Heading Out! // My Reading List

The day has come. Well, the day before the day. I’ve got everything I’m taking scattered around my room, ready to be strategically into a suitcase, and I’ve been keeping the laundry machines downstairs pretty busy, as I’m not only packing what I’m taking, but cleaning and organizing what will be left behind. Seasonal jobs like these are great for re-evaluating what belongings I need to keep, and for doing a bit of re-organizing in my room. Sort of like packing up and moving all together, except not as drastic cause I know I’m coming back.

My mother and I will be heading out sometime tomorrow, preferably before lunchtime, but we’re in no hurry. I just need to report for work on this Thursday. We’ll be driving our green subaru, which recently lost one of its headlights and received a small dent due to a deer that jumped in front of me this morning(in broad daylight) on Highway 203. Yeah everything happens to me on 203… Not sure what happened to the deer, but it was not there when we went back, so we’re hoping it’s all right!

While I was packing everything up, I thought I would show you my reading list for this year, since I showed you what books I was taking last year.

My reading list:

Looks a bit slimmer this time, eh? This is the Kindle Keyboard, aka the newest Kindle… last year. It’s really my dad’s but he’s been reading on a tablet recently, and when he saw me looking into buying a Kindle for Wyoming and Oregon, urged me to just take his. There’s a great selection of free, copyright-expired books to choose from online, as well as library Kindle books. Once I discovered I could borrow the rest of the Sierra series by Robin Jones Gunn through the library (I read and reviewed the first book), I pretty much had this Kindle attached to my hand for over a month as I finished the Sierra series and then the Christy series. I’m currently enjoying reading St. Augustine, Elizabeth Gaskell, and other books from the library.

But no, that’s not my entire reading list. I am bringing a couple physical, smell-like-ink-and-paper books as well, just not as many as last year.

Besides my Kindle, I am bringing:

• The Reason for God, by Timothy Keller. I received this book at a college bible study and only read a chapter or two, but I enjoyed what I read so thought I would read the rest.
• My Bible, in a smaller form this year
• Celebration of Discipline, by Richard Foster. Brought it last year and never read it… =P
• Then Sings My Soul (Vol. 3), by Robert Morgan. The next book I need to read and review for Blogging for Books.
• The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern. This was a present from my lil brother Adam. The author was a Nanowrimo-er, and this book’s beginnings were inspired during a Nanowrimo. It’s gotten great reviews and I am very excited to enjoy it.

I would bring my Lord of the Rings collection again, as I did not finish it last year and I am not sure whether it is available on the Kindle, but I don’t think I would get around to reading it… *sigh*

So that’s it! What do you think? Good selection? How does it compare to last year?

If there’s any book you think I’m missing, just send it to my Kindle!

Just Mention Blackpool Rock… My Time at the British Pantry

Last Friday was the last day of work at my job and “second home” for the last four months. If you haven’t heard the story of how I got that job…

The day after New Year’s Eve I finally got serious about job hunting and moved to the physical walk-in, hand-out-resume. My Army Strong brother Caleb came along for the ride, but stayed in the car as I walked into restaurants, stores, etc, shook hands, handed out my resumes, and felt my spirits and sense of self-worth instantly plummet to my feet.

Mom had insisted that I stop by this place that was the only store to sell the one kind of tea that she would drink. It was called the British Pantry. This time Caleb came in with me. The store was quaint and small so I found the tea quickly. As the cashier (a petite lady with a British accent) rang me up, I ask her if they would be hiring anytime soon.

“Just a moment, love,” she replied, and disappeared into the back. A moment later the manager emerged, a moment later I was discussing my availability with said manager, and several minutes after I was leaving the British Pantry with tea in one hand and my brother by my side, set to start training 10 am the next morning! Quite a short yet successful job search, I must say.

Four months later, I hugged every server, cook, and cashier that I had worked with and clocked out for the last time. They all treated me so kindly, I am sorry to go.  But Wyoming awaits!  

 

I thought I would introduce you to my workplace of 4 months. It was a rather unique store – opened almost 35 years ago by a couple from England. Now their children and grandchildren run the place, and they have expanded into a restaurant (that makes GREAT fish & chips!), a slightly larger store, and a pub. All right next to each other along the street.

