resume life

I haven't written in here in awhile, but I'd kinda lost track of it, until Debbie pointed out that, like, my last six posts have been photographs I pulled off the Web. Sorta like a rock band being in a creative slump, and tossing out a mediocre Live album to distract from the real creative process.

And then she challenged me by asking if anything interesting had been happening in my life.

So I stopped to think about it, as I was cutting Dad's yard last week.
Always a good hour for some good inner personal conversation, and introspection.
And cardio.

What has been going on in my life, and why haven't I been writing about it?

Have I not been writing because it hasn't been interesting, or because I don't want to broadly share my current and personal insecurities and vulnerabilities? Perhaps both.

Generally speaking, the past fives months have been a bit of a challenge, since I lost my job,
and my Mom died in the same week, between Christmas and New Years.

I was pretty slow out of the gate making any attempt at a new job search, mainly because I
didn't want to jump into the same type of job, especially in the food and beverage industry.
But, of course, that begged the question of "What DO you want to do?" Great question.
The only thing that has seriously come to mind since the Fall of 2008 has been a job in the home improvement industry, and I've targeted Lowe's as the company I want to work for, and Department Head as the appropriate level of entry for me.

I have been personally networking with the Store Managers of four Lowe's, and I have developed relationships with them, such that, when a Department Head position opens up, and they are able to interview externally, I will be on a short list for consideration.
And as encouraging as each Store Manager interaction has been, job searching and interviewing in any economy can go slowly, but because I have narrow-cast my search so tightly, this particular interview process has felt exceptionally slow in progress. And the time in between the positive conversations cannot be fully kept afloat in hope by the buzz of a once-weekly affirmation that I am on the right path.

And it is during those in-between times, that I am currently living my life, and trying to make it interesting, while fighting the insecurities that vie for my spirit.

Debbie asked if I'd done anything interesting (read "blogworthy") lately.
I haven't written much, if anything, on my search for my next career until now.

However.....

























I may have written a bit about the massive home improvement project we've undertaken at Debbie's 120 year old house, removing 75% of the floors down to the crawlspace dirt, replacing the floor joists and foundation, and rebuilding from there. I could update to say that we are currently walking on new OSB sub-flooring, and slowly bringing the function of the house back together. The ultimate plan is to re-use as much of the original hardwood as we can, which could/should be 85-90% of it. I'm not sure how this will progress, but Debbie feels good about it.
Personally, I don't see how it can be harder than the deconstruction!

There are two walls in the middle of the house that will need some major work. The floor joist
leveling lifted that part of the foundation three inches, and the old plaster cracked rather badly.
We'll probably pull all that plaster down to the original lathe work, and put up fresh dry wall.

Meanwhile, we will be slowly reconstructing the function of the house by bringing back most of the items we temporarily put into storage. Like beds, dressers, sofas, clothing, TV's, and more.

So is that interesting? It's fun to dream, plan, and be a physical part of the process of change.
But it's also work, and it's not exactly Spring Break on the beach. Sometimes, you just need to get away. So we did just that last Saturday, but it's late, and I think I will leave our Ikea road trip for the next post. Suffice it to say, it was rather interesting, and a good getaway for us.
I hope this post isn't my throwaway Live album.