June 3, 2009
We saw Wayne Dyer, the noted author and self-help guru, on PBS the other night. He was touting his new book and CD, “Excuses Begone” and he seemed to be talking to me.
“It’s too difficult.”
“We can’t afford it.”
Those are some of the excuses people make not to pursue their dreams or make changes in their lives. Dyer refers to them as mind viruses, or "memes." They are products of the ego trying to undermine the desires of the real you. That faulty thinking makes you operate and make decisions out of fear.
Anyway, I’m starting to see my life transitioning from journalism to education as an occupation.
I am meeting tomorrow with the D’Youville College Learning Center staff to get the rubric for grading essays written by incoming students at orientation. I’ll be working those orientation sessions this summer. (The power of networking – Blessed Wife.)
Also, I accepted a six-week position starting July 6 as a teacher’s aide at a school for special-needs children. It’s a $9.75 an hour job, but it gets some education experience on my resume. I am pretty excited about it. It felt good filling out a W-2 form, to belong to some organization. I can hardly wait to get up in the morning, have a cup of joe and drive off to work. Ah, just like the good old days. I like the hours, too – 8 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. Also, I’ll be working with my son, who will be doing his second summer at the school. It was his talking about how rewarding his work was last summer that started me thinking about this journey. What better way to serve than to help kids with cerebral palsy, Down syndrome and behavioral disorders? (Again, the power of networking.)
I also heard from the headmistress of a private school in the Buffalo area who said she is looking forward to having me as a student observer, student teacher and substitute teacher in the coming academic year. I have to return her call. (I had left a message for her several days ago. I have a connection at the school – my lovely niece teaches there. Again, the power of networking.)
So, I’m starting to see some seedlings sprout where I had planted seeds. It’s not easy tilling the scorched earth of the workworld, but you have to stay at it – day after day – and not get discouraged or wallow in despair.
I’m starting to use daily visualization as a morale booster, and that seems to be really keeping my energy and spirits high. I also seem to be doing well in school. How refreshing, only good news to report!
I will be at home in the classroom. I see myself there, serving the needs of people – young and old – who could use my assistance.
In the words of Wayne Dyer: “How may I serve?”
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Monday, June 1, 2009
A touch of confidence
June 1, 2009
Sorry I’ve been away for a while, but the boy must have some time to play and to reflect without sharing with everyone. I can say that while I’ve been absent from the blogosphere for several days, I feel waves of self-confidence washing over me. Self-confidence was never lacking in my life prior to the past two months. But it took a small vacation.
After last week’s inspirational readings put renewed meaning in this adventure, I’ve been additionally buoyed by a rich discussion with my Vukote neighbors. And with sustained communication with the good Lord, or the Source, I feel like myself today.
As mentioned, my Vukote neighbors needed to sell their vacation home, and they never lost faith that they would. It was on the market for a couple of years. Well, two days ago, they received a bona fide offer to purchase their place, they said. They occasionally despaired, but their faith remained strong and the outcome worked in their favor – probably just in the nick of time, too. Their message to me is to stay strong, fearless and the pendulum will swing your way. Patience is a virtue, they advised.
Today I was back in the classroom at D’Youville. I learned how to do an academic unit plan and a lesson plan, and dashed off a unit plan with no problem. When the professor first dropped the assignment on me, I thought he was asking me to design a nuclear weapon. I felt the flutters in the chest and belly, but just settled down and immersed myself in the work. When I turned in the draft copy four hours laster, the professor complimented the work. He also returned my grade for my first “teaching” session two weeks ago – I got 5 out of 5 points. So the confidence is starting to grow.
Also, I have visualized the future and I know I will be employed. In fact, there will be several academic institutions vying for my skills. Richard D. Stanley, M. S. in Education.
Additionally, my travel story on Joshua Tree National Park appeared in The News yesterday, so I’m feeling pretty good about what I’m doing. I’m not sitting at a desk and computer all day, every weekday, especially during the summer. I’m writing, reading, learning. My life is being enriched.
It’s been two months to the day that I experience my first day of unemployment. It was a mental test to battle through those two months, but I did it. Today I felt like myself again, only knowing that I’m growing, getting smarter, more knowledgeable and am better able to understand the world.
I also know how to push fear out of my psyche – turn off the negative news media with its pervasive message of fear and despair. To replace fear with hope and light – move myself to a higher, faster energy level. The world is good. There are children and adults to help. I really enjoy being able to move about freely, exploring new frontiers.
What is that I feel circulating around the spiritual atmosphere of this house? The return of confidence, a friend who had become a spector, but is now finding form again. Welcome back, dude.
Sorry I’ve been away for a while, but the boy must have some time to play and to reflect without sharing with everyone. I can say that while I’ve been absent from the blogosphere for several days, I feel waves of self-confidence washing over me. Self-confidence was never lacking in my life prior to the past two months. But it took a small vacation.
After last week’s inspirational readings put renewed meaning in this adventure, I’ve been additionally buoyed by a rich discussion with my Vukote neighbors. And with sustained communication with the good Lord, or the Source, I feel like myself today.
As mentioned, my Vukote neighbors needed to sell their vacation home, and they never lost faith that they would. It was on the market for a couple of years. Well, two days ago, they received a bona fide offer to purchase their place, they said. They occasionally despaired, but their faith remained strong and the outcome worked in their favor – probably just in the nick of time, too. Their message to me is to stay strong, fearless and the pendulum will swing your way. Patience is a virtue, they advised.
Today I was back in the classroom at D’Youville. I learned how to do an academic unit plan and a lesson plan, and dashed off a unit plan with no problem. When the professor first dropped the assignment on me, I thought he was asking me to design a nuclear weapon. I felt the flutters in the chest and belly, but just settled down and immersed myself in the work. When I turned in the draft copy four hours laster, the professor complimented the work. He also returned my grade for my first “teaching” session two weeks ago – I got 5 out of 5 points. So the confidence is starting to grow.
Also, I have visualized the future and I know I will be employed. In fact, there will be several academic institutions vying for my skills. Richard D. Stanley, M. S. in Education.
Additionally, my travel story on Joshua Tree National Park appeared in The News yesterday, so I’m feeling pretty good about what I’m doing. I’m not sitting at a desk and computer all day, every weekday, especially during the summer. I’m writing, reading, learning. My life is being enriched.
It’s been two months to the day that I experience my first day of unemployment. It was a mental test to battle through those two months, but I did it. Today I felt like myself again, only knowing that I’m growing, getting smarter, more knowledgeable and am better able to understand the world.
I also know how to push fear out of my psyche – turn off the negative news media with its pervasive message of fear and despair. To replace fear with hope and light – move myself to a higher, faster energy level. The world is good. There are children and adults to help. I really enjoy being able to move about freely, exploring new frontiers.
What is that I feel circulating around the spiritual atmosphere of this house? The return of confidence, a friend who had become a spector, but is now finding form again. Welcome back, dude.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Stay on course
May 27, 2009
Today’s lesson comes from Wayne W. Dyer, noted author and self-help guru. I was rereading a part of his book, “Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life,” this morning when I came across this quote:
“Do not limit the view of yourself. … Do not resist the natural course of your life.”
For the first time in a couple of months, I felt some of the anxiety and discomfort dissolve as I digested those words. What those words mean to me is that the time had come in the grand scheme of the universe and in the realm of the Supreme Being, whoever that might be, that I embark on a new path in life. It means that I didn’t make a mistake by leaving my job. It means that destiny dictated that there are new plans ahead for me.
I was able to shed those nagging worries about the family future and approach the day with great confidence. I did my last student observation at Mill Middle School for my masters in education course. I started reading J.M. Coetzee for my English class. I did yard work. I talked to my kids. I applied for a few more jobs. I started thinking about my fall courses at D’Youville and doing more student observation in the autumn. (It won’t be long before grades start rolling in for the two courses I’m currently taking.)
Anyway, I’ll have to send Dyer an e-mail of thanks. “Do not resist the natural course of your life.” That comes from the Tao, 72nd verse.
What a great saying.
Stop fighting what is supposed to transpire in your life, it is telling me. Accept it. Enjoy it.
This should be a monster summer for me. I am in great health, have lots of money and lots of time to do what I want to do, whether it’s ride around in a boat on Chautauqua Lake, garden, or sit in the hot tub and soak down beers. I could also do more free-lance writing, read great books or go hiking somewhere.
Free to be – you and me.
Today’s lesson comes from Wayne W. Dyer, noted author and self-help guru. I was rereading a part of his book, “Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life,” this morning when I came across this quote:
“Do not limit the view of yourself. … Do not resist the natural course of your life.”
For the first time in a couple of months, I felt some of the anxiety and discomfort dissolve as I digested those words. What those words mean to me is that the time had come in the grand scheme of the universe and in the realm of the Supreme Being, whoever that might be, that I embark on a new path in life. It means that I didn’t make a mistake by leaving my job. It means that destiny dictated that there are new plans ahead for me.
I was able to shed those nagging worries about the family future and approach the day with great confidence. I did my last student observation at Mill Middle School for my masters in education course. I started reading J.M. Coetzee for my English class. I did yard work. I talked to my kids. I applied for a few more jobs. I started thinking about my fall courses at D’Youville and doing more student observation in the autumn. (It won’t be long before grades start rolling in for the two courses I’m currently taking.)
Anyway, I’ll have to send Dyer an e-mail of thanks. “Do not resist the natural course of your life.” That comes from the Tao, 72nd verse.
What a great saying.
Stop fighting what is supposed to transpire in your life, it is telling me. Accept it. Enjoy it.
This should be a monster summer for me. I am in great health, have lots of money and lots of time to do what I want to do, whether it’s ride around in a boat on Chautauqua Lake, garden, or sit in the hot tub and soak down beers. I could also do more free-lance writing, read great books or go hiking somewhere.
Free to be – you and me.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Wonders of change
May 24, 2009
It’s a holiday weekend (although, without a job every day seems like Memorial Day), so there is some time to reflect. The Blessed Wife is busy tending to her rose garden under an overcast sky, and I’m inside the cottage doing a little homework. I'm reading "Persepolis" by Marjane Satrapi. "You're even sounding smarter every day," the Blessed Wife old me yesterday.
I continue to marvel at how my life has changed. I still feel anxious when someone starts to talk about their job. (You lucky son of a gun, I think to myself.) But I’m getting into some type of comfort zone. Instead of walking into the same building and seeing the same faces every day, it seems I am in different environments and talking to new people almost daily. From the D’Youville classroom to my student observation at Mill Middle School, I’m meeting new people every day. At home, I do my freelance work and study. It seems out of place, but I think I am adjusting. My family and friends continue to provide great support, and that is a major morale booster.
Chautauqua continues to offer a great escape, even though I’m not working and don't feel in need of an “escape.” There’s just a good vibe here. I equate Chautauqua with relaxation and fun. I must spend more time here this summer.
When we (myself and the Anderson clan) went to Southern Tier Brewery on Saturday, I met some Buffalo-area acquaintances who urged me to apply to the Buffalo School District as a substitute teacher this fall. I probably will.
I hear the sounds of laughter outside, so I feel the need to join in, so I will cut this entry short.
PS: I heard on the radio last night an expert saying that Americans of the future will have multiple careers in their lifetimes. I think the man’s name was Howard Bloom. He said Americans will be very career mobile and also geographically mobile. I think that is already happening, with the downturn in the auto industry and newspapers.
I am one of many.
Monday, May 18, 2009
They call me Mr. Chips
May 18, 2009
I stood in front of a classroom of my peers today and taught my first lesson – on the Five Ws of journalism (who, what, when, where and why). The professor, Dr. David Gorlewski, had instructed us to teach our first lesson on something we were familiar with, so I chose the obvious from Journalism 101. I did a fairly credible job in my 10 minutes at the head of the class. I felt like I was babbling wildly, stuttering and doing a fairly average job. (It's strange how your mind races when you speak publicly.) My classmates kindly told me afterward that I had performed admirably. I would assess my performance as OK, enough to get by in my first foray into teaching.
I later told the Blessed Wife that it was like an infant taking his first uncertain step, the first stride in a long and arduous journey. (The longest journey begins with the first step.) I am starting to make my way.
I also visited with the head of the D’Youville College Learning Center and could possibly do some work for her this summer reading essays written by incoming freshmen during Orientation Week. The Blessed Wife also was able to network for me and get a commitment for me to teach a couple of writing seminars at the college this fall for the a special population of multicultural students.
Things are starting to gel a little bit. My sister-in-law might get me into her school for special-needs youths as a teacher’s aide this summer or fall. I know people in the Williamsville School District who might be able to get me in there as a teacher’s aide as well. I need to get some education experience on my resume. As it now stands, it’s almost all newspaper experience. Plus, I'd like to work while I'm going to school. It would give me valuable experience. I'm not a big fan of unemployment benefits; it's like accepting public assistance, although everyone says you've paid into the unemployment fund for 30-some years, you might as well reap some benefits.
Also, the only luck I’ve had since leaving The News is through networking. A “headhunter” told me that last month. He advised against papering the town with resumes and answering classified ads for jobs. A worthless pursuit, he said. My advice for those who have quit their jobs or have been furloughed is to network. Especially in tough economic times, that seems to be the only way to open doors. Otherwise, it seems you can be smart and industrious and no one will even take a look at you.
So if you are a displaced worker who has stumbled on my blog, get to networking. It’s as clear and as simple as that.
For the first time in weeks, I’m mentally exhausted from a day of hard mental work (a good feeling). So I’m going to cut this entry short. I will keep reciting the mantra -- study, succeed, Masters, teach, success. My road is uphill but I think I will be able to make that climb. What a great feeling it will be to summit that mountaintop, and I will do it at some point next year.
I know there is so much I’ve omitted from these blogs. Hopefully I will improve with these efforts as well.
Today, I was a teacher for 10 minutes.
I stood in front of a classroom of my peers today and taught my first lesson – on the Five Ws of journalism (who, what, when, where and why). The professor, Dr. David Gorlewski, had instructed us to teach our first lesson on something we were familiar with, so I chose the obvious from Journalism 101. I did a fairly credible job in my 10 minutes at the head of the class. I felt like I was babbling wildly, stuttering and doing a fairly average job. (It's strange how your mind races when you speak publicly.) My classmates kindly told me afterward that I had performed admirably. I would assess my performance as OK, enough to get by in my first foray into teaching.