I worked in the middle section – in the store, where we sold china, sweet and savory pastries, imported British foods, and other odds and ends. I don’t claim to be an expert now, but because I had been so ignorant on all things British, I learned a lot about those people that live ‘cross the pond! Like what black pudding is (NOT pudding!), that mushy peas is somehow considered breakfast food, that if you ever want to remind a British of their childhood, show them a Blackpool Rock.

(Story: An English guy from eastern Washington came into our store for the first time and was exclaiming at everything in delight. As he was browsing in the back of the store, I mentioned to my friend and co-worker Laura that whenever any native Englander noticed the Blackpool Rock sitting behind the register, they always exclaimed about it and reminisced how much it reminds them of their childhood. When the man came to register and I was ringing him up, he noticed the Blackpool Rock. His whole face lit up as he loudly exclaimed, “Blackpool Rock!” I started laughing and turned to Laura, saying “Told ya so!” End of story. )

 

 

These are pickles. Yet one of the many things I never got around to trying… for perhaps obvious reasons.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

That’s right, ladies and gents – Canned. Vegetarian. Haggis. At $7 a can no less.

 

 

We sold many a banger.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crisps! I only tried a bite of the Wuster Sauce. ‘Twasn’t bad.

 

 

 

 

 

My co-worker Rebecca wanted you to note the cute dragon on this box of porridge. It is pretty cute.

 

 

 

 

 

The British dearly love their beans!

 

 

 

 

      Peas!

 

 

 

 

Now I don’t want you to think that I did not try anything in the shop, and thought that everything was nasty, because this would not be true. I found many food items I enjoyed – just many of them were candy bars!

 

     <—Delicious

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Delicious —>

 

 

 

 

 

  <— Definitely delicious. Just very crumbly – do not eat on your bed. Speaking from experience, he he.

 

 

And then, of course, there are the baked goods. Made fresh, everyday, on location. Every bit delicious. Just not food you want to eat that often!

If that doesn’t make your mouth water, I don’t know what will.

We still have memorabilia from the wedding. Cute, no?

Some of my co-workers

A photo they took of me hard at work.

 

The job was not perfect, of course, but I choose to remember the great times, the kind co-workers, the wonderful and unique customers that made up a one-of-a-kind experience I can tell others about for years to come. Like Mount Rainier, The British Pantry now holds a place of fondness in my heart.

Next to come: Signal Mountain! Hmmmm maybe I should start packing…

Cheers!

Rarely Simple

Well hello.

I know I haven’t written in a while, and I think about that fact often, but really I’ve had no desire to post…

In fact lately I have been going a couple days without checking my email or taking care of my Travian village. O.O I like to think that this is because I am busy actually living a life.

Also, I’m pretty sure that my brain is now incapable of producing any more interesting or witty Facebook statuses. Such a terrible thing, I know.

And, in case you didn’t notice, I have not been posting on my blog.

I have always restrained myself when writing blog posts. I do not like to talk about all the little things of my life and describe in detail what happens to me everyday. I do not like to write posts that offer advice or that make it sound in any way as though I have even one area in my life figured out – because it is really really easy to give out advice and to talk about the valuable lesson I’ve learned when in fact I am in the middle of the lesson. It is all too easy to have something touch my heart – a verse, a saying, a moment – and to spit it out in a blog post before I have truly let it sink into my heart and have let it marinate within me. Do you know what I mean? Sometimes when I write little Facebook statuses or blog posts or even write in my diary, it feels like I am just taking in life through my ears and pouring it out again through my open mouth. Sometimes I just need to close my mouth and let things remain in my mind for a while.

Of course sometimes I need the entire opposite. Living inside your mind, without much people-interaction, is not healthy. Sometimes I hold thoughts inside of me and turn them over and over. The kind of thoughts that people have been thinking for thousands of years and that don’t have a conclusion, and those wonderings can drive you kinda crazy. If you stop and look at this world: the trees and the tiny details and think about how real it is and how many people have lived and are living and how many cultures there are and how small I am and my world, what a small piece of everything I am, and how many things there are in this universe …

One thing I appreciate about God is that He never says life is simple. I mean, He tells us not to worry and that He’s in charge, and He reprimands us when we get caught up in our human frantic-ness, but I always feel that He understands. I appreciate that He does not make life or faith sound like a 1-2-3 step easy-peasy thing, because it’s not. Life is messy and rarely feels simple.

I am thankful we have a God who is patient with sheep, and who loves the one that says, “I believe, help me with my unbelief.”

