyone can tell that's me next to Emily on the carousel. I wish you hadn't, but let me explain my deranged expression. I was turning around to look at Penny, on a horse (or equivalent sea-creature) behind us, terrified that she was going to let go and slide, the-stuff-of-nightmares-fashion, off the horse while we were moving, if I didn't take my eyes off her. But I didn't want to spend the entire ride looking worried so I faked enthusiasm: Isn't this FUN, Penny? Aren't we having the best time of our lives? She was, and she held on very tight, and everything was fine. Of course. (Because I never took my eyes off her, that's why.)

I will post more tomorrow. Maybe I'll get us to Gymnastics Jamboree! Or maybe all the way to Cousin's Birthday in the Park! But probably not to Penny's Birthday! Or Emily's Kindergarten Graduation! (Come on, people, that was only yesterday!)

Fragments

[Read this first.]

I keep dreaming about my office. Not the building, but the actual small room where I worked. The scratched wooden desk whose drawers I never fully cleaned out from the last resident. My filing cabinets, the rusty metal bookcase behind me where I kept neat stacks of in-progress projects and frequently used forms. The not-outstanding rolling chair, slightly wobbly and creaky. Even the computer and phone, same as everyone else's, which nonetheless felt like an extension of me, the worker.

When I'm awake, though, I think about the people I had to leave without warning. Like I said last time, I don't want to inflate my own self-importance. The people I worked with are used to being left behind, low priority, forgotten, so my absence likely won't be significant for very long. Yet, that in itself bothers me. Not my insignificance, but that these are marginalized people, with more emphasis on the "marginal" than the "people" part. I know there's this whole middle class employee socialization about never at any cost jeopardizing one's references, but what's my greater responsibility? To the people I was trying to help, whom I was paid to help, or to the employer who might or might not even be around to give me a reference. My conscience (or my also socialized evangelical Christian-guilt) tells me I'm not off the hook, human-to-human, just because I was asked to pack my things and stop working there. I don't know what that means, though. I don't know what I should do.

I wrote a note to one woman I was working with. I put it in my home mailbox this morning. She'd asked me to help her with a very simple, human need the day before I was laid off. In fact she asked me as I was walking out the door the day before, so I'd planned to start working on it the next morning. It was a line on a post-it on my desk. It was one of the things I mentioned to my supervisor as I was taking down my pictures and trying to remember if I'd brought the calculator from home (I decided I did). So I just this morning wrote her a note, telling her that I was sorry I couldn't have said good bye. I told her I was still thinking about her and wishing her well. I told her the resource I was considering calling on her behalf and gave her the number to try to call herself. I put my return address on the envelope.

I wasn't working as a counselor, just a case manager, but in my counseling program we hear a lot about boundaries. I had doubts in my mind about whether I should maintain contact, however slight and unobtrusive, since I can no longer help her with the backing of any agency. Is it appropriate to imply some kind of friendship, however passing and limited? But also, how human is it to just pretend that no one mattered to me beyond the paycheck? She's just one person out of over 100 people I worked with in the brief 6 months I was there. I'm only speaking of the over 100 homeless people who can't do anything for me, who can't give me references or remember that I was professional and competent when I coordinated services with them or made referrals to them in the spring of 2009. I have a few of those other names, too, which I'm keeping for my future employment searches.

Most of the homeless people have moved on already, of course, and funding woes may cause the rest of them to move on soon. Many of them I only met for a few hours or a few days. Many of them were addicts. A few of them were unpleasant sociopaths, but then again, I've met a few of those who weren't homeless, too, haven't you? They all had stories, though. And they were all human, like me, like my co-workers, like my supervisors, like you.

This layoff is still less than 4 days old. I may be going through one or more of the stages of guilt. I may be having trouble moving on and accepting my situation. Beyond all that, though, part of me wants to get out of the line of sheep moving from one insecure employment situation/temporarily-grassy-field to the next. I don't know what all of this means. Part of me wants to take the $100 digital voice recorder I had to buy for my graduate program and interview these people for public radio. But maybe I've just been listening to too much This American Life. Before their stories make me laugh or get a lump in my throat as I take my exercise walks around my neighborhoods, how were those contributors perceived? Slightly deranged, potentially obsessed yahoos with digital recorders, pursuing their highly personal stories with no hope of financial gain.

