Work (Five Minute Friday)

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When I think of work, I think of the job I have had for the past eleven years. It is probably the most difficult job I have ever had. This was not a job I asked for or applied for. I didn’t go looking for it, but it found me.

I had been a stay at home mother after graduating with my teaching degree and deciding the classroom was not the place for me. I had poured myself into running the house and doing so with as little money as we could get by on. Think clipping coupons, cooking meals at home and shopping for most clothing second hand. Eventually, hubby mentioned that it was time to cut way back on volunteer commitments and find some work that actually paid me instead. I gradually gave up most of my volunteer commitments. In December 2005, as I turned in the last issue of the quarterly genealogy journal I had been doing for the past five years in to be printed, I mentioned to the woman who owned the print shop that it was my last issue and that hubby wanted me to start working at a job that actually paid. She asked if I was good at computers. I told her I was decent and she told me that she would keep my phone number and keep me in mind if they ever needed someone to do some data entry. I told her that was fine and thought no more of it.

Fast forward to April 2006. I had just gotten home from taking my fourteen-year-old son to high school after he had been home for two weeks following his run in with a car, resulting in a broken leg which required surgery to insert a titanium plate to repair the damage. He couldn’t ride the bus, so I was driving him to and from school for the foreseeable future. When I sat down to figure out what to get accomplished around the house for the day, the phone rang. When I answered, it was the lady from the print shop asking if I could come in and help them out with some computer work. I told her I could and when she asked me when I could start, I hesitantly asked if the next day would work. She said it would and suddenly, I had a job and one last partial day of freedom from the working world. I needed that day.

I always figured it was God’s plan for me to have that time to nurse my son through his first two weeks with a broken leg and to be able to take my mother for her cancer treatments years earlier. I was glad hubby hadn’t pushed the finding a job thing earlier and had thus allowed me to do these things for my family. But God was clearly telling me that hubby was right and it was time to work for pay again. It isn’t my dream job, but I’m still not sure what I want to be when I grow up. I have gained confidence in my ability to learn new things, and I have learned loads in the time I have been there. I may fuss and fume some days wishing I could quit the job, but I can’t help but feel like this is still God’s plan for my life. He tells me my work here is still not done.

Alright, Lord. I’m not crazy about the idea, but I understand. I tell Him to please let me know loud and clear when he has a different assignment for me. I also ask that it be a job I can wake up each day looking forward to and love and that it be one that will take me through until retirement. I also mention to Him that it would be great at this stage in life if the next job hubby or I get just happened to come with health insurance, because we all know that eventually, not having it will catch up to us, and hubby and I aren’t getting any younger. Affordable care coverage isn’t affordable yet either, so we have no choice but to save some back each month to cover what we must and pay the fines when we file our taxes. I don’t mind working but that doesn’t mean I am not eagerly awaiting the day when I can retire and get back to all the things that having to work full-time keeps me from doing now.

Has God ever found you a job? Tell us about it in the comments below, please.

This post is part of the weekly Five Minute Friday link-up!
The prompt this week is: Work
The assignment: Write for five minutes on the word of the week. This is meant to be a free write, which means: no editing, no over-thinking, no worrying about perfect grammar or punctuation. Just write.

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