Old Dog; New Tricks

I recently started a new job, and I'm even getting paid for it! For the past four years I've been volunteering in a ministry that I helped to start at our church. We serve pregnant and newly parenting women, helping them when they don't have family or friends around to do the stuff that new moms need help with, especially right after their babies are born.

When the opportunity came up to join the staff at a transitional home for pregnant and newly parenting women, it seemed like a logical extension of the ministry and worth pursuing. I'm now on the substitute list for the regular staff. Since the house is staffed around the clock with either 24 or 48-hour shifts, there is plenty of opportunity to fill in for the regulars when they're ill or want vacation time.

I figured that round the clock shifts would take some getting used to, and that I'd learn a lot, and was that ever an underestimation! I've worked one 24-hour and one 48-hour shift so far, and boy, do I have some stamina to build. Working for 48 hours was a good way to learn the rhythm of the house and to get to know the residents. The time actually went by pretty quickly. The advantages are that I got a full work week into two days, and only had to sit in traffic once. But I wasn't prepared for how difficult the re-entry would be; it was a doozy! It took almost 24 hours to feel like I had readjusted to my regular life and my own home, and I was way more tired than I expected to be, in spite of being able to sleep in the staff quarters. And I actually got six good hours of sleep each night, since the house was quiet and there were no emergencies (like someone going into labor).

At this stage of my life, almost every experience seems to come down to the realization that everyone has a story. Each of the residents have a story, they each have hopes and dreams, they each want to build a better life for themselves and their babies.
Now they're living in a cooperative setting, sharing chores and living space, learning communication skills, dealing with not only their own kids, but all the kids in the house. Shared toys, shared space, shared bathrooms. And they're all trying to find jobs or get trained for jobs, and their ultimate goal is to move out of this place and into permanent housing. Whew! Kind of like dorm life on a manic hormone binge.

I feel so blessed to have the best guy in the world to come home to, and already I've roped him into a home improvement chore at the house. Two people have told me already that having Cosmo show up at the house to visit me or do chores will be such a bonus for these women to see the example and the possibility of a good and faithful man. Amen to that.

Tomorrow I work another twenty-four- hour shift. At last week's house meeting, I offered to bake Thanksgiving pies with anyone who's interested. I got a very enthusiastic response. One woman who is going to visit some family for the holiday, told me that even though she was looking forward to seeing her family, she was sorry to have to miss the pie making.

I'm grateful for the opportunity to earn a little money doing work that's so similar to the volunteer work I've been doing. I think I have something to offer here. I'm even more sure that I still have much to learn.