I've wanted to be a writer my entire life, but the main reason I'm not (leaving aside any judgment on my actual ability) is because I've always been afraid to take risks. I didn't want to get rejected (even though every published writer I respect says they've gotten countless rejection letters). I didn't want to put myself out there, in every possible meaning of that cliche. I'm not good at being vulnerable. I'm not good at being scrutinized. As much as I want to be loved, accepted, and approved of like every other human, I always fight the tendency to hide and disappear. I'm sure I'm not alone in that, either.

I'm right in the middle here. I'm less than two months from having a master's degree, my second master's degree, in a field where layoffs due to agency funding is unfortunately all too common (even before the global economic collapse). Even when employed, I can expect to work long hours for less than teacher's pay, unless I go into private practice, which is also no sure thing and pretty much guarantees that I will not be working with the most needy, since I will have to seek paying clients. My husband probably doesn't want to hear this, since we just spent thousands of dollars on this degree. I don't even know what I'm saying. Let's just call it adjustment disorder, for the moment.

I have to make pancakes now, for the two most important little humans in my life. My employment makes no difference to them. They're too young to notice any financial sacrifice we have to make, which won't, at any rate, include going hungry or losing the house. I still have all that: my children, my marriage, my house, my friends and family. Not much has changed, really, but I'm trying to allow myself to do whatever it is I'm doing. To mourn. To ponder. To give myself room to grow. To be. It is what it is. What will I be?

The Economy Hits Home

One day you're at your desk, making phone calls and checking emails. Someone gives you an updated phone extension list, because someone moved to a new office, and you put it up on the side of your filing cabinet with the blue crab magnet one of your clients made. You complete a few tasks and throw away the post-it notes reminding you to do them. You sit across the desk from a new client, desperate and nervous, who clutches her small bag of meager belongings on her lap while rapidly tapping her leg. You think about what resources might be helpful for her and set up a follow-up appointment for tomorrow, because it's almost four o'clock and you have to get to class.

And then the next day they tell you they had to make some layoffs and, unfortunately, you're one of them. From there it's a little bit like on TV, and it feels that way, too. Not quite real. You take down the pictures of your children, turn over your keys to your apologetic supervisor, glance over the desk at the sticky notes that you'll never get to. Your supervisor promises he'll be calling you because he's sure he'll have questions. You have mixed feelings about this--you want to help, but if they need you, they shouldn't let you go. You shakily write your hours down in the payroll logbook for the last time. The few people you see in the hallway seem shaken as well. One co-worker says, "I'll be next. I have to be next."

You have a 30 minute drive home, during which you have to keep reminding yourself that those clients, those people you were actually helping, are not your problem anymore. They can't be. You think about the ones you just started helping, the ones who've told you about everyone in their lives abandoning them. You realize you sound a little grandiose, thinking you're the only one who could help them. Or that your clients will remember you in a year. But you were proud of your work; as cynical as you usually are, that mattered.

You also miss the people you'd almost become friends with. The people you spent 30-40 hours a week with, joking around, rolling your eyes, rushing around and getting things done. You realize it's too late to get their phone numbers. You wonder how you could have thought you were friends without getting phone numbers. Of course, you thought you'd have time.

You never think it's going to happen to you, even when it happened to others across the hall last month and the month before that. You never think you're going to be walked down the hallway carrying your belongings, the slim personal trappings of your former office, your former persona. What next? What now?

Um, February

I am ashamed that it's been a month and a half since I posted anything. Ugh. My excuse is that I am working 50 hours a week, although only being paid for 30. The other 20 are internship hours, which will be done in April. And the 30 are a stressful 30, with more like 40 hours of work laid before me and irritation directed at me when I can't get it done. It's even more complicated than that, and there's a possibility the balance might shift to the totally-not-worth-it-for-the-paycheck side. If that happens, well, I'll let you know. (People like Mrs. Spock put me to shame, what with their several-times-a-week updates.)

So, Daddy is the house-husband, S-A-H-D, home dad, or whatever you want to call him. He's doing a fine job--a great job--but of course, not doing everything the way I would do it. I'm having to adjust to that and self-edit my why-did-you-do-it-that-way inquiries (or at least my accusatory tone). We really don't need/want to spend the three or fours a day together sniping at each other, do we? And this week, with Penny's nasty cold, there's been no morning daycare for her. Poor Daddy.