Sorry for the ramblings. But then I don’t post for you readers, as much as I post for myself. If you don’t see blog posts for a while, just know it’s because I am closing my mouth and holding life-things inside me, to contemplate for a while.

Book review coming soon.

There is a Plan

Just a few minutes ago, I received the final declaration about the last piece of the path this next year will follow. Needless to say, I am STOKED! This upcoming year is looking absolutely AMAZING and I am so excited to experience it! And after switching from one idea to another – considering everything from Europe to New Zealand to the Pacific Crest Trail and about a million other neat destinations – it feels so wonderful to know where I am going.

Do you want to know??

I have been absolutely blessed with countless options for a summer job. Last year I was contacted by Glacier and Mt. Rainier, and as you probably know I went with the latter choice. This year I was contacted and offered a job by Glacier National Park, Bryce Canyon, Acadia, Yellowstone. Wow! Talk about amazing places to work!

If you’ve kept up with my social updates, you know my head was spinning from all of these choices and everything that had to be considered – money, location, friends… what did I want?? My first choice rested on Acadia, then on Bryce, then on Yellowstone… But with each new job offer, I realized more and more what I wanted. I did not want Glacier, because of the location (call me crazy, but I felt it was too similar to Mt. Rainier!). Bryce was very secluded, and since I would not be bringing my own car, it would be difficult to travel around during my days off. Acadia was very intertwined with towns and more suburban than remote. And at Yellowstone, the company had some bad “reviews”.

Enter New Option.

When I came home to find an email from Signal Mountain waiting, asking if I would consider a summer job with them, I was exasperated. I was ready for God to start closing doors – there were too many open doors at the moment! But God knew what He was doing. As usual.

As I began to look into the company and the location, I found people could say nothing but good things about both. Phrases like “best summer ever” and “would go back in a heartbeat” showed up. Many people return to Signal Mountain – what a change from Mt. Rainier, where many people left before their contract ended, and would never come back again! Two of my coworkers and friends from Mt Rainier, Lee and Kayla, had worked at Signal Mountain several years before. As I read their blogs and scrolled through the pictures capturing the scenery and their adventures, I was intrigued.

Signal Mountain was about 30 minutes from Jackson, Wyoming – fairly remote, yet you could still easily drive to a town, other hikes, and Yellowstone National Park. It was next to Jackson Lake, so I could do some kayaking – which I have been longing to do recently.

I was offered a job as a busser in the restaurants – which did not give me the stress and responsibility of a server, yet was not as low and menial as dishwasher. I would be happily busy and would also get a share of the tips.

And did I mention the company?? They have employee events such as Olympics and Christmas in August. Their employee dining room is known for its great food. Looking through the paperwork they sent me, I could easily tell they cared about their employees.

So… I took the job.

That’s right, I am working at Signal Mountain in the Grand Teton National Park this summer!!

As usual, God was overseeing my way. Time and time again in my life, He has provided perfectly at the right time – never too late. I kinda thought I had the trust issue down, but looking back at how consumed with worry and fret I had been, I see I’ve still got a lot to learn.

But that’s not the end of my news… yes, there’s more. (This is going to be a long blog post, sorry!) Just less than an hour ago I received confirmation that my application to Ecola was complete, and even more than that… I had been accepted!! The official letter will come in a few days.

What is Ecola, you ask?

Well it’s located at the Canyon Beach Conference Center in Oregon, and is a place for people, 18 years and up, to set aside a year (or a semester… but in my case a year) and study God and His Word. The teachers come from all over, stay for several weeks, and speak about books of the Bible, theology, doctrine, missions, etc… Students don’t just sit around and soak in, they also get involved with local churches and put their learning into action.

I have been planning to go to Ecola since I graduated, but something else has always come up. But about a month ago I finally finished the entire application and sent it in, and now I know for sure I am going.

Yes, it feels great to know my path.

I will not be depending on or resting my full weight upon this plan, though – my Pillar of Fire could move, stay, or switch directions at any time. But for now these are my bearings, and the wind is behind me and strong. Adventure waits ahead!

Why Has Dancing Disappeared?

This last night I hung out with the women at my church and we did some Jewish dancing. Which did not include Topol furiously jiggling and tossing chicken feed, nor did it include a rope strung down the middle of the room as men and women whirled separately. Rather it involved holding hands in a circle and doing steps called the “grapevine” and “yemenite”.