I later told the Blessed Wife that it was like an infant taking his first uncertain step, the first stride in a long and arduous journey. (The longest journey begins with the first step.) I am starting to make my way.
I also visited with the head of the D’Youville College Learning Center and could possibly do some work for her this summer reading essays written by incoming freshmen during Orientation Week. The Blessed Wife also was able to network for me and get a commitment for me to teach a couple of writing seminars at the college this fall for the a special population of multicultural students.
Things are starting to gel a little bit. My sister-in-law might get me into her school for special-needs youths as a teacher’s aide this summer or fall. I know people in the Williamsville School District who might be able to get me in there as a teacher’s aide as well. I need to get some education experience on my resume. As it now stands, it’s almost all newspaper experience. Plus, I'd like to work while I'm going to school. It would give me valuable experience. I'm not a big fan of unemployment benefits; it's like accepting public assistance, although everyone says you've paid into the unemployment fund for 30-some years, you might as well reap some benefits.
Also, the only luck I’ve had since leaving The News is through networking. A “headhunter” told me that last month. He advised against papering the town with resumes and answering classified ads for jobs. A worthless pursuit, he said. My advice for those who have quit their jobs or have been furloughed is to network. Especially in tough economic times, that seems to be the only way to open doors. Otherwise, it seems you can be smart and industrious and no one will even take a look at you.
So if you are a displaced worker who has stumbled on my blog, get to networking. It’s as clear and as simple as that.
For the first time in weeks, I’m mentally exhausted from a day of hard mental work (a good feeling). So I’m going to cut this entry short. I will keep reciting the mantra -- study, succeed, Masters, teach, success. My road is uphill but I think I will be able to make that climb. What a great feeling it will be to summit that mountaintop, and I will do it at some point next year.
I know there is so much I’ve omitted from these blogs. Hopefully I will improve with these efforts as well.
Today, I was a teacher for 10 minutes.
Friday, May 15, 2009
A happy heart
May 15, 2009
My heart is happy in Chautauqua as I mulch the gardens. My heart is happy as I mow the lawn. My heart is happy as I screech down the lake in the Searay 175 Series. My heart is happy as I stand at the bar of the Lakewood Rod and Gun Club and watch the people mingle and have a good time.
Then I see someone I know. “I took the buyout from The News,” I say.
“What, are you insane?” they exclaim. “I talked to Joe and he said you wouldn’t be happy because you like to be busy.”
Well, at least this person is honest, he tells it like it is.
I still think that in the long run, this was a good decision. There are bright, bright days ahead. Only the prophets will know if metropolitan newspapers collapse on themselves like dwarf stars.
So, here I am in Chautauqua. You’d think this would be the logical place to settle down, but it isn’t. There isn’t long-term happiness here, only short-term peace. My neighbors tell me so. I believe them.
I saw my “peeps” at Yesterdays in Lakewood. I came home and listened to Todd Rundgren and Jackson Browne. “Where were you when you got the picture? Where were you when it blew from every direction?”
Where will be in one year?
That is the question. Keep living like you were a 20-year-old again. That’s the key. Too many grownups. Even the “young people” are entwined in the work world. Can’t come down this weekend, bro. I have to work until 9 on Friday. Sorry.
What a bunch of unfun people we have become.
Have another Beer. No, two’s my limit. I have no limits!
My heart is happy in Chautauqua as I mulch the gardens. My heart is happy as I mow the lawn. My heart is happy as I screech down the lake in the Searay 175 Series. My heart is happy as I stand at the bar of the Lakewood Rod and Gun Club and watch the people mingle and have a good time.
Then I see someone I know. “I took the buyout from The News,” I say.
“What, are you insane?” they exclaim. “I talked to Joe and he said you wouldn’t be happy because you like to be busy.”
Well, at least this person is honest, he tells it like it is.
I still think that in the long run, this was a good decision. There are bright, bright days ahead. Only the prophets will know if metropolitan newspapers collapse on themselves like dwarf stars.
So, here I am in Chautauqua. You’d think this would be the logical place to settle down, but it isn’t. There isn’t long-term happiness here, only short-term peace. My neighbors tell me so. I believe them.
I saw my “peeps” at Yesterdays in Lakewood. I came home and listened to Todd Rundgren and Jackson Browne. “Where were you when you got the picture? Where were you when it blew from every direction?”
Where will be in one year?
That is the question. Keep living like you were a 20-year-old again. That’s the key. Too many grownups. Even the “young people” are entwined in the work world. Can’t come down this weekend, bro. I have to work until 9 on Friday. Sorry.
What a bunch of unfun people we have become.
Have another Beer. No, two’s my limit. I have no limits!
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Keep your head up
May 14, 2009
What a Titanic mental struggle.
Just keep fighting on. Pick yourself up when you’re down. Get to work. Don’t give up. Just power through it.
I need all the clichés in the book to fight through this. This is definitely the toughest period of my life. Everyone is telling me what a joy and walk in the park this should be. I'm not seeing it -- yet.
I trundled off to my first day of observation at the local middle school. I watched several teachers in action, using different styles from old-school authoritarian to the new-school guided practice instructor. Like I’ve said before, I’m learning a lot, but there is so much change, so many new situations, new buildings, new people, it is just hammering my psyche. My mind is just reeling. There are textbooks, papers due, assignments to be posted, free-lance articles to turn in, rooms to be vacuumed, lawns to mow, letters to write, books to read. It’s a deluge and it’s a struggle to keep your head above water. It sure is different than putting it on autopilot for 25 years and mailing in the work.
Then I keep torturing myself, to boot.
I applied to this Internet sweatshop to do some freelance editing a couple of weeks ago. They sent two small articles to edit, as a test, in order to qualify for the $2.50 each that the firm pays to edit one article. I edited the articles, admittedly half-assed, yesterday. Today, I received an e-mail signed by Weng Chai Ka, saying that my editing wasn’t up to snuff. Sorry. After 31 years in journalism, I’m rejected by a Chinese sweatshop. That’s $5 that won’t be going into my Pay Pal account. How the mighty have fallen.
“You just have to laugh,” eldest daughter says.
Still, it sent me into a funk. I plopped on the bed, ready to sink into a depression. No, I said, get up and do something.
So Blessed Wife came home from her school-sponsored dinner to find two bathrooms gleaming. I polished and cleaned those restrooms so you could eat in the tub or dine on the toilet seats. It admittedly made me feel better. I am a good cleaner.
Power, through it, my friend.
Brighter days will come. There’s no doubt about it.
What a Titanic mental struggle.
Just keep fighting on. Pick yourself up when you’re down. Get to work. Don’t give up. Just power through it.
I need all the clichés in the book to fight through this. This is definitely the toughest period of my life. Everyone is telling me what a joy and walk in the park this should be. I'm not seeing it -- yet.
I trundled off to my first day of observation at the local middle school. I watched several teachers in action, using different styles from old-school authoritarian to the new-school guided practice instructor. Like I’ve said before, I’m learning a lot, but there is so much change, so many new situations, new buildings, new people, it is just hammering my psyche. My mind is just reeling. There are textbooks, papers due, assignments to be posted, free-lance articles to turn in, rooms to be vacuumed, lawns to mow, letters to write, books to read. It’s a deluge and it’s a struggle to keep your head above water. It sure is different than putting it on autopilot for 25 years and mailing in the work.
Then I keep torturing myself, to boot.
I applied to this Internet sweatshop to do some freelance editing a couple of weeks ago. They sent two small articles to edit, as a test, in order to qualify for the $2.50 each that the firm pays to edit one article. I edited the articles, admittedly half-assed, yesterday. Today, I received an e-mail signed by Weng Chai Ka, saying that my editing wasn’t up to snuff. Sorry. After 31 years in journalism, I’m rejected by a Chinese sweatshop. That’s $5 that won’t be going into my Pay Pal account. How the mighty have fallen.
“You just have to laugh,” eldest daughter says.
Still, it sent me into a funk. I plopped on the bed, ready to sink into a depression. No, I said, get up and do something.
So Blessed Wife came home from her school-sponsored dinner to find two bathrooms gleaming. I polished and cleaned those restrooms so you could eat in the tub or dine on the toilet seats. It admittedly made me feel better. I am a good cleaner.
Power, through it, my friend.
Brighter days will come. There’s no doubt about it.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Hitting the books
May 13, 2009
We’re only a couple of days into the summer session and I’m already hitting the books bigtime. I spent from 8:45 a.m. until 5:15 p.m. doing schoolwork with several breaks, of course. This will be a grind, for sure. Power through it, baby. I’m enjoying most of the coursework and am learning plenty. I’ve already amassed more knowledge about teaching than I learned in my previous 52 years. And reading “heady” literature for an English class can’t be bad for you.
So I’m off and running.
I told Judy, the Blessed Wife, that I’m still mourning my old life, but I’m getting ready to celebrate my new life. She is so confident about the future. I’m hoping that some of her optimism rubs off on me.
Yesterday was a tough day because economic worries started creeping into my brain – probably because I took a three-hour break and went into the hot tub with a couple of beers. (Guilt trip) I should just stick to the books at this point.
Why is it that we find it so difficult to live in the moment? We are doing super right now, so why not just enjoy that? Why project yourself into the future? STOP DOING IT!
Wayne Dyer says live for today.
“Live for today, forget tomorrow,” say the lyrics on a famous Pink Floyd song.
Carpe Diem!
We’re only a couple of days into the summer session and I’m already hitting the books bigtime. I spent from 8:45 a.m. until 5:15 p.m. doing schoolwork with several breaks, of course. This will be a grind, for sure. Power through it, baby. I’m enjoying most of the coursework and am learning plenty. I’ve already amassed more knowledge about teaching than I learned in my previous 52 years. And reading “heady” literature for an English class can’t be bad for you.
So I’m off and running.
I told Judy, the Blessed Wife, that I’m still mourning my old life, but I’m getting ready to celebrate my new life. She is so confident about the future. I’m hoping that some of her optimism rubs off on me.
Yesterday was a tough day because economic worries started creeping into my brain – probably because I took a three-hour break and went into the hot tub with a couple of beers. (Guilt trip) I should just stick to the books at this point.
Why is it that we find it so difficult to live in the moment? We are doing super right now, so why not just enjoy that? Why project yourself into the future? STOP DOING IT!
Wayne Dyer says live for today.
“Live for today, forget tomorrow,” say the lyrics on a famous Pink Floyd song.
Carpe Diem!
Monday, May 11, 2009
The bell rings
May 11, 2009
I was up at 6:30, out the door at 7:15 and in Room 534 of the Alt Building at D’Youville College at 7:55. I have to say the first day of graduate school classes was fairly exhilarating. I’d say my performance was pretty good. I participated in class discussions and group activities, talked to some classmates from Canada and schmoozed with the professor for a while. All in all, not too shabby for the first day of school in 32 years.
I don’t feel overwhelmed by the assignments, but it’s early in the game. I have my week planned out to cover all my assignments and hopefully will start my classroom observation sometime this week, either in Williamsville or at Bishop Timon-St. Jude, whoever will take me quickly.
My graduate classmates seem to have respect for me. Most were fairly impressed that I was back in academia. I even heard one say, “It just goes to show you that it’s never too late.” I’m the oldest of the 16 students. There are probably three women in their 30s or early 40s and the rest are traditional students. We had to carpool to get our textbooks during lunch break, and I jumped in the car with three Canadian women! It certainly is more exciting and different than sitting in a stagnant newsroom all day.
I didn’t feel out of place or uncomfortable. It also felt good to be out of the house and busy – to be part of a community, to be interacting with people. I did learn quite a bit, too. I actually absorbed a good amount of expertise about being a good teacher. I'd say my professor is very solid.
On the work front, I still have this big freelance writing assignment to do – if only these corporate CEOs would send me back the surveys with answers. Also, another little freelance editing offer came in, but now I think I want to concentrate on academics.
My spirits were definitely buoyed today. I hope it continues. I have to teach for 10 minutes next Monday in front of the graduate class. I feel pretty confident about that. I’m not going to stress about the schoolwork. It all will get done, and let the grades fall where they may.
I’d give my first day of school an A.
I was up at 6:30, out the door at 7:15 and in Room 534 of the Alt Building at D’Youville College at 7:55. I have to say the first day of graduate school classes was fairly exhilarating. I’d say my performance was pretty good. I participated in class discussions and group activities, talked to some classmates from Canada and schmoozed with the professor for a while. All in all, not too shabby for the first day of school in 32 years.
I don’t feel overwhelmed by the assignments, but it’s early in the game. I have my week planned out to cover all my assignments and hopefully will start my classroom observation sometime this week, either in Williamsville or at Bishop Timon-St. Jude, whoever will take me quickly.
My graduate classmates seem to have respect for me. Most were fairly impressed that I was back in academia. I even heard one say, “It just goes to show you that it’s never too late.” I’m the oldest of the 16 students. There are probably three women in their 30s or early 40s and the rest are traditional students. We had to carpool to get our textbooks during lunch break, and I jumped in the car with three Canadian women! It certainly is more exciting and different than sitting in a stagnant newsroom all day.
I didn’t feel out of place or uncomfortable. It also felt good to be out of the house and busy – to be part of a community, to be interacting with people. I did learn quite a bit, too. I actually absorbed a good amount of expertise about being a good teacher. I'd say my professor is very solid.
On the work front, I still have this big freelance writing assignment to do – if only these corporate CEOs would send me back the surveys with answers. Also, another little freelance editing offer came in, but now I think I want to concentrate on academics.
My spirits were definitely buoyed today. I hope it continues. I have to teach for 10 minutes next Monday in front of the graduate class. I feel pretty confident about that. I’m not going to stress about the schoolwork. It all will get done, and let the grades fall where they may.
I’d give my first day of school an A.
Saturday, May 9, 2009
Attention, class
May 9, 2009
Well, there won’t be any last-minute jobs appearing to keep me from my appointed rounds as a graduate student. The employment cavalry won't be riding over the hill sounding its job bugle. Classes formally begin Monday but my English 216 class came up on the Internet on Friday, so I did the first week’s assignment. I read Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis” and answered the eight essay questions that followed. It took about five hours. So I'm off and running with schoolwork.