So, photos! Here are the three little ones, in photos taken by my sister. The toddlers love to make the Baby laugh. (Wait, are 3-year-olds and almost 3-year-olds toddlers? What's the correct term? Preschooler? What if they're not in preschool? Toddler sounds like they're still unsteady on their feet, which, despite a tendency toward bowleggedness on Penny's part, is untrue. Don't they look giant next to the baby-face?)







Penny, in one of many costume changes per day, proving that witches can be wistful. (The plunging neckline is because this [cheap Target] halloween costume is size 4-6. Also, is that a sock on her shoulder?)


And more evidence of what Penny likes. Necklaces, bracelets, hair stuff. And SHOES. Notice the ones that are all neatly lined up, rather than tossed around in a pile? Those are all the ones with heels. Mommy's "fancy shoes" (relatively speaking). Her favorites. Clomp. Clomp. Clomp.


I would promise not to wait so long again before updating, but I would probably not be able to keep that promise. Would it interest you to know that in between this sentence and the last, I just washed out underwear (not mine) in the toilet? I didn't think so. The only bonus of working (besides the paycheck) seems to be that I only have to do that on the weekends.

Maybe I will make it my new Saturday tradition, after pancake breakfast and exercise (those two kind of cancel each other out, don't they?), to blog. I couldn't exercise this morning--at least not the kind of exercise that entails driving to the Y, dropping the kids at the babysitting room, and chatting with my sister while walking uphill for 3 miles on the treadmill--because three out of five of our collective children are running at the nose and barking at the throat. The Y frowns upon sharing that kind of thing. We'll see if next week I can do all three (pancakes, exercise, blog). Until then [cough], have a good week!

Christmases (plural)

We had Christmas with both families this year. Christmas Day, since my mom was up in the hospital getting her kidney transplant, we were at my parents' house (where the ham was) without my parents. Which meant my siblings and I were in charge of the food and what time we opened presents, and everything, just as if we were actual grown-ups! I think we pulled it off. Of course we missed my parents, but my dad kept calling with updates, and we all had her in our thoughts pretty much all the time.

The day after Christmas we drove to Charlotte, to be with Carlyle's parents and siblings. We had another Christmas feast (steaks! yum!) and another round of opening presents. The weather was temperate, colder than Florida, but pleasant (at least until Wednesday when we were driving on friend-and-family-visits and the winds came . . .Brrr!). It was especially nice to sleep in since Grandmother Sharon volunteered to be on children-duty in the mornings!

Here are some snapshots from our various festivities.

There were stockings here and stockings there.




There were kittens and cousins and siblings and babies.






There were dinosaurs here and dinosaurs there. We now have a dinosaur drawer, one of those three under the bunk bed. Very convenient.




They learned how to be good consumers. Or consumers of some kind. I didn't remove the red-eye in the second picture because it kind of seems appropriate (also, I'm tired.)




There was a Hawaiian theme, thanks to Aunt H.'s recent trip and gifts. Even Shadow the dog got into the act.






They took baths in the swimming pool (Grandmother Sharon's tub).



We ended with visits to friends even farther north. We actually caught up with two couples we used to work with at the bookstore, couples who also married and each have two daughters. It was great catching up and the visits were over way too quickly. I only have pictures from the second family, our friends Jared and Julie, but our girls had fun playing with all their new friends. Emily asked (whined), "Do we have to leave?" at each stop we made.

Pictured is J & J's 4 1/2 year-old daughter Mary, who was gracious enough to share her bedroom floor with both Penny and Emily. It only took the three of them about 45 minutes, and stern visits from each of the four parents in turn, to fall asleep. Not too bad, considering. Check out Julie's blog (you can see her socks as she takes her photos in my pictures) for better photos of the same event and the un-pictured (by me), adorable Caroline, who, at 9 months, wasn't quite old enough to join the slumber party.




These faces pretty much sum it up (although Penny's face is a little on the 2-year-old's-idea-of-camera-smile-equals-intense-scary-face side). Christmas was good, especially when you factor in the bonus kidney. (My mom is home now and looks great! She'll be taking the rest of the school year off on doctor's orders to avoid 6-year-old germs on her immuno-suppressed system.)




Tomorrow it's back to school for the kids, and my first full week of work and internship and class and oh-no-did-we-pack-lunches?