Let me clarify something – I cannot dance. Or I suppose it would be more accurate to say, I am a terrible dancer! I have done square dancing, swing dancing, and a couple other types of dancing, and I have terrible rhythm and more often than not end up on the opposite foot as everyone else. The best dances for me are the ones where I am told precisely what steps to take at every moment, and get to practice those steps over and over through out the night so I master them fairly well. Square dancing is, for me, ideal. Simple, repetitive, and yet very fun and fulfilling.

But I love all kinds of dancing, a lot, so I just make sure to warn people before hand that I’m terrible. They had been warned!

A woman from Bellevue came to show us the steps to the Jewish dance, and we started out slowly, gradually mastering steps and learning more, then putting it to music, then adding more steps, until we could dance through the whole song. We had a large circle of people with an smaller, inner circle, and the dance involved rotating in one direction, than the other, coming into the middle, then dropping the hands we were holding to do some pivots, spins, and other motions.

Like this:

Except more womanly.

The woman in charge counted out loud and named the next steps, until the last two dances, which we did simply to the music.

It was funny to lift my eyes from my feet and watch the women in the two revolving circles, to watch their feet stepping forward and backward at the same time as my own. And if I watched their faces, to see the mingled looks of pleasure and concentration as they stared back at other feet, their mouths silently moving as they counted. It was odd to think about how I was watching them to ensure I was stepping right, and they were watching me to ensure they were stepping right. As if there were two people, each holding the end of a rope, leaning back, their entire weight holding the other person which in turn held them. We were dependent on each other. And because none of us stopped moving and counting and watching and leaning, it worked.

I wish people danced more. There is square dancing, and swing dancing, and slow dancing for special occasions, and do-whatever-looks-cool at teenager events – but it’s different. Different than it used to be. We learn those dances then never use them, and go to blue moon events specifically for dancing, or perhaps join a group and square dance every Monday. But – and perhaps this is only my imagination – I feel that dancing has been set aside and is no longer so entwined with living. It seems to me that dancing used to be something that could be spontaneously suggested at dinners or parties or events, and the proposal could be immediately set into action – because people knew dances and knew the music, and were always ready and eager for the chance to dance. Musicians were immediately employed to provide the music – that was probably the reason why many of them learned their instrument in the first place. Live music was the only option – how many learned the fiddle or piano so they could watch their family and friends dance to their tunes?

Songs were written for dancing, rooms were built for dancing. people gathered for dancing.

I am thinking here not so much of solo dancing or partner dancing, but of group dancing.

I am not a history buff – in fact the only thing that makes me think dancing is different nowadays then it was “back then” is movies. The wedding scene in “Fiddler on the Roof”. Jane Austen movies. The folk dancing in “Tangled”. They all indicate a culture where dancing was not as separated from daily life.

Dancing contributes to life. It provides a way to express joy. It can bring complete strangers together. It prompts men to step up and lead. It gives people confidence in who God has created them to be, whether they are a man or a woman. It unifies.

I know that dancing has not and will not vanish completely – it simply changes faces, and roles, and importance, throughout the centuries. But I wish group dancing had a greater importance right now, in America.

No matter how much dancing I am able to do on this earth, I look forward to the dancing there will be in heaven, when every person from every nation that has ever risen on this earth will join hands and there, in the presence of our God, who watches with greatest pleasure (or perhaps He will be holding your hand?), dance.

Then maidens will dance and be glad, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.

-Jeremiah 31:13

The Familiar & The Unknown

 

Hello reader,

Pardon me if my thoughts seem scrambled and vague (not that that’s anything out of the ordinary for me), but I want to try puzzling this"out loud".

With all of the summer job possibilities before me right now, I have been realizing all the more how much I love variety. I love to be constantly seeing new things, new places. The biggest factor in my mind as I consider Maine, Utah, Montana, is how different the scenery and experience will be from home and Mt. Rainier.

I had a few thoughts on choices between the familiar and the unknown.

What I am thinking about when I say that is, for example, choosing the same flavor of ice cream every time, or choosing a different flavor every time. Like my younger brother, Adam, who has tried black licorice ice cream and a caramel & toasted marshmallow Italian soda, among other things. Whereas my brother Kevin will choose vanilla 99% of the time. Although I can’t really fault him – why would I try other flavors when I already know that mint chocolate chip is indisputably the best?