It was strange indeed to be doing coursework in my home.
“It’s what you always wished for,” the Blessed Wife said to me, "to work out of our home.”
That is true. I could learn to enjoy working and studying out of the home, but it’s just strange at first. Everyone shuffles off the street in the morning to their little widget-production jobs and there I am still hanging with the retirees and career homemakers. It takes some getting used to.
My eight-hour education class meets on Monday. Part of me wants to ditch this whole undertaking, part of me just wants to return to my drone job at the newspaper and part of me is excited about returning to the classroom, in effect turning back the hands of time. It’ll be like going back to the 1970s, only with a lot less hair.
I continue to network for future jobs and for possible shots at student teaching in the Williamsville School District. In my best moments, I tell myself to go for the gold, to shoot for teaching at one of the best school districts in Western New York. I have to heed everyone’s advice: Stay focused and get completely immersed in school. Don’t look back, only to what lies ahead. Believe me, I want to heed that advice, but Mr. Ego keeps telling me that I am the family breadwinner and have to generate cash for the cause. Go away for a while, Mr. Ego. OK?
Going back to school is very enlightening. I’m reading Jose Saramago, for instance. I relearned the difference between a metaphor and a simile. I read Franz Kafka. I was never exposed to this at Syracuse University. What the heck was going on in higher education 30 years ago?
Meanwhile, most of the family is at Chautauqua for Mother's Day, which is tomorrow. It was a pretty enjoyable reunion except for the 60 mph winds howling through the area. The children chastised me for being money-centric, but they don't know that Mr. Ego wants to think that way and finds it difficult to stop that monkey mind.
At this point, there’s nothing more to do than put my fate in the hands of the Lord. I learned that as a child as part of my Catholic upbringing and now find myself returning to that premise. Or is it just a convenient crutch? I don’t think so. I have to believe the universal mind, God, Buddha, or whatever you want to refer to as the supreme being has some plans for me. I just need help to show me the way.
I remember sitting around in January and February, mulling the buyout offer from my former employer and thinking that the easy thing to do would be to stay at the newspaper and continue to work in a pretty difficult environment amid a lot of unhappy people. The hard choice, I thought, would be to take the buyout, go back to school and reinvent myself. Well, hello, hard choice. Time to put up or shut up. This hasn’t been easy and it won’t be for the next 12 to 15 months. I have to learn to enjoy the ride, as scary as it may be.
In the words of my daughters, I’ll just have to “power through it.”
Well, there won’t be any last-minute jobs appearing to keep me from my appointed rounds as a graduate student. The employment cavalry won't be riding over the hill sounding its job bugle. Classes formally begin Monday but my English 216 class came up on the Internet on Friday, so I did the first week’s assignment. I read Kafka’s “The Metamorphosis” and answered the eight essay questions that followed. It took about five hours. So I'm off and running with schoolwork.
It was strange indeed to be doing coursework in my home.
“It’s what you always wished for,” the Blessed Wife said to me, "to work out of our home.”
That is true. I could learn to enjoy working and studying out of the home, but it’s just strange at first. Everyone shuffles off the street in the morning to their little widget-production jobs and there I am still hanging with the retirees and career homemakers. It takes some getting used to.
My eight-hour education class meets on Monday. Part of me wants to ditch this whole undertaking, part of me just wants to return to my drone job at the newspaper and part of me is excited about returning to the classroom, in effect turning back the hands of time. It’ll be like going back to the 1970s, only with a lot less hair.
I continue to network for future jobs and for possible shots at student teaching in the Williamsville School District. In my best moments, I tell myself to go for the gold, to shoot for teaching at one of the best school districts in Western New York. I have to heed everyone’s advice: Stay focused and get completely immersed in school. Don’t look back, only to what lies ahead. Believe me, I want to heed that advice, but Mr. Ego keeps telling me that I am the family breadwinner and have to generate cash for the cause. Go away for a while, Mr. Ego. OK?
Going back to school is very enlightening. I’m reading Jose Saramago, for instance. I relearned the difference between a metaphor and a simile. I read Franz Kafka. I was never exposed to this at Syracuse University. What the heck was going on in higher education 30 years ago?
Meanwhile, most of the family is at Chautauqua for Mother's Day, which is tomorrow. It was a pretty enjoyable reunion except for the 60 mph winds howling through the area. The children chastised me for being money-centric, but they don't know that Mr. Ego wants to think that way and finds it difficult to stop that monkey mind.
At this point, there’s nothing more to do than put my fate in the hands of the Lord. I learned that as a child as part of my Catholic upbringing and now find myself returning to that premise. Or is it just a convenient crutch? I don’t think so. I have to believe the universal mind, God, Buddha, or whatever you want to refer to as the supreme being has some plans for me. I just need help to show me the way.
I remember sitting around in January and February, mulling the buyout offer from my former employer and thinking that the easy thing to do would be to stay at the newspaper and continue to work in a pretty difficult environment amid a lot of unhappy people. The hard choice, I thought, would be to take the buyout, go back to school and reinvent myself. Well, hello, hard choice. Time to put up or shut up. This hasn’t been easy and it won’t be for the next 12 to 15 months. I have to learn to enjoy the ride, as scary as it may be.
In the words of my daughters, I’ll just have to “power through it.”
Wednesday, May 6, 2009
Choose abundance
May 6, 2009
Could the lesson of this journey be to keep your ego under control?
I had my “unemployment seminar” today in a storefront in Transitown Plaza along a busy strip of businesses. It was 45 minutes of bullshit, and the hostess basically said, “We can’t help you find a job. Do it yourself, but we’ll sit around, sip coffee and offer you some lame advice. There are so many people unemployed that we can’t find squat for anyone.”
Why bother looking for jobs, was the message, when there are none out there other than pooper scooper and hamburger helper?
OK, I can buy that. Thanks Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. The residue of your squalid years at the helm of state are is coating everything in slime. But what the heck? I didn’t have to voluntarily resign my job – I chose to in the hopes of finding a more fulfilling life. I jumped into this of my own free will. We’ll see what happens.
Anyway, my fellow unemployed seminar-takers turned out to be mostly men – probably a 3 to 1 ratio -- and they ran the gamut in ages from 21 to 60 and from laborer to accountant, it seems.
What a strange turn of events in my life. Living the life of humility. Isn’t that what Jesus did? Only he didn’t get $382 a week (after taxes) plunked into his bank account for doing gardening, vacuuming the house and sending out resumes all morning on the Internet. Just think, only four more days till school begins.
After the scintillating “unemployment surrender seminar,” I made my way to the shopping arenas. At first, I hesitated to buy food for the birds, flowers for the garden and a trellis for our clematis (which we call chlamydia). Then I thought: You know what? I choose to think in terms of abundance, rather than scarcity. Live for today, feed the birds, your appetite and your soul and you will be provided for in a year’s time. I had a real feeling that blue skies are ahead, that there is a reason why I took this big gamble.
If nothing else, it taught me to rein in the ego.
Could the lesson of this journey be to keep your ego under control?
I had my “unemployment seminar” today in a storefront in Transitown Plaza along a busy strip of businesses. It was 45 minutes of bullshit, and the hostess basically said, “We can’t help you find a job. Do it yourself, but we’ll sit around, sip coffee and offer you some lame advice. There are so many people unemployed that we can’t find squat for anyone.”
Why bother looking for jobs, was the message, when there are none out there other than pooper scooper and hamburger helper?
OK, I can buy that. Thanks Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney. The residue of your squalid years at the helm of state are is coating everything in slime. But what the heck? I didn’t have to voluntarily resign my job – I chose to in the hopes of finding a more fulfilling life. I jumped into this of my own free will. We’ll see what happens.
Anyway, my fellow unemployed seminar-takers turned out to be mostly men – probably a 3 to 1 ratio -- and they ran the gamut in ages from 21 to 60 and from laborer to accountant, it seems.
What a strange turn of events in my life. Living the life of humility. Isn’t that what Jesus did? Only he didn’t get $382 a week (after taxes) plunked into his bank account for doing gardening, vacuuming the house and sending out resumes all morning on the Internet. Just think, only four more days till school begins.
After the scintillating “unemployment surrender seminar,” I made my way to the shopping arenas. At first, I hesitated to buy food for the birds, flowers for the garden and a trellis for our clematis (which we call chlamydia). Then I thought: You know what? I choose to think in terms of abundance, rather than scarcity. Live for today, feed the birds, your appetite and your soul and you will be provided for in a year’s time. I had a real feeling that blue skies are ahead, that there is a reason why I took this big gamble.
If nothing else, it taught me to rein in the ego.
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
OK to have fun
May 5, 2009
A ray of sunshine lights the way to the future. I’ve received my first post-employment break. There is a glimmer of hope for my working future.
A local major university has hired me to write an article for one of their school’s quarterly publications and it is paying what was a week’s worth of take-home wages from my previous job. This is a fairly major piece so it will take me at least a week’s worth of labor to get it done properly, but the big thing is, it is work and it is making a valuable contact for me at a major employer in the area.
It’s nice to think that I could possibly make a decent living as a free-lancer. I know how tough that is from previous dealings with free-lance writers as a newspaper editor. My article is due by May 25 so I’ll be very busy the next couple of weeks, especially with school starting on Monday. That’s OK because the inactivity was wreaking havoc on my mind. I am a person who needs to be busy.
By the way, I got the work as a result of a networking connection with a local friend. That proves correct the advice I got from a "headhunter" a couple of weeks ago who said it is almost worthless to respond to “help wanted” ads in the newspaper or on the Internet. He said the way to a new job is through networking. Who knows where this gig will lead? That’s the excitement of taking this opportunity to make a midcareer change and try my hand at going back to school.
I also figured out that because I wasn’t actively generating income anymore, I was punishing myself by not allowing myself to have a good time. I enjoy our hot tub, for instance, and I haven’t been using it for a couple of weeks. Self-flagellation. I wasn’t allowing myself to bask in the sun during the afternoon or enjoy a hockey game on TV. That changed today. I ventured into the hot tub. I must be regaining some self-worth and a sense of identity. I am a writer and editor, and also a student. I am pretty good at all those tasks, so how hard should it be to get hired in a year?
A note to self: It’s OK to have fun, to enjoy life. I haven’t done anything wrong, and with all the positive support I’ve received, I should be floating on Cloud Nine.
A ray of sunshine lights the way to the future. I’ve received my first post-employment break. There is a glimmer of hope for my working future.
A local major university has hired me to write an article for one of their school’s quarterly publications and it is paying what was a week’s worth of take-home wages from my previous job. This is a fairly major piece so it will take me at least a week’s worth of labor to get it done properly, but the big thing is, it is work and it is making a valuable contact for me at a major employer in the area.
It’s nice to think that I could possibly make a decent living as a free-lancer. I know how tough that is from previous dealings with free-lance writers as a newspaper editor. My article is due by May 25 so I’ll be very busy the next couple of weeks, especially with school starting on Monday. That’s OK because the inactivity was wreaking havoc on my mind. I am a person who needs to be busy.
By the way, I got the work as a result of a networking connection with a local friend. That proves correct the advice I got from a "headhunter" a couple of weeks ago who said it is almost worthless to respond to “help wanted” ads in the newspaper or on the Internet. He said the way to a new job is through networking. Who knows where this gig will lead? That’s the excitement of taking this opportunity to make a midcareer change and try my hand at going back to school.
I also figured out that because I wasn’t actively generating income anymore, I was punishing myself by not allowing myself to have a good time. I enjoy our hot tub, for instance, and I haven’t been using it for a couple of weeks. Self-flagellation. I wasn’t allowing myself to bask in the sun during the afternoon or enjoy a hockey game on TV. That changed today. I ventured into the hot tub. I must be regaining some self-worth and a sense of identity. I am a writer and editor, and also a student. I am pretty good at all those tasks, so how hard should it be to get hired in a year?
A note to self: It’s OK to have fun, to enjoy life. I haven’t done anything wrong, and with all the positive support I’ve received, I should be floating on Cloud Nine.
Monday, May 4, 2009
Weekend vibrations
May 4, 2009
I think I have it figured out: I feel fairly normal on weekends because I'm at the cottage “cheese” and I’m used to relaxing and spending my time in Chautauqua on Saturdays and Sundays. I’m in my comfort zone on weekends. It’s what I’m used to.
Then come Monday, the anxiety level ramps up because most able-bodied people head off to work. It kind of gives me the creeps to be stuck at home. That will end one week from today when my first postgraduate class begins. We’ll see how that goes. I have to remain optimistic and grow some stones. It can’t be that difficult. Hundreds of thousands of people accomplish their degrees every year.
I’m thinking I might spend a lot of study time at the college. That might help reinforce my sense of purpose. That will help get me out of the house. (The “grass is always greener principle”: I had always dreamed of staying home and doing yard work and gardening. Now that I have that, I’d rather be trudging off to work.)
There’s not a lot to report. The days at home seem to have taken on a rhythm: wake up, go on the Internet, do a little studying for some CLEP exams I’ll have to take, do some yard work, pester the Blessed Wife at her place of employment by calling a couple of times, lay around with the cat, try to dust off the jacket of anxiety that seems to be wrapped around me and then set to preparing dinner.
For all those people who make midcareer changes, I salute you. It takes real determination to accomplish that goal. I need to turn up the volume on those knobs as well: determination and happiness. Don’t worry, be happy.
I think I have it figured out: I feel fairly normal on weekends because I'm at the cottage “cheese” and I’m used to relaxing and spending my time in Chautauqua on Saturdays and Sundays. I’m in my comfort zone on weekends. It’s what I’m used to.
Then come Monday, the anxiety level ramps up because most able-bodied people head off to work. It kind of gives me the creeps to be stuck at home. That will end one week from today when my first postgraduate class begins. We’ll see how that goes. I have to remain optimistic and grow some stones. It can’t be that difficult. Hundreds of thousands of people accomplish their degrees every year.
I’m thinking I might spend a lot of study time at the college. That might help reinforce my sense of purpose. That will help get me out of the house. (The “grass is always greener principle”: I had always dreamed of staying home and doing yard work and gardening. Now that I have that, I’d rather be trudging off to work.)
There’s not a lot to report. The days at home seem to have taken on a rhythm: wake up, go on the Internet, do a little studying for some CLEP exams I’ll have to take, do some yard work, pester the Blessed Wife at her place of employment by calling a couple of times, lay around with the cat, try to dust off the jacket of anxiety that seems to be wrapped around me and then set to preparing dinner.