But choosing the familiar or the unknown can apply to large decisions as well as small. Careers, schooling, where you want to live – desiring something you have experienced before or something you have never encountered can be a big factor.

My thought – or hypothesis – is that in the constant there is variety, and vice versa.

Choosing the same every time can be in itself a way to experience variety. In the small ways – you discover what brand of vanilla ice cream tastes the best, and are able to appreciate it all the more because you’ve tasted the cheap or nasty versions. And in the large ways – while visiting a beautiful or unique place temporarily can be wonderful, when you live in any place for an extended amount of time, it’s like getting to know a person. You see all of its moods – you see the different sunrises, and weather, and seasons. You see the small, gradual changes of time, and witness the radical changes when natural disasters or the hands of men alter the earth and buildings and growing plants.

A woman who has lived in the same house her entire life may not have seen other countries – states – counties – but she has seen that land and community quietly change, in slow, small steps and sudden, abrupt bounds. She has seen the many, varied faces of her home and knows it in an intimate way no stranger hope to gain by pausing on the same foot of earth for a breath.

As for constantly chooses something new, I have less experience in this area – at least concerning large decisions. After all, I’ve only been alive for 19 years, and until recently many decisions were not mine to make, because I was not yet old enough to shoulder my own life. The decisions that affected my life have been gradually shifting from my parents’ shoulders to mine as I grew older and taller. Mostly older.

So now I stand on the road of life (poetic, no?), facing future decisions that will concern schooling, jobs, housing, serving the Lord – with so many forks at every turn that I can only be grateful God is the one viewing this spiderweb from above, and He does not leave me to navigate on my own.

But I digress.

I think that choosing something different every time can be just another way of looking for familiarity. The more you have experienced, the more you are familiar with. The more you have seen of the world, the more flavors of ice cream you have tried, the more you are familiar with that life. The more you have explored, the less there is not to explore

Obviously this is not always true, because there are things that you can learn about forever and yet never fully understand. At the top of the list is God. He is too vast and our minds are too limited.

God has also given us a world that is HUGE – and full of such varied people, cultures, lifestyles, animals and ecosystems. A person could travel constantly, from the moment they are born, and perhaps see every country and landscape. If they are constantly moving, I suppose there is a perhaps.

And then there are humans. God created us in His image, and we are complex and have so many unmined depths and brilliant and ugly facets that have not yet seen the light. We are complex and not necessarily predictable or understandable, like Him, but in a lesser way. Indeed, what I’m talking about right now supports the complexity of humans and human nature. We cannot all be stamped with labels or classified into groups of those who prefer new things and those who prefer the old. Because the preferences of new and old and familiar and unfamiliar are all mixed up, like a greatly tangled ball of yarn, and cannot be separated from the others.

 

Like I said at the beginning, my thoughts might be vague, but I’m really just doing this to puzzle it “out loud.” Hope you didn’t mind reading.

 

Sarah

Life Update

Sarah’s Life Update:

So last week it felt like my brain was pedaling at about three times faster than normal, processing things and trying to decide where I wanted to go for the summer. After submitting a ton of applications to every national park in existence through CoolWorks, I heard back from Glacier National Park. I had a job there, if I wanted it. But what about Bryce Canyon in Utah? Or Acadia National Park in Maine?

At this point my brain became a huge web of complex pros and cons as I considered every option I had. I had to call Glacier back on Monday, so I felt pressed to make a decision. On Friday I detailed my entire thought process out loud to my co-worker, who kindly listened and offered suggestions, but in the end didn’t really contribute to my internal dilemma. From waking to sleeping, questions of what I wanted to do whirled through my head. On Saturday I had a bit of vertigo – I figure my head was spinning so much on the inside I was starting to feel literally dizzy.

And then on Sunday, all of the spinning thoughts slid away.

I wish I could say I had an amazing spiritual moment and thus point at God who took away my fret, but I didn’t. I am very grateful, though, because it is difficult to enjoy the present when all thoughts are in the future, and not even dwelling in a pleasant dream, but fretting.

Today I arranged one interview for later this week, and told Glacier I can’t give them a decision right now.

I am blessed with many, many options before me of what I could do with this summer, and with my life.

Many options can also make the decision much, much harder.

But whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.”

-Isaiah 30:21

11/11–The Day of the Singles

So I’m mentioning this about 9 months early, but it seems appropriate with Valentine’s Day coming up. I recently found out that November 11th is celebrated (or mourned, depending on the individual) in China, as Singles Day, due to the date 11/11.

Singles Day can be celebrated in a variety of ways – some people get married, others "use this date and this meaning to tell their special someone that they are the only ‘one’ in their heart" (http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/citylife/2006-11/10/content_729511.htm), some go on blind dates, and others celebrate the day with their single friends! When I heard of this idea from my friend, she told me singles would go out, essentially, on a date with themselves.

Good food tastes just as good when eaten alone!

This interested me, and has stuck in my mind, so much so that I already programmed a reminder into my phone for when 11/11 comes around! On that day I am planning to take myself out to dinner and a walk. All the things a couple would do on date, but with me, myself and I. Ha ha, I suppose some people would find that terribly morbid, but I will use any excuse to treat myself to dinner. Plus I find myself entertaining, he he. I am rather excited!

Take this suggestion and run with it.! There are a lot of different ways you could choose to spend this day. Not everyone is like me and wants to take themselves out on a date .

You might want to spend the night with some of your single friends – a dinner at home and games, reminding yourself of what amazing people God has blessed you with, even if none of them bear the title of your “Prince Charming” (or Princess, for any guys reading…)

If you’re already married, maybe you want to take that special someone on a date. You can’t go on too many dates when you’re married, and I’m not talking about a bunch of fancy-dress-up, drain-the-bank dates. I’m talking about hold-her-hand, enjoy-being-best-friends-too dates.

You might want to spend the night with God, reaffirming your commitment to Him – that He is the one Lord and God and Provider in your life.

You might want to spend the day with just one of your very good friends, or maybe you’ll be busy on that day, and just have a couple minutes at night to jot down a letter and a prayer for your future spouse.

How do you want to celebrate 11/11?

Thoughts

It’s hard to feel

Like any of my thoughts matter

So many thoughts have already been spoken, and written, and shared

They shape my thoughts

But my thoughts stand alone – they are unique

 

If I could, I would have

A book

With all of my thoughts.

Because I think many things,

But forget almost all

Even the things

I want to remember

 

In heaven, there must be a library

Perhaps somewhere among its shelves, there is a book

With my memories

and thoughts

And I can settle it in my lap, and open it, and remember

 

The joy

and sorrows

Good news… ba ba ba… good news… sha la la

The falling snow on my blog has departed… hopefully that means it is drifting through cyber space to reappear in the real world, on a hill just north of Duvall.

So it’s official: Today was my second day of work! I have been hired, and the negative drain on my money supply has just switched to paychecks of positivity in every way. This Wednesday I finally moved the job search beyond filling out endless job applications and scouring Craigslist from the comfort of my own home… after visiting a couple businesses and shaking some hands, I began to feel the familiar, sour, depressing fog descending upon me that always comes when job searching and finding nothing but fake smiles and rejection. Then a couple neat things happened:

• REI took back items that had been sold with no refund guaranteed. I slept in a car with several friends to wake early for their Scratch-and-Dent sale, wandered the madness as people made quick work of the piles of hiking boots, clothes, and gear, and ended up buying only one thing: a pair of fingerless gloves that could convert to mittens. When I got home, it turned out there were two LEFT-handed gloves!!! Hilarious, yes, but entirely un-useful! Fortunately REI refunded me. Great store, shop there!
• Second thing: Used a free drink coupon at Starbucks only to find it was expired. They gave the drink to me anyway. Yah, Starbucks!
• Third thing: Visited Quiznos (this is starting to sound like advertisements for businesses…) and the manager said, “oh yeah, I remember you!” and proceeded to say that he still had my resume, that it was on top of his list, that my experience was impressive, and he would hire me right then if he had a spot available. He jokingly mused, “maybe I could fire someone…” Very encouraging to me to see that my resumes weren’t immediately discarded and that my experience was enough to get noticed….
• And lastly… did I mention I got hired?! Completely unexpected. I walked into The British Pantry for the first time to buy my mom some of her favorite brand of tea as she was almost out… while checking out happened to ask if they were hiring… five minutes later I was shaking hands with the manager, and five minutes after that I was to come in the next day for training, hired immediately. As it so happened, someone had just quit without giving notice, so there was an open spot.

Thursday was my first day of work, where I had everything crammed into my head at once… and today was much quieter and gave me a chance to learn more names and settle into this new, entirely unexpected opportunity to earn money and DO something.

‘Tis a blessing, indeed.