For all those people who make midcareer changes, I salute you. It takes real determination to accomplish that goal. I need to turn up the volume on those knobs as well: determination and happiness. Don’t worry, be happy.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Tranquility of Chautauqua
May 1, 2009
Sitting on the porch of the cottage “cheese” on this Friday night, I don’t have any pressing blog concerns. I see the weekend warriors starting to arrive after their hectic workdays pursuing the Almighty Dollar. They look beat. They arrive, look at the undulating water, grunt and retire to the couch inside their weekend domiciles. Just a month ago, I was among them. Now I’m not. Now I’m a graduate student. When does the party start?
I find that the peacefulness of Chautauqua brings a sense of tranquility. Maybe we will start calling the cottage “Tranquility Base.” I can immerse myself in the atmosphere, the care of the lovely little beige cottage (especially since the garage has a new roof on it), and the gardens that surround is. The neighbors came home this afternoon carrying hanging baskets of flowers. What a heart-warming sight! Our other neighbor, a spry 86-year-old, just came out in his fishing outfit and a couple of poles in hand to drown some worms in the Vukote Canal. The wind is friskily blowing around our flags, our neighbor’s Old Glory and our three-flower offering, both snapping in the breeze. A gray blanket of clouds has shrouded what was a lovely, late-afternoon sun. The lake is still kicking up waves. There is hardly a sound. A paddle boat tied up in the canal is rhythmically hitting the breakwall. Occasionally a bird sings a brief song. The laptop computer emits a soft hum. But that’s it. Oh, what a difference from the cities.
What a joy it was planting the gladiolus bulbs in the garden, bringing them from the long winter slumber in our basement to their summer home in the soil of Vukote. Maybe that is my calling – gardener, caretaker, keeper of the soft and beautiful vegetation. That brings the mind to focus, telling me that is what is important in this world – life and its nurturing.
As dusk approaches, I wait for my son to arrive. Tomorrow morning we help our good friends put the dock in the lake. It’s a major project (three or four hours), and a small army of men and sometimes women lend their hands. I view it as one of the happiest days of the year because it signals the start of the summer season – a time for fun, conviviality and long nights spent around bonfires. The boat also goes in the water. I can’t wait to take the first seasonal ride down Chautauqua from Bemus Point, where we launch it every year, under the Veterans Bridge and into the open south basin. I hit the throttle and the 18-foot Searay screams down the lake toward the Vukote Canal. What a fabulous rush that is. And it only happens once a year, so you better savor it.
Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing my son. I think his anti-materialistic outlook on life played a part in me forsaking a safe corporate job and taking off on this weird path of going back to school. I hope a year from now, I can thank him and all my wonderful family and friends for helping me to re-invent and reshape my life.
As a final note, I haven’t mentioned my “going away” party that some former co-workers held for me earlier in the week. It was a low-key, maudlin affair. I knew that night that I hadn’t made a mistake.
Sitting on the porch of the cottage “cheese” on this Friday night, I don’t have any pressing blog concerns. I see the weekend warriors starting to arrive after their hectic workdays pursuing the Almighty Dollar. They look beat. They arrive, look at the undulating water, grunt and retire to the couch inside their weekend domiciles. Just a month ago, I was among them. Now I’m not. Now I’m a graduate student. When does the party start?
I find that the peacefulness of Chautauqua brings a sense of tranquility. Maybe we will start calling the cottage “Tranquility Base.” I can immerse myself in the atmosphere, the care of the lovely little beige cottage (especially since the garage has a new roof on it), and the gardens that surround is. The neighbors came home this afternoon carrying hanging baskets of flowers. What a heart-warming sight! Our other neighbor, a spry 86-year-old, just came out in his fishing outfit and a couple of poles in hand to drown some worms in the Vukote Canal. The wind is friskily blowing around our flags, our neighbor’s Old Glory and our three-flower offering, both snapping in the breeze. A gray blanket of clouds has shrouded what was a lovely, late-afternoon sun. The lake is still kicking up waves. There is hardly a sound. A paddle boat tied up in the canal is rhythmically hitting the breakwall. Occasionally a bird sings a brief song. The laptop computer emits a soft hum. But that’s it. Oh, what a difference from the cities.
What a joy it was planting the gladiolus bulbs in the garden, bringing them from the long winter slumber in our basement to their summer home in the soil of Vukote. Maybe that is my calling – gardener, caretaker, keeper of the soft and beautiful vegetation. That brings the mind to focus, telling me that is what is important in this world – life and its nurturing.
As dusk approaches, I wait for my son to arrive. Tomorrow morning we help our good friends put the dock in the lake. It’s a major project (three or four hours), and a small army of men and sometimes women lend their hands. I view it as one of the happiest days of the year because it signals the start of the summer season – a time for fun, conviviality and long nights spent around bonfires. The boat also goes in the water. I can’t wait to take the first seasonal ride down Chautauqua from Bemus Point, where we launch it every year, under the Veterans Bridge and into the open south basin. I hit the throttle and the 18-foot Searay screams down the lake toward the Vukote Canal. What a fabulous rush that is. And it only happens once a year, so you better savor it.
Anyway, I’m looking forward to seeing my son. I think his anti-materialistic outlook on life played a part in me forsaking a safe corporate job and taking off on this weird path of going back to school. I hope a year from now, I can thank him and all my wonderful family and friends for helping me to re-invent and reshape my life.
As a final note, I haven’t mentioned my “going away” party that some former co-workers held for me earlier in the week. It was a low-key, maudlin affair. I knew that night that I hadn’t made a mistake.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
The gift of time
April 30, 2009
I am blessed with a fabulous network of friends and family whom I lean on for support.
A former co-worker and now a pastor of a local community church met me for a Starbucks coffee this afternoon. He had kind words of support and assured me that I hadn’t made a bad decision to take the newspaper buyout.
He raved about reiki and said if I felt like I was stressed to try a reiki practitioner. “It’s like opium,” he said of the healing treatments. I will have to do some research on reiki. It may be worth a few visits.
His other great comment was: “Look at it as if you gave yourself the gift of time. A time to reflect and enjoy.”
Later in the day, I sought the counsel of my father-in-law, who is an Anglican priest. He had some great advice and words of encouragement. He, too, said the decision to leave the newspaper will prove to be a wise one as time ticks on. (He’s an avid newspaper reader. So that comment is somewhat surprising.)
He suggested that I immerse myself in the D’Youville community, which I think is great advice. I will try to get involved with the student newspaper, at his suggestion. That would be fun.
Also great words of wisdom from my father-in-law: “Sure you’ve had a loss of identity and a paycheck,” he said, “but now it’s time to forget the past and set your sights on the future. Going back to school is going to be a lot of fun, and you will excel. Everybody else in the class is going to be more concerned about partying. You will do very well.”
So that’s the lesson of today: Savor these days of free time and to look to the future. Enough of the backward thinking, it can be as toxic as the atmosphere at a dysfunctional workplace.
I am ready for the future and the uncertainty is brings. That, according to my father-in-law, will put the excitement back in my life. “It will make you feel much younger,” he said, “being on a college campus.”
Let it be so. Maybe I'll even sign up for some reiki.
I am blessed with a fabulous network of friends and family whom I lean on for support.
A former co-worker and now a pastor of a local community church met me for a Starbucks coffee this afternoon. He had kind words of support and assured me that I hadn’t made a bad decision to take the newspaper buyout.
He raved about reiki and said if I felt like I was stressed to try a reiki practitioner. “It’s like opium,” he said of the healing treatments. I will have to do some research on reiki. It may be worth a few visits.
His other great comment was: “Look at it as if you gave yourself the gift of time. A time to reflect and enjoy.”
Later in the day, I sought the counsel of my father-in-law, who is an Anglican priest. He had some great advice and words of encouragement. He, too, said the decision to leave the newspaper will prove to be a wise one as time ticks on. (He’s an avid newspaper reader. So that comment is somewhat surprising.)
He suggested that I immerse myself in the D’Youville community, which I think is great advice. I will try to get involved with the student newspaper, at his suggestion. That would be fun.
Also great words of wisdom from my father-in-law: “Sure you’ve had a loss of identity and a paycheck,” he said, “but now it’s time to forget the past and set your sights on the future. Going back to school is going to be a lot of fun, and you will excel. Everybody else in the class is going to be more concerned about partying. You will do very well.”
So that’s the lesson of today: Savor these days of free time and to look to the future. Enough of the backward thinking, it can be as toxic as the atmosphere at a dysfunctional workplace.
I am ready for the future and the uncertainty is brings. That, according to my father-in-law, will put the excitement back in my life. “It will make you feel much younger,” he said, “being on a college campus.”
Let it be so. Maybe I'll even sign up for some reiki.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
The one-month mark
April 29, 2009
Tomorrow marks one month away from the work world. I’m disappointed that I’ve spent four golden weeks of semi-leisure being a Fretful Jones. I disregarded, or couldn’t allow myself, to take the advice of my children and party my butt off during this month. I enjoyed a few days to the hilt, but overall it’s been a lackadaisical month. Someday, I will realize what I was meant to learn from this episode in my life. For now, it pretty much remains a mystery.
I’m keeping busy getting ready for school, cruising the college’s Web site, and learning to use the online database, my student e-mail and the Blackboard learning platform. I’m trying to read some short stories to get in the groove for extensive reading. I can’t believe I’m yearning for the start of classes so I can put my mind to the test.
There are times when I feel pretty proud of myself for going back to school to learn new skills. It should be an exciting time. The Blessed Wife keeps telling me that.
It’s that fear of the unknown that keeps gnawing at my psyche. It’s so irrational, when you think about it.
My 22-year-old daughter is two-thirds of her way through her master’s in education program, working three part-time jobs, taking out loans to finish her coursework this summer, is starting to apply for jobs not knowing if and where she’ll get one, is less than four months away from getting married and possibly moving hundreds of miles away from her current home. I don’t hear her complaining about not being able to sleep or experiencing monkey mind. She does complain about not having enough money, though.
That makes me think back to my days at Syracuse where I was married with a small child, worked a part-time job answering telephones, went to school full-time and didn't know if I would have a job after graduation. We had no money. I slept pretty well in those days and thoroughly enjoyed myself. And you know what? Things worked out in the end. Just before graduation, I scored a job at the Hornell Evening Tribune. Prayers answered.
As we get old, we get set in our ways. We start to fear change. Heck, we’re changing TV services tomorrow from cable to satellite dish and that seems like a daunting prospect. I’ll have to learn new channels to find my science programs! Why is life so hard? (I’m joking, of course.)
Another subject I have to tackle at some point: Why we identify so much with what we do. The ego must be subdued. We are not our occupations. We are something more than that – spiritual beings having a human experience. We are what we give to the world.
Tomorrow marks one month away from the work world. I’m disappointed that I’ve spent four golden weeks of semi-leisure being a Fretful Jones. I disregarded, or couldn’t allow myself, to take the advice of my children and party my butt off during this month. I enjoyed a few days to the hilt, but overall it’s been a lackadaisical month. Someday, I will realize what I was meant to learn from this episode in my life. For now, it pretty much remains a mystery.
I’m keeping busy getting ready for school, cruising the college’s Web site, and learning to use the online database, my student e-mail and the Blackboard learning platform. I’m trying to read some short stories to get in the groove for extensive reading. I can’t believe I’m yearning for the start of classes so I can put my mind to the test.
There are times when I feel pretty proud of myself for going back to school to learn new skills. It should be an exciting time. The Blessed Wife keeps telling me that.
It’s that fear of the unknown that keeps gnawing at my psyche. It’s so irrational, when you think about it.
My 22-year-old daughter is two-thirds of her way through her master’s in education program, working three part-time jobs, taking out loans to finish her coursework this summer, is starting to apply for jobs not knowing if and where she’ll get one, is less than four months away from getting married and possibly moving hundreds of miles away from her current home. I don’t hear her complaining about not being able to sleep or experiencing monkey mind. She does complain about not having enough money, though.
That makes me think back to my days at Syracuse where I was married with a small child, worked a part-time job answering telephones, went to school full-time and didn't know if I would have a job after graduation. We had no money. I slept pretty well in those days and thoroughly enjoyed myself. And you know what? Things worked out in the end. Just before graduation, I scored a job at the Hornell Evening Tribune. Prayers answered.
As we get old, we get set in our ways. We start to fear change. Heck, we’re changing TV services tomorrow from cable to satellite dish and that seems like a daunting prospect. I’ll have to learn new channels to find my science programs! Why is life so hard? (I’m joking, of course.)
Another subject I have to tackle at some point: Why we identify so much with what we do. The ego must be subdued. We are not our occupations. We are something more than that – spiritual beings having a human experience. We are what we give to the world.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Repeat the mantra
April 28, 2009
It’s weird being alone with your thoughts. No co-workers bustling around. No radios blaring. No TV squawking. Just your brain and your spirit doing a back-and-forth volley. Replaying past experiences. Rethinking old decisions. Projecting future events. All in a mad jumble, one frantic thought pushing out the old one in a door-busting rush. All the while, watching a soft spring rain turn the grass a fluorescent green.
How to make it end? How to quiet the mind, to bring peace and order to seeming chaos? Repeat the mantra: study, success, master’s teach, excel.
Coming from the hectic pace of a newsroom, my brain must feel it needs to keep up its Olympic triathlon pace. No need, oh jumpy neurons. Make it a time for reflection – a time to slow down.
Learning, reflection and growth – that’s what this day is for.
It’s weird being alone with your thoughts. No co-workers bustling around. No radios blaring. No TV squawking. Just your brain and your spirit doing a back-and-forth volley. Replaying past experiences. Rethinking old decisions. Projecting future events. All in a mad jumble, one frantic thought pushing out the old one in a door-busting rush. All the while, watching a soft spring rain turn the grass a fluorescent green.
How to make it end? How to quiet the mind, to bring peace and order to seeming chaos? Repeat the mantra: study, success, master’s teach, excel.
Coming from the hectic pace of a newsroom, my brain must feel it needs to keep up its Olympic triathlon pace. No need, oh jumpy neurons. Make it a time for reflection – a time to slow down.
Learning, reflection and growth – that’s what this day is for.
Sharpen the focus
April 28, 2009
It’s a cool, damp spring morning following a scorcher of a day.
Today’s lesson is to sharpen my focus on re-educating myself.
Unless something jumps out of the weeds at me, I’ve suspended my active job search in favor of concentrating on school and developing a free-lance business and my own Web site. The Blessed Wife and eldest daughter laid down the law yesterday after I struggled with anxiety attacks again. Put the money worries on hold for year, narrow your focus to retraining yourself, take it a day at a time and let the rest work itself out over the next year.
So that’s it: Study, success, teach, excel. Have a focus like a laser beam. Whatever doesn’t further your goal of earning a master’s degree, teaching students and sharing your writing and editing with the world is not under consideration. Turn up the volume on the mental toughness.
“You’re just going to have to power through it,” advised eldest daughter. (That includes shutting down the monkey mind that keeps me awake at night.)
That means a stop to papering Western New York with CVs for jobs I don’t really want right now and to stop trivial pursuits that don’t get me closer to my goal. Outside of school work and building a free-lance business, everything else is just a distraction.
In that vein, I stopped for a job interview yesterday for a summer position at a venerable Western New York institution. While the young man who interviewed me seemed accommodating, a six-day-a-week job during the middle of summer didn’t appeal to me, at least this year with two weddings and classwork bound to take up quite a bit of time during July and August. So I immediately shut that proposal down with a quick, polite e-mail last night.
So that’s it, folks. A year of hard work ahead, but labor that is going to grow my stock, not Warren Buffett’s.
Again, I going to affirm my vision: I see myself next August in front of a college classroom sharing my writing and learning skills with eager students.
I’m going the Post-It note route as well, with little affirmations going up around the house, the car, etc. Here’s what they say:
Study, success, degree, teach, excel. Study, success, degree, teach, excel. Study, success, degree, teach, excel.
It’s a cool, damp spring morning following a scorcher of a day.
Today’s lesson is to sharpen my focus on re-educating myself.
Unless something jumps out of the weeds at me, I’ve suspended my active job search in favor of concentrating on school and developing a free-lance business and my own Web site. The Blessed Wife and eldest daughter laid down the law yesterday after I struggled with anxiety attacks again. Put the money worries on hold for year, narrow your focus to retraining yourself, take it a day at a time and let the rest work itself out over the next year.
So that’s it: Study, success, teach, excel. Have a focus like a laser beam. Whatever doesn’t further your goal of earning a master’s degree, teaching students and sharing your writing and editing with the world is not under consideration. Turn up the volume on the mental toughness.
“You’re just going to have to power through it,” advised eldest daughter. (That includes shutting down the monkey mind that keeps me awake at night.)
That means a stop to papering Western New York with CVs for jobs I don’t really want right now and to stop trivial pursuits that don’t get me closer to my goal. Outside of school work and building a free-lance business, everything else is just a distraction.
In that vein, I stopped for a job interview yesterday for a summer position at a venerable Western New York institution. While the young man who interviewed me seemed accommodating, a six-day-a-week job during the middle of summer didn’t appeal to me, at least this year with two weddings and classwork bound to take up quite a bit of time during July and August. So I immediately shut that proposal down with a quick, polite e-mail last night.
So that’s it, folks. A year of hard work ahead, but labor that is going to grow my stock, not Warren Buffett’s.
Again, I going to affirm my vision: I see myself next August in front of a college classroom sharing my writing and learning skills with eager students.
I’m going the Post-It note route as well, with little affirmations going up around the house, the car, etc. Here’s what they say:
Study, success, degree, teach, excel. Study, success, degree, teach, excel. Study, success, degree, teach, excel.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Out of dormancy
April 26, 2009
Here I am, on the porch of our cottage “cheese” typing away as all the weekend warriors head back to Buffalo, Pittsburgh or Cleveland after their big days on the lake shore. I feel like I’m getting to be part of the Chautauqua culture. I told our neighbors that the beauty and relaxed feeling of being here for days on end is like the high of “Chautauqua crack.”
Perhaps the decision to take the buyout from The News will be like the “butterfly effect” for the Stanleys. (You know the butterfly effect. A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazon and sets off a thunderstorm in Kansas.) The titanic mental debate that went into the buyout decision could end up as the catalyst for change – change that Judy (blessed wife) and I have discussed for a very long time, but were always reluctant to actually make happen. We could end up selling both houses and consolidating into one home, either in the Chautauqua region or out of state, perhaps North Carolina. (Hello, Duke University, you’re missing out on a brilliant professor in Dr. Stanley.) What is life all about if you can't take some chances and make life a little more exhilarating?
I talked with all the children today, and everyone seems to be in good spirits. I like what my eldest daughter told me:
“You’re awakening something that has been dormant in you for a long time.”
That’s how she explained away the stress and anxiety I’ve been feeling. I want to say that I’m becoming somewhat more comfortable in my post-newspaper skin. We had an excellent session around the bonfire last night with our neighbors, just enjoying the warm spring evening and talking about all the change coming this year.
We’ve been noticing all these instances of synchronicity over the past few weeks, seeing people we haven’t seen in years. Last night, Judy (blessed wife) and I were regaling people around the bonfire with tales of how we met at “the log” when we were teenagers. It was a rather bucolic spot in suburban Buffalo where two trees had fallen to make some comfortable sitting areas. It was surrounded by woods, and Cazenovia Creek rippled along not far from the log. Our teenage clique used to make bonfires there, sit on the logs and drink Boone’s Farm wine and Koehler beer. That’s how Judy and I came to meet for the start of a wonderful life together. I was about to fall backward off the log and Judy was sitting next to me at the time. As I fell, I think I whacked her with one of my arms. That got her attention, and the rest is history. I did fall off the log, onto my back, but bounced back up red-faced and happy.
Anyway, as we took a walk this morning, we came upon two old friends from “the log,” one of whom we hadn’t seen in 30 years. It’s weird how life keeps coming around in circles. Why are we talking about the log, and then meeting someone from there the next day that we hadn’t seen in decades? What does it mean? What lesson should I draw from the encounter?
All I know is that my brain neurons are firing in sequences not encountered in years. It’s exciting not to know what lies ahead one year from now. I’ve been trying to envision myself in May 2010, but then again the daily journey is getting pretty interesting and worth paying attention to.
In two weeks, I’ll be immersed in classes, just like I was 34 years ago at Syracuse University.
Will I be a good student?
I think so. (And the weekend will still begin on Tuesdays!)
Here I am, on the porch of our cottage “cheese” typing away as all the weekend warriors head back to Buffalo, Pittsburgh or Cleveland after their big days on the lake shore. I feel like I’m getting to be part of the Chautauqua culture. I told our neighbors that the beauty and relaxed feeling of being here for days on end is like the high of “Chautauqua crack.”
Perhaps the decision to take the buyout from The News will be like the “butterfly effect” for the Stanleys. (You know the butterfly effect. A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazon and sets off a thunderstorm in Kansas.) The titanic mental debate that went into the buyout decision could end up as the catalyst for change – change that Judy (blessed wife) and I have discussed for a very long time, but were always reluctant to actually make happen. We could end up selling both houses and consolidating into one home, either in the Chautauqua region or out of state, perhaps North Carolina. (Hello, Duke University, you’re missing out on a brilliant professor in Dr. Stanley.) What is life all about if you can't take some chances and make life a little more exhilarating?
I talked with all the children today, and everyone seems to be in good spirits. I like what my eldest daughter told me:
“You’re awakening something that has been dormant in you for a long time.”
That’s how she explained away the stress and anxiety I’ve been feeling. I want to say that I’m becoming somewhat more comfortable in my post-newspaper skin. We had an excellent session around the bonfire last night with our neighbors, just enjoying the warm spring evening and talking about all the change coming this year.
We’ve been noticing all these instances of synchronicity over the past few weeks, seeing people we haven’t seen in years. Last night, Judy (blessed wife) and I were regaling people around the bonfire with tales of how we met at “the log” when we were teenagers. It was a rather bucolic spot in suburban Buffalo where two trees had fallen to make some comfortable sitting areas. It was surrounded by woods, and Cazenovia Creek rippled along not far from the log. Our teenage clique used to make bonfires there, sit on the logs and drink Boone’s Farm wine and Koehler beer. That’s how Judy and I came to meet for the start of a wonderful life together. I was about to fall backward off the log and Judy was sitting next to me at the time. As I fell, I think I whacked her with one of my arms. That got her attention, and the rest is history. I did fall off the log, onto my back, but bounced back up red-faced and happy.
Anyway, as we took a walk this morning, we came upon two old friends from “the log,” one of whom we hadn’t seen in 30 years. It’s weird how life keeps coming around in circles. Why are we talking about the log, and then meeting someone from there the next day that we hadn’t seen in decades? What does it mean? What lesson should I draw from the encounter?
All I know is that my brain neurons are firing in sequences not encountered in years. It’s exciting not to know what lies ahead one year from now. I’ve been trying to envision myself in May 2010, but then again the daily journey is getting pretty interesting and worth paying attention to.
In two weeks, I’ll be immersed in classes, just like I was 34 years ago at Syracuse University.
Will I be a good student?
I think so. (And the weekend will still begin on Tuesdays!)
Friday, April 24, 2009
All that it ever was
April 24, 2009
What a beautiful day in Chautauqua. Many days in Chautauqua seem to be excellent.
The days are so nice that’s it’s difficult not to have an upbeat attitude. On the ride down here from the Big B, I was listening to Coast to Coast AM and the show had a guest on reiterating that, even in your 50s, if you wake up, it’s a great day. Let the air be filled with optimism!
When I arrived here, a neighbor greeted me and said there is nothing to worry about. Judy and I can make ends meet no matter what, if we put our minds to it. So just enjoy the day! What a day it’s been. The first day of true summer. Even at 8 p.m., it’s 80 degrees and the windows are wide open.
Judy (the blessed wife) told me yesterday that the job I had was a good-paying job, but it wasn’t a good job. I was like an automaton stuck on the word widget assembly line. I was all I was ever going to be at The News – a pagination jockey. Nothing more, nothing less. Ten more years of that and then hang up the keyboard. No thanks, dudettes. I’d like to try something different for a change. Forget about that job. Let it reside in the past as a lengthy experience that helped me successfully raise a family, but now it’s done. It’s history. You can’t go back. Toastarama.
There’s a new horizon ahead. Focus on that and be happy. What an opportunity you have to make a difference in this world now that you are free of the bonds of corporate slavery.
With a positive attitude, no matter the outcome, it will be good.
Again, my friendly neighbor advised me that he’s seen many people leave their jobs, and it takes a year before they start to get calm down mentally, even in retirement, because of the displacement factor. That’s great, knowing that I’m not alone in this bad-ass tape loop that berates me for my bold decision. It’s OK. It really is. My children, wife and friends still love me. I am the same person, only more interesting.
On a broader scale, when will America get its act together? How long will this crushing recession continue? The suit boys that Harvard, Yale and Princeton churned out and put in charge of corporate America sure have made a mess of things. “Me, me, me, me, me.”
I think it’s time to turn most of the operations over to women. Men seem to be sorely out of touch and deserving of castration. Let the women lead, I say.
All is well on this gorgeous Chautauqua day, and nothing can ever change that. I am headed to a bright future. We’ll have to see what it is – teacher, househusband, free-lance writer.
On to what awaits!
What a beautiful day in Chautauqua. Many days in Chautauqua seem to be excellent.
The days are so nice that’s it’s difficult not to have an upbeat attitude. On the ride down here from the Big B, I was listening to Coast to Coast AM and the show had a guest on reiterating that, even in your 50s, if you wake up, it’s a great day. Let the air be filled with optimism!
When I arrived here, a neighbor greeted me and said there is nothing to worry about. Judy and I can make ends meet no matter what, if we put our minds to it. So just enjoy the day! What a day it’s been. The first day of true summer. Even at 8 p.m., it’s 80 degrees and the windows are wide open.
Judy (the blessed wife) told me yesterday that the job I had was a good-paying job, but it wasn’t a good job. I was like an automaton stuck on the word widget assembly line. I was all I was ever going to be at The News – a pagination jockey. Nothing more, nothing less. Ten more years of that and then hang up the keyboard. No thanks, dudettes. I’d like to try something different for a change. Forget about that job. Let it reside in the past as a lengthy experience that helped me successfully raise a family, but now it’s done. It’s history. You can’t go back. Toastarama.
There’s a new horizon ahead. Focus on that and be happy. What an opportunity you have to make a difference in this world now that you are free of the bonds of corporate slavery.
With a positive attitude, no matter the outcome, it will be good.
Again, my friendly neighbor advised me that he’s seen many people leave their jobs, and it takes a year before they start to get calm down mentally, even in retirement, because of the displacement factor. That’s great, knowing that I’m not alone in this bad-ass tape loop that berates me for my bold decision. It’s OK. It really is. My children, wife and friends still love me. I am the same person, only more interesting.
On a broader scale, when will America get its act together? How long will this crushing recession continue? The suit boys that Harvard, Yale and Princeton churned out and put in charge of corporate America sure have made a mess of things. “Me, me, me, me, me.”
I think it’s time to turn most of the operations over to women. Men seem to be sorely out of touch and deserving of castration. Let the women lead, I say.
All is well on this gorgeous Chautauqua day, and nothing can ever change that. I am headed to a bright future. We’ll have to see what it is – teacher, househusband, free-lance writer.
On to what awaits!
Thursday, April 23, 2009
The long and winding road
April 23, 2009
And so this midlife journey of inner exploration is underway for real.
Will we find that the hero has sabotaged his own life and turned it to ruin? Or will the saga have a fairy tale-like ending where the hero lives happily ever after? That, my friends, we won’t learn for a while.
Here is what we know after three weeks: My horizons are definitely broadening, as I’m talking to new people, making new acquaintances and exploring new things – like blogging. I’m listening to the tales of economic woe with open and sympathetic ears. I’m thinking that maybe we do have too much “stuff’ and this is our opportunity to live a leaner, meaner life.
Do we really need two homes, a boat, a jet ski, numerous cars and dinner out three times a week? Maybe life wasn’t meant to be lived with all these material burdens. Without them, I would be pretty much worry free right now. Is that the lesson I'm supposed to learn?
Every American family should be able to live off the proceeds of one income. That’s my new economic principle. It’s really an old principle, too. My parents raised four children basically from the wages earned by my father. I didn’t really think much of it as a kid, but I think my father was laid off often, and I know he traveled to places like Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Massena and Oswego to work on jobs, commuting home on weekends. That could not have been easy.
Speaking of easy, I’ve come to the conclusion that my first 52 years were free of almost all hassles. Life was too easy. The higher powers must have wanted me to experience a little adversity on the journey, so they instructed me to take this buyout and take a more difficult, but rewarding path.
“Get off easy street and see what life is like when you’re struggling to get a job; see how it feels when no one responds to your letters and resumes. This is the other side of life,” my mind says.
Even with the mental travails of the past few weeks, my problems are nothing compared to many people. That’s an important fact to remember. I can get out of this jam by successfully completing a year of higher education like many, many hard-working young people do, or by just getting rid of some of the “stuff” we’ve come to acquire.
The important thing in life is to maintain my close-knit family, keep us safe and happy, and to treasure the friendships we’ve made. As Bill Clinton would say, “It’s the people, stupid.”
Today’s lesson boils down to this: It took leaving a safe, secure job for me to start really experiencing life. I hadn't realized how smug I was. I do feel aware and engaged doing different things each day instead of being bored to tears sitting in the same office every day for 24 years. (Out of the comfort zone.)
As for the roulette wheel: Round and round she goes, and where she stops, nobody knows.
And so this midlife journey of inner exploration is underway for real.
Will we find that the hero has sabotaged his own life and turned it to ruin? Or will the saga have a fairy tale-like ending where the hero lives happily ever after? That, my friends, we won’t learn for a while.
Here is what we know after three weeks: My horizons are definitely broadening, as I’m talking to new people, making new acquaintances and exploring new things – like blogging. I’m listening to the tales of economic woe with open and sympathetic ears. I’m thinking that maybe we do have too much “stuff’ and this is our opportunity to live a leaner, meaner life.
Do we really need two homes, a boat, a jet ski, numerous cars and dinner out three times a week? Maybe life wasn’t meant to be lived with all these material burdens. Without them, I would be pretty much worry free right now. Is that the lesson I'm supposed to learn?
Every American family should be able to live off the proceeds of one income. That’s my new economic principle. It’s really an old principle, too. My parents raised four children basically from the wages earned by my father. I didn’t really think much of it as a kid, but I think my father was laid off often, and I know he traveled to places like Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Massena and Oswego to work on jobs, commuting home on weekends. That could not have been easy.
Speaking of easy, I’ve come to the conclusion that my first 52 years were free of almost all hassles. Life was too easy. The higher powers must have wanted me to experience a little adversity on the journey, so they instructed me to take this buyout and take a more difficult, but rewarding path.
“Get off easy street and see what life is like when you’re struggling to get a job; see how it feels when no one responds to your letters and resumes. This is the other side of life,” my mind says.
Even with the mental travails of the past few weeks, my problems are nothing compared to many people. That’s an important fact to remember. I can get out of this jam by successfully completing a year of higher education like many, many hard-working young people do, or by just getting rid of some of the “stuff” we’ve come to acquire.
The important thing in life is to maintain my close-knit family, keep us safe and happy, and to treasure the friendships we’ve made. As Bill Clinton would say, “It’s the people, stupid.”
Today’s lesson boils down to this: It took leaving a safe, secure job for me to start really experiencing life. I hadn't realized how smug I was. I do feel aware and engaged doing different things each day instead of being bored to tears sitting in the same office every day for 24 years. (Out of the comfort zone.)
As for the roulette wheel: Round and round she goes, and where she stops, nobody knows.
Monday, April 20, 2009
It's truly a small world
April 20, 2009
George Noory, the host of the radio program Coast to Coast AM, says there are no such things as coincidences.
Then today was a weird and fortuitous day that was meant to be, I guess.
I started scanning the employment ads this morning on a journalism Web site when I came across one seeking senior copy editors at The National newspaper in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. That’s a long way away, but the little kingdom has been getting lots of publicity lately for its opulence.
I immediately thought about my daughter Rachel, a marketing representative for a Los Angeles architect, being in that very Middle-Eastern place this week on business.
I read the ad and part of it stated, “Chief copy editors who have taken buyouts or who have recently retired are especially encouraged to apply.”
That seems to be addressing me personally, I thought. So I sent out a cover letter and resume for the heck of it. What a great life adventure that would be, to work in Abu Dhabi for a year or two. That would be something I never expected in my life.
Anyway, I shipped off an e-mail to Rachel who, as aforementioned, is in Abu Dhabi. I told her, “You wouldn’t believe where I just sent a resume for a job – Abu Dhabi, a newspaper called The National. I figure you might be visiting that area often for the next couple of years on business, so why not get a job there?”
Amazingly, 10 minutes later I got an e-mail from Rachel saying, “I was just at The National.” (More than 7,000 miles away, on the opposite side of the globe and we have near instant communication. What a changing world it is.)
The phone rang minutes later and it was Rachel calling. The signal was a little weak, but I could hear her pretty well. “I was at The National this morning. I met with the features editor – she’s an older woman from America. I can’t believe it. I have to go back there tomorrow, so I’ll tell her you sent a resume.”
Can you believe it?
We chatted some more about her stay there and what a great experience it is. She’s of the opinion that I wouldn’t want to live there. “Would mom come, too?” she asked.
“Rachel, I wouldn’t move there permanently, but I wouldn’t mind working there for a year, or two, or three, maybe make some pretty good money,” I responded.
What a bizarre occurrence. What are the chances of sending a resume to an exotic place half a world away and having your L.A.-based daughter be at that newspaper as the resume arrived? Too crazy.
What would be more crazy? To get a reply from The National and an interview. Stay tuned.
Also, on the proud Dad front: Son James called to say he’s been appointed a co-captain of the John Carroll University hockey team next season. What a kid! Kudos to James!
All in all, it was a pretty good day.
George Noory, the host of the radio program Coast to Coast AM, says there are no such things as coincidences.
Then today was a weird and fortuitous day that was meant to be, I guess.
I started scanning the employment ads this morning on a journalism Web site when I came across one seeking senior copy editors at The National newspaper in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. That’s a long way away, but the little kingdom has been getting lots of publicity lately for its opulence.
I immediately thought about my daughter Rachel, a marketing representative for a Los Angeles architect, being in that very Middle-Eastern place this week on business.
I read the ad and part of it stated, “Chief copy editors who have taken buyouts or who have recently retired are especially encouraged to apply.”
That seems to be addressing me personally, I thought. So I sent out a cover letter and resume for the heck of it. What a great life adventure that would be, to work in Abu Dhabi for a year or two. That would be something I never expected in my life.
Anyway, I shipped off an e-mail to Rachel who, as aforementioned, is in Abu Dhabi. I told her, “You wouldn’t believe where I just sent a resume for a job – Abu Dhabi, a newspaper called The National. I figure you might be visiting that area often for the next couple of years on business, so why not get a job there?”
Amazingly, 10 minutes later I got an e-mail from Rachel saying, “I was just at The National.” (More than 7,000 miles away, on the opposite side of the globe and we have near instant communication. What a changing world it is.)
The phone rang minutes later and it was Rachel calling. The signal was a little weak, but I could hear her pretty well. “I was at The National this morning. I met with the features editor – she’s an older woman from America. I can’t believe it. I have to go back there tomorrow, so I’ll tell her you sent a resume.”
Can you believe it?
We chatted some more about her stay there and what a great experience it is. She’s of the opinion that I wouldn’t want to live there. “Would mom come, too?” she asked.
“Rachel, I wouldn’t move there permanently, but I wouldn’t mind working there for a year, or two, or three, maybe make some pretty good money,” I responded.
What a bizarre occurrence. What are the chances of sending a resume to an exotic place half a world away and having your L.A.-based daughter be at that newspaper as the resume arrived? Too crazy.
What would be more crazy? To get a reply from The National and an interview. Stay tuned.
Also, on the proud Dad front: Son James called to say he’s been appointed a co-captain of the John Carroll University hockey team next season. What a kid! Kudos to James!
All in all, it was a pretty good day.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Sunday afternoon heroes vanish
April 19, 2009
As I was wallowing on the couch this afternoon, I tried to watch with interest one of my favorite sports spectacles – the Stanley Cup hockey playoffs. After a few minutes of watching what was probably a pretty interesting game featuring one of the sport’s biggest stars, Sydney Crosby, I wandered out of the room and perched myself outside to watch the birds fly among the feeders in our backyard.
Once upon a time, I was a HUGE sports fan, especially cherishing football and hockey, and all the news about them. Lately, I just can’t find the passion for professional sports. Could it be that:
* There are too many games of all kinds broadcast now? On Saturdays, there are literally dozens of college football or basketball games on the tube. On Sundays and every other day of the week during the autumn, it seems there is an endless parade of National Football League games. How does one say “overexposure”?
* The greed, arrogance and criminal records of many professional athletes have removed most of them from the pantheon of heroes. Who wants to listen to some 350-pound knucklehead who never earned his college diploma give discourse to the news media about adjusting to life playing for the Philadelphia Eagles instead of the Buffalo Bills – having just inked a $56 million deal while many Americans are lining up for their $400 a week unemployment check? How does one say “forget about Jason Peters”?
* Being a Buffalo sports fan has just turned the whole adventure into an exercise in futility. Both the city’s professional sports franchises are dull, have a lengthy legacy of losing and are unwilling to make bold moves in order to truly pursue a championship. My attitude is: Why bother to watch?
I think, for me, the combination of all three of those factors has made an afternoon of sitting in front of the television watching beer and Cialis commercials interspersed with a little athletic competition a thing of the past.
All in all, I’d rather just watch the birds.
As I was wallowing on the couch this afternoon, I tried to watch with interest one of my favorite sports spectacles – the Stanley Cup hockey playoffs. After a few minutes of watching what was probably a pretty interesting game featuring one of the sport’s biggest stars, Sydney Crosby, I wandered out of the room and perched myself outside to watch the birds fly among the feeders in our backyard.
Once upon a time, I was a HUGE sports fan, especially cherishing football and hockey, and all the news about them. Lately, I just can’t find the passion for professional sports. Could it be that:
* There are too many games of all kinds broadcast now? On Saturdays, there are literally dozens of college football or basketball games on the tube. On Sundays and every other day of the week during the autumn, it seems there is an endless parade of National Football League games. How does one say “overexposure”?
* The greed, arrogance and criminal records of many professional athletes have removed most of them from the pantheon of heroes. Who wants to listen to some 350-pound knucklehead who never earned his college diploma give discourse to the news media about adjusting to life playing for the Philadelphia Eagles instead of the Buffalo Bills – having just inked a $56 million deal while many Americans are lining up for their $400 a week unemployment check? How does one say “forget about Jason Peters”?
* Being a Buffalo sports fan has just turned the whole adventure into an exercise in futility. Both the city’s professional sports franchises are dull, have a lengthy legacy of losing and are unwilling to make bold moves in order to truly pursue a championship. My attitude is: Why bother to watch?
I think, for me, the combination of all three of those factors has made an afternoon of sitting in front of the television watching beer and Cialis commercials interspersed with a little athletic competition a thing of the past.
All in all, I’d rather just watch the birds.
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Consider it a gift
April 18, 2009
Why can’t I get it through my thick skull that this opportunity to return to school for nearly free is a tremendous gift from the universe? Just accept it, and stop fighting it and you’ll be much better off, I’m telling myself in the past day.
Sitting by the bonfire last night with a neighbor, she counseled me that my intentions are divided and that’s what’s leading to the wholesale anxiety.
“Don’t be looking for jobs on a serious basis. Why are you looking for jobs? That’s like serving two masters. You can’t go to school and be looking for jobs at the same time,” she said.
I’ve picked up my mother’s rosary and have started to recite the rosary during the past two days, asking for strength and focus. People always resort to the appealing to the higher power during trying times, and I am no exception. (And times aren’t really all that trying. I have about a 15-month financial cushion, school starting in three weeks, and after only two weeks of job seeking, have an opportunity to work during the summer at a place I’ve always wanted to work.
How bad is all that?
Today is a beautiful spring day in Chautauqua, so I’m going to put my mental resources into lapping up the splendor of the day. I’ll get some more gardening done, maybe take a paddle boat ride and head for the Rod and Gun Club for dinner. Now that’s a nice day in my book.
I keep saying this, but it is amazing what I’m learning about myself in these three weeks since I’ve left my longtime employment at The News. I’ve learned that I really have to put into practice all those self-help tips I’ve been reading through the years: Live for the day, stay positive, keep focused and maintain your inner strength. Also, keep moving because it would be easy to fall into a depression. (Some cottage friends told a story the other day of a neighbor who lost his good job in Erie, Pa., and feel into a deep depression. He’s now selling his house, they said. Trying times in America – the elimination of the middle class and orchestrated by the powers that be.)
Having said that, I’m off to grab a shovel and rake and make friends with the soil.
Why can’t I get it through my thick skull that this opportunity to return to school for nearly free is a tremendous gift from the universe? Just accept it, and stop fighting it and you’ll be much better off, I’m telling myself in the past day.
Sitting by the bonfire last night with a neighbor, she counseled me that my intentions are divided and that’s what’s leading to the wholesale anxiety.
“Don’t be looking for jobs on a serious basis. Why are you looking for jobs? That’s like serving two masters. You can’t go to school and be looking for jobs at the same time,” she said.
I’ve picked up my mother’s rosary and have started to recite the rosary during the past two days, asking for strength and focus. People always resort to the appealing to the higher power during trying times, and I am no exception. (And times aren’t really all that trying. I have about a 15-month financial cushion, school starting in three weeks, and after only two weeks of job seeking, have an opportunity to work during the summer at a place I’ve always wanted to work.
How bad is all that?
Today is a beautiful spring day in Chautauqua, so I’m going to put my mental resources into lapping up the splendor of the day. I’ll get some more gardening done, maybe take a paddle boat ride and head for the Rod and Gun Club for dinner. Now that’s a nice day in my book.
I keep saying this, but it is amazing what I’m learning about myself in these three weeks since I’ve left my longtime employment at The News. I’ve learned that I really have to put into practice all those self-help tips I’ve been reading through the years: Live for the day, stay positive, keep focused and maintain your inner strength. Also, keep moving because it would be easy to fall into a depression. (Some cottage friends told a story the other day of a neighbor who lost his good job in Erie, Pa., and feel into a deep depression. He’s now selling his house, they said. Trying times in America – the elimination of the middle class and orchestrated by the powers that be.)
Having said that, I’m off to grab a shovel and rake and make friends with the soil.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
The wheels begin to turn
April 15, 2009
Tax day, 2009 and the country is in an uproar over our tax burden. Even the Canadian students at D’Youville College say that we’re overtaxed in the United States, reports wife Judy. Now that’s saying something! Today was a national tea party to protest our government’s greed.
For me, it was a second advisement visit to D’Youville, and I learned with some relief that I can obtain a master’s degree without getting state teaching certification. That means I can focus on my coursework and student teaching and concern myself with the standardized tests at a later date. That definitely relieves some of the immediate anxiety.
I am going to set my schedule of achievement over the long weekend at the Cheese (cottage) so I know my plan of attack for the coming year. I may squeeze in a big competency exam or two, if I feel comfortable with the summer courses. As of now, my ultimate goal is teaching at a community college or a private high school.
On the employment front, the e-mail and telephone were silent all day. I fired off another resume only to learn that when this document goes over the Internet to potential employers, it’s losing its formatting so it looks like a giant glob of paragraphs. I’ll have to rectify that. It’s a brave new world, indeed.
So anyway, the wheels are slowly starting to turn on the re-education process. Let me enjoy the ride, Lord, let me enjoy the ride.
Tax day, 2009 and the country is in an uproar over our tax burden. Even the Canadian students at D’Youville College say that we’re overtaxed in the United States, reports wife Judy. Now that’s saying something! Today was a national tea party to protest our government’s greed.
For me, it was a second advisement visit to D’Youville, and I learned with some relief that I can obtain a master’s degree without getting state teaching certification. That means I can focus on my coursework and student teaching and concern myself with the standardized tests at a later date. That definitely relieves some of the immediate anxiety.
I am going to set my schedule of achievement over the long weekend at the Cheese (cottage) so I know my plan of attack for the coming year. I may squeeze in a big competency exam or two, if I feel comfortable with the summer courses. As of now, my ultimate goal is teaching at a community college or a private high school.
On the employment front, the e-mail and telephone were silent all day. I fired off another resume only to learn that when this document goes over the Internet to potential employers, it’s losing its formatting so it looks like a giant glob of paragraphs. I’ll have to rectify that. It’s a brave new world, indeed.
So anyway, the wheels are slowly starting to turn on the re-education process. Let me enjoy the ride, Lord, let me enjoy the ride.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
The tide will turn
April 14, 2009
It’s been another rather rough day on the morale front. For the past 20 years, I’ve dreamed of being at home every day cleaning and cooking and doing some reading and writing. Now that it’s here, it’s amazing to me that I don’t seem to be able to enjoy it.
My body and brain wants to get up in the morning and get off to the salt mines. There’s no doubt about it. That routine is deeply ingrained, and it will take some time to let it ease its grip on my psyche. I know that time will come. I just don’t know when. The tide will turn at some point – maybe tomorrow, next week or next year.
I found myself during the day pledging that when I get another job, I will cherish it like a jewel, without complaint or compunction. Wow!
I’m even jealous of the people I see driving off like automatons to their appointments with the daily grind. God help us.
I madly fired off resumes today to get myself back in the workplace. I need to back off a bit and smell the coffee.
I remember my father, among many others, saying that if he had it to do over again, he wouldn’t have retired at 65. “Silent Dick,” as they called him, had his routine every weekday. Get up at 5 a.m., have boiled coffee, go out the door, get in the big old Lincoln Continental, stop for breakfast at a greasy spoon somewhere and then get to the job.
Since he was an electrician, he worked all over the place, sometimes at Donner-Hanna Furnace, sometimes at Children’s Hospital. It depended on where the union assigned him. He’d buzz home at 4 p.m., take a shower in the basement.(The shower actually was a garden hose hooked up to the hot water spigot and the nozzle was held in place with a piece of wood nailed to the ceiling.) "Hockey puck hamburgers" and whole potatoes boiled for three hours were served at 4:30. From 5 to 9 p.m., he parked himself in front of the tube, sometimes drinking a 16-ounce World’s Fair glass of wine and chowing a bag of chocolate chip cookies as an evening snack. Then it was off to a gaseous night in the crib. And he loved it. He told me when he retired about what a bad decision it was. I think many people feel that way.
So be careful what you wish for, folks. This joblessness isn’t all it’s cranked up to be. I’m only 52, so there are many more productive years ahead (although Judy loves coming home to a hot cooked meal and a sparkling clean house).
Tomorrow, I’ll be headed to D’Youville for a few hours to get more information on the Masters in Education Program. Maybe some of those employers will even call.
It’s been another rather rough day on the morale front. For the past 20 years, I’ve dreamed of being at home every day cleaning and cooking and doing some reading and writing. Now that it’s here, it’s amazing to me that I don’t seem to be able to enjoy it.
My body and brain wants to get up in the morning and get off to the salt mines. There’s no doubt about it. That routine is deeply ingrained, and it will take some time to let it ease its grip on my psyche. I know that time will come. I just don’t know when. The tide will turn at some point – maybe tomorrow, next week or next year.
I found myself during the day pledging that when I get another job, I will cherish it like a jewel, without complaint or compunction. Wow!
I’m even jealous of the people I see driving off like automatons to their appointments with the daily grind. God help us.
I madly fired off resumes today to get myself back in the workplace. I need to back off a bit and smell the coffee.
I remember my father, among many others, saying that if he had it to do over again, he wouldn’t have retired at 65. “Silent Dick,” as they called him, had his routine every weekday. Get up at 5 a.m., have boiled coffee, go out the door, get in the big old Lincoln Continental, stop for breakfast at a greasy spoon somewhere and then get to the job.
Since he was an electrician, he worked all over the place, sometimes at Donner-Hanna Furnace, sometimes at Children’s Hospital. It depended on where the union assigned him. He’d buzz home at 4 p.m., take a shower in the basement.(The shower actually was a garden hose hooked up to the hot water spigot and the nozzle was held in place with a piece of wood nailed to the ceiling.) "Hockey puck hamburgers" and whole potatoes boiled for three hours were served at 4:30. From 5 to 9 p.m., he parked himself in front of the tube, sometimes drinking a 16-ounce World’s Fair glass of wine and chowing a bag of chocolate chip cookies as an evening snack. Then it was off to a gaseous night in the crib. And he loved it. He told me when he retired about what a bad decision it was. I think many people feel that way.
So be careful what you wish for, folks. This joblessness isn’t all it’s cranked up to be. I’m only 52, so there are many more productive years ahead (although Judy loves coming home to a hot cooked meal and a sparkling clean house).
Tomorrow, I’ll be headed to D’Youville for a few hours to get more information on the Masters in Education Program. Maybe some of those employers will even call.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Life's biggest challenge
April 13, 2009
A belated Happy Easter to all. It will be a topsy-turvy year for many of us. So let’s bring the joy and euphoria of a new beginning to all our ventures in every season.
That said, I now know I am in for the biggest challenge of my life. I picked up a review book for the Liberal Arts and Sciences Test I am scheduled to take in August. I figured I’d sample a few of the math and science questions to see where I stood in terms of time needed to prepare for the exam. I looked at the first few questions. They didn’t seem to be written in any language I could understand. Uh-oh. What followed were a few moments of anxiety, angst and panic. Then I sat down and put in two solid hours of trying to begin studying for this beast.
Now I know what I’m doing for the next four weeks until classes begin at D’Youville. I’ll be spending a minimum of two hours a day with my standardized test workbook.
“Why did I do this to myself?,” I wondered.
“Because you were bored to tears and not enjoying what you were doing,” I answered myself.
“It’s like going from a couch potato to an Olympic athlete in a year,” added my wife, Judy. (She’s so smart.)
And so it is.
It was mostly business today, signing up for unemployment benefits, sending off a couple of resumes for jobs, getting an encouraging e-mail about one possible part-time job teaching an SAT prep class, getting some housework in on the side, and doing the aforementioned dance with the test preparation guide.
As always the motto is: Stay focused. Live one day at a time. Do what you need to do that day.
What a difference this is from my staid, predictable life of a month ago.
“I’m very surprised that I haven’t felt a sense of euphoria about being out of The News,” I told Judy. “I really thought I’d be jumping around and doing handstands. Instead, it’s been very melancholy, a very tenuous time.”
The smell of fear is clearly in the air -- fear of failure, fear of not meeting other’s expectations. Fear is very bad. It saps the life force. I needn’t quote Franklin Delano Roosevelt here, but it’s true: There is nothing to fear but fear itself.
Fear is the opposite of love. All the self-help gurus caution against falling into the fear trap. Perhaps daily meditation will provide an antidote to foul fear.
Author David Hawkins states in “Power Versus Force”:
“In the process of examining our everyday lives we can find that all our fears have been based on falsehood. The displacement of the false by the true is the essence of the healing of all things visible and invisible.”
If you’ll excuse me now, I have to get back to my review book.
A belated Happy Easter to all. It will be a topsy-turvy year for many of us. So let’s bring the joy and euphoria of a new beginning to all our ventures in every season.
That said, I now know I am in for the biggest challenge of my life. I picked up a review book for the Liberal Arts and Sciences Test I am scheduled to take in August. I figured I’d sample a few of the math and science questions to see where I stood in terms of time needed to prepare for the exam. I looked at the first few questions. They didn’t seem to be written in any language I could understand. Uh-oh. What followed were a few moments of anxiety, angst and panic. Then I sat down and put in two solid hours of trying to begin studying for this beast.
Now I know what I’m doing for the next four weeks until classes begin at D’Youville. I’ll be spending a minimum of two hours a day with my standardized test workbook.
“Why did I do this to myself?,” I wondered.
“Because you were bored to tears and not enjoying what you were doing,” I answered myself.
“It’s like going from a couch potato to an Olympic athlete in a year,” added my wife, Judy. (She’s so smart.)
And so it is.
It was mostly business today, signing up for unemployment benefits, sending off a couple of resumes for jobs, getting an encouraging e-mail about one possible part-time job teaching an SAT prep class, getting some housework in on the side, and doing the aforementioned dance with the test preparation guide.
As always the motto is: Stay focused. Live one day at a time. Do what you need to do that day.
What a difference this is from my staid, predictable life of a month ago.
“I’m very surprised that I haven’t felt a sense of euphoria about being out of The News,” I told Judy. “I really thought I’d be jumping around and doing handstands. Instead, it’s been very melancholy, a very tenuous time.”
The smell of fear is clearly in the air -- fear of failure, fear of not meeting other’s expectations. Fear is very bad. It saps the life force. I needn’t quote Franklin Delano Roosevelt here, but it’s true: There is nothing to fear but fear itself.
Fear is the opposite of love. All the self-help gurus caution against falling into the fear trap. Perhaps daily meditation will provide an antidote to foul fear.
Author David Hawkins states in “Power Versus Force”:
“In the process of examining our everyday lives we can find that all our fears have been based on falsehood. The displacement of the false by the true is the essence of the healing of all things visible and invisible.”
If you’ll excuse me now, I have to get back to my review book.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Looking into the crystal ball
April 11, 2009
And so it was that I was able to enjoy a beautiful spring day in Buffalo, to focus on the sunshine, the company of my family and the freedom to dream of the future.
Where will I be two years from now?
I believe we will still be living in suburban Buffalo, in our same home of the past 21 years. We will still have our little cottage on the Vukote Canal and enjoy the company of all of our friends and the splendor of Chautauqua Lake.
As for myself, I see myself in front of the classroom in a college environment, but I can’t tell if it’s a junior college or a university setting. Writing is still a vocation and I will be employed by several Web sites to blog and edit. I will have plenty of personal freedom, to come and go as I please for the workday, as long as I’m in my appointed classes on time, of course.
Judy and I will be very happy, maybe even grandparents. All three children will be gainfully employed and living in various parts of the country, so we will have places to visit and explore.
From the tumultuous year that is to come will blossom great opportunity and enjoyment. I have come to believe in the past 10 days that a higher power drove my decision to leave The News. There is a great and noble calling waiting for me. When is comes, I will be ready.
That is my future, as I see it today, but I know the road there won’t be an easy one.
(When all is said and done, I knew what my future at the newspaper held: I’d be assigned to a desk and computer for another 10 years producing word widgets -- “hanging on,” as they say -- if the print product survives that long.)
I’m hoping that yesterday was the “tipping point” where I put any regrets about leaving The News behind me and make my way boldly into the future.
Son James had a piece of advice for me that I recalled today: Every day, you should challenge yourself to do something out of your comfort zone. (That kid has come a long way during his three years at John Carroll University.) That includes anything from listening to some different music to visiting a museum that you’ve never seen before. Or maybe just getting up two hours earlier than normal.
How many people do that? Not very many. Most of us rise at the same time, eat the same breakfast, drive the same route to work, sit at the same desk, do the same work, eat with the same people, listen to the same radio stations and watch the same idiot box every night, then we turn in at the same appointed hour.
The blessed wife also counseled that we didn’t have much change in our first 32 years together, but because we, and most people we know, are aging, there is bound to be waves of changes during the next 32 years. So you might as well get into the “change groove.”
By the summer of 2010, I will be the guru of change.
And so it was that I was able to enjoy a beautiful spring day in Buffalo, to focus on the sunshine, the company of my family and the freedom to dream of the future.
Where will I be two years from now?
I believe we will still be living in suburban Buffalo, in our same home of the past 21 years. We will still have our little cottage on the Vukote Canal and enjoy the company of all of our friends and the splendor of Chautauqua Lake.
As for myself, I see myself in front of the classroom in a college environment, but I can’t tell if it’s a junior college or a university setting. Writing is still a vocation and I will be employed by several Web sites to blog and edit. I will have plenty of personal freedom, to come and go as I please for the workday, as long as I’m in my appointed classes on time, of course.
Judy and I will be very happy, maybe even grandparents. All three children will be gainfully employed and living in various parts of the country, so we will have places to visit and explore.
From the tumultuous year that is to come will blossom great opportunity and enjoyment. I have come to believe in the past 10 days that a higher power drove my decision to leave The News. There is a great and noble calling waiting for me. When is comes, I will be ready.
That is my future, as I see it today, but I know the road there won’t be an easy one.
(When all is said and done, I knew what my future at the newspaper held: I’d be assigned to a desk and computer for another 10 years producing word widgets -- “hanging on,” as they say -- if the print product survives that long.)
I’m hoping that yesterday was the “tipping point” where I put any regrets about leaving The News behind me and make my way boldly into the future.
Son James had a piece of advice for me that I recalled today: Every day, you should challenge yourself to do something out of your comfort zone. (That kid has come a long way during his three years at John Carroll University.) That includes anything from listening to some different music to visiting a museum that you’ve never seen before. Or maybe just getting up two hours earlier than normal.
How many people do that? Not very many. Most of us rise at the same time, eat the same breakfast, drive the same route to work, sit at the same desk, do the same work, eat with the same people, listen to the same radio stations and watch the same idiot box every night, then we turn in at the same appointed hour.
The blessed wife also counseled that we didn’t have much change in our first 32 years together, but because we, and most people we know, are aging, there is bound to be waves of changes during the next 32 years. So you might as well get into the “change groove.”
By the summer of 2010, I will be the guru of change.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Mr. Overanalysis
April 10, 2009
Most of the people out there (including the blessed wife) don’t want to read any negativity about this journey I’m embarking on, but like any voyage across the ocean of life, there are going to be good days and bad days. You’re going to have clear sailing at some points and at other times storms will be roiling.
Today was a rather tempestuous day.
My guess is that I lost focus on what my mission is because my monkey (and money) mind kept leaping into the future, casting preposterous scenes of dire fiscal collapse, not of the country, but of the family. I saw us scraping to make the property tax payments in a year. Groceries becoming scarce. The Repo Man coming for the Saturn Vue. People dying and leaving me with no health insurance. I even had a dream last night of people I know from The News (my former employer) on a train that was leaving the station. Note to self: Don’t take melatonin before bed as a sleeping aid because it gives you savagely crazy dreams.
I met my spouse at the door when she came home from one of her two jobs and laid the poverty trip on her. After a grimace of disbelief and a stern warning to get my act together, she advised: “You made this leap of faith, now hold on to the faith.”
College-age son, while sympathizing with my concerns, opined: “You overanalyze everything. You overthink stuff. How about stopping at A-Plus for a twelve pack?”
Eldest daughter added via e-mail, in regards to my reluctance to share this down and dirty day: “Changing careers at 52 is NOT an easy task – anyone knows that. So, if you’re writing a real-life account you need to include some not-so-perfect information as well.”
So most of the past 24 hours was spent dwelling on a future that isn’t here, and probably won’t be in any form that I imagined today. Just chalk it up to a crappy day.
The forlorn feeling was magnified by a neighbor who stopped to chat this afternoon as I was struggling to fill a 15-year-old blue plastic Bills football with air using a pump that plugs into a car’s cigarette lighter. Cords were twisting. The pump refused to work at first and then, after filling the ball, I pulled the pin and the orb promptly deflated. That’s how the day went. Anyway, the kind neighbor, who is my age, exploded in disbelief when he heard I took a minuscule buyout and bolted from the city’s respected newspaper.
“You’re retired, that’s great,” he said. “More time to sit around and drink beer.”
I started to explain that I was not retiring, but re-training and returning to the halls of academia, but he was having none of that. “Nothing but the good life now,” he said. “All beer, all day.”
Then he clinched the conversation by saying he just got a nice raise while more than 100 of his company’s warehouse workers in Jamestown, N.Y., got their walking papers this week.
“Goodbye, Al,” I said, and tossed the flattened football I was trying to inflate in the garage trash can before trudging into the house.
At least my family came to my rescue. I seem to be again on point – this is going to be a great, transforming adventure that few people in my position have the cohones to take.
One day at a time, bro. One day at a time.
Most of the people out there (including the blessed wife) don’t want to read any negativity about this journey I’m embarking on, but like any voyage across the ocean of life, there are going to be good days and bad days. You’re going to have clear sailing at some points and at other times storms will be roiling.
Today was a rather tempestuous day.
My guess is that I lost focus on what my mission is because my monkey (and money) mind kept leaping into the future, casting preposterous scenes of dire fiscal collapse, not of the country, but of the family. I saw us scraping to make the property tax payments in a year. Groceries becoming scarce. The Repo Man coming for the Saturn Vue. People dying and leaving me with no health insurance. I even had a dream last night of people I know from The News (my former employer) on a train that was leaving the station. Note to self: Don’t take melatonin before bed as a sleeping aid because it gives you savagely crazy dreams.
I met my spouse at the door when she came home from one of her two jobs and laid the poverty trip on her. After a grimace of disbelief and a stern warning to get my act together, she advised: “You made this leap of faith, now hold on to the faith.”
College-age son, while sympathizing with my concerns, opined: “You overanalyze everything. You overthink stuff. How about stopping at A-Plus for a twelve pack?”
Eldest daughter added via e-mail, in regards to my reluctance to share this down and dirty day: “Changing careers at 52 is NOT an easy task – anyone knows that. So, if you’re writing a real-life account you need to include some not-so-perfect information as well.”
So most of the past 24 hours was spent dwelling on a future that isn’t here, and probably won’t be in any form that I imagined today. Just chalk it up to a crappy day.
The forlorn feeling was magnified by a neighbor who stopped to chat this afternoon as I was struggling to fill a 15-year-old blue plastic Bills football with air using a pump that plugs into a car’s cigarette lighter. Cords were twisting. The pump refused to work at first and then, after filling the ball, I pulled the pin and the orb promptly deflated. That’s how the day went. Anyway, the kind neighbor, who is my age, exploded in disbelief when he heard I took a minuscule buyout and bolted from the city’s respected newspaper.
“You’re retired, that’s great,” he said. “More time to sit around and drink beer.”
I started to explain that I was not retiring, but re-training and returning to the halls of academia, but he was having none of that. “Nothing but the good life now,” he said. “All beer, all day.”
Then he clinched the conversation by saying he just got a nice raise while more than 100 of his company’s warehouse workers in Jamestown, N.Y., got their walking papers this week.
“Goodbye, Al,” I said, and tossed the flattened football I was trying to inflate in the garage trash can before trudging into the house.
At least my family came to my rescue. I seem to be again on point – this is going to be a great, transforming adventure that few people in my position have the cohones to take.
One day at a time, bro. One day at a time.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Is 50 the new 30?
April 9, 2009
Dear Followers: Son James is home from college, so I’ve had to take a break from the seriousness of the situation to have a few cool ones, sit in the hot tub and watch some college and pro hockey. Life can’t be all stress, can it? All work and no play makes Jack an unhappy boy, or something like that.
Anyway, I’ve been chipping away, trying to keep myself busy with reading (to prepare for the large volume of bookwork coming this summer), finishing a travel story from our incredible desert adventure last month and sending out some resumes for part-time instructor jobs. We’ll see what happens.
I just hope that the old bugaboo of ageism doesn’t rear its ugly head in my quest for a new career.
I don’t think it will, but someone in the house left an article from the local weekly newspaper on the table entitled, “Is 50 the new 30?” It goes on to say that many people over the age of 50 who find themselves disenfranchised come off as a bunch of lazy, whiny goons. Now where would the writer (whose picture makes her look like someone approaching the five decade range) get that idea? To her credit, she does go on to say that now is the time to “re-invent yourself.”
The writer, Joan Graci, says we over-50 job-seekers should identify our core strengths (check), get the skills you need (working on it), go back to school (check), identify employers who need your skills (schools – secondary and college) and show them what you’re made of (still to come). So, based on that article, I’m not doing too bad.
I would think that in academia, an energetic middle-age instructor would be a highly valued commodity. Not only does that person have book knowledge, but has rich and deep life experience to relate to students. We’ll see if that holds true around this time next year.
Most important for me right now is to keep in mind: One step at a time, one day at a time. If you let your mind race to the future, the whole scenario can get overwhelming. Just know that what needs to be done today is relatively simple.
Another subject I need to tackle is this: I’m tired of hearing working people say, “I’m trying to hang on for (fill in the number of years)."
That’s why I’m where I am today -- unemployed and trying to get back into the academic way of life. I decided after much soul searching earlier this year that I don’t want to just “hang on.” I want to do something that is rewarding and challenging. If it helps other people, especially younger ones, in a meaningful way, that’s a great bonus. A paycheck would help, too.
So my advice to the American worker is this: Stop hanging on, start making a difference. It’s much harder to leave that comfort zone and jettison the guaranteed paycheck, but in the long run, it will be well worth your while. America would be better off if people stopped "just hanging on."
Ciao.
Dear Followers: Son James is home from college, so I’ve had to take a break from the seriousness of the situation to have a few cool ones, sit in the hot tub and watch some college and pro hockey. Life can’t be all stress, can it? All work and no play makes Jack an unhappy boy, or something like that.
Anyway, I’ve been chipping away, trying to keep myself busy with reading (to prepare for the large volume of bookwork coming this summer), finishing a travel story from our incredible desert adventure last month and sending out some resumes for part-time instructor jobs. We’ll see what happens.
I just hope that the old bugaboo of ageism doesn’t rear its ugly head in my quest for a new career.
I don’t think it will, but someone in the house left an article from the local weekly newspaper on the table entitled, “Is 50 the new 30?” It goes on to say that many people over the age of 50 who find themselves disenfranchised come off as a bunch of lazy, whiny goons. Now where would the writer (whose picture makes her look like someone approaching the five decade range) get that idea? To her credit, she does go on to say that now is the time to “re-invent yourself.”
The writer, Joan Graci, says we over-50 job-seekers should identify our core strengths (check), get the skills you need (working on it), go back to school (check), identify employers who need your skills (schools – secondary and college) and show them what you’re made of (still to come). So, based on that article, I’m not doing too bad.
I would think that in academia, an energetic middle-age instructor would be a highly valued commodity. Not only does that person have book knowledge, but has rich and deep life experience to relate to students. We’ll see if that holds true around this time next year.
Most important for me right now is to keep in mind: One step at a time, one day at a time. If you let your mind race to the future, the whole scenario can get overwhelming. Just know that what needs to be done today is relatively simple.
Another subject I need to tackle is this: I’m tired of hearing working people say, “I’m trying to hang on for (fill in the number of years)."
That’s why I’m where I am today -- unemployed and trying to get back into the academic way of life. I decided after much soul searching earlier this year that I don’t want to just “hang on.” I want to do something that is rewarding and challenging. If it helps other people, especially younger ones, in a meaningful way, that’s a great bonus. A paycheck would help, too.
So my advice to the American worker is this: Stop hanging on, start making a difference. It’s much harder to leave that comfort zone and jettison the guaranteed paycheck, but in the long run, it will be well worth your while. America would be better off if people stopped "just hanging on."
Ciao.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
School days
April 7, 2009
Going back to school is like learning to walk or ride a bike again.
I’m going back to visit my alma mater, Bishop Timon-St. Jude, tomorrow to talk with the administration about substitute teaching. I am excited at the prospect of walking the halls again. I haven’t been back to the South Buffalo school since my 20th class reunion in 1994. We spent much of that night recalling our glory days and having a few cool ones on the rooftop retreat once occupied by the school’s many Friars.
I told Judy (blessed wife) excitedly that I get to put my Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes out tonight so I can slip them on in the morning. This could be the start of something good. I’ve always felt an affinity for Timon, probably because my brother has taught there for 43 years. I believe there has been a Stanley in Timon since 1958 (more than 50 years!) when my oldest brother walked in as a freshman. My other brother followed him, and then I came along as well. In the meantime, Jim started teaching there in 1966. When he retires in a year or two, as he says he will, I might be destined to walk to the front of the class as a teacher, keeping the Stanley string alive at Timon for another 15 years. How crazy is that?
I also started browsing through practice tests for some standardized competency exams I’ll have to take in the coming year. It takes a while to get your brain back in analysis mode. Did I ever think I’d be hitting the books again? Well, yes. I’ve had that thought for years now, especially watching my wife and kids enjoying their academic pursuits – for the most part.
Studying is actually fun. It's certainly different from what I’ve been doing. I know I will enjoy walking the hallowed halls of academia again. It’ll be good to be around mostly younger people again. It should get the creative juices flowing. You betcha. You are as you think, so it won’t hurt to be around people 20 to 30 years my junior. Maybe my hair will start to grow back? Who needs Rogaine?
I’ve learned so much in the past couple of weeks, including how to take classes on the Internet, registering for classes on the Web and blogging. Now this is what life and learning is about. I have a lot to catch up on. With no offense to Geico, I feel like a cave man re-emerging into the modern world.
I’m pretty sure it was Ray Davies and the Kinks who sang: School days/are the happiest days/though they seem/so far away.
No longer, my friends, no longer.
Going back to school is like learning to walk or ride a bike again.
I’m going back to visit my alma mater, Bishop Timon-St. Jude, tomorrow to talk with the administration about substitute teaching. I am excited at the prospect of walking the halls again. I haven’t been back to the South Buffalo school since my 20th class reunion in 1994. We spent much of that night recalling our glory days and having a few cool ones on the rooftop retreat once occupied by the school’s many Friars.
I told Judy (blessed wife) excitedly that I get to put my Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes out tonight so I can slip them on in the morning. This could be the start of something good. I’ve always felt an affinity for Timon, probably because my brother has taught there for 43 years. I believe there has been a Stanley in Timon since 1958 (more than 50 years!) when my oldest brother walked in as a freshman. My other brother followed him, and then I came along as well. In the meantime, Jim started teaching there in 1966. When he retires in a year or two, as he says he will, I might be destined to walk to the front of the class as a teacher, keeping the Stanley string alive at Timon for another 15 years. How crazy is that?
I also started browsing through practice tests for some standardized competency exams I’ll have to take in the coming year. It takes a while to get your brain back in analysis mode. Did I ever think I’d be hitting the books again? Well, yes. I’ve had that thought for years now, especially watching my wife and kids enjoying their academic pursuits – for the most part.
Studying is actually fun. It's certainly different from what I’ve been doing. I know I will enjoy walking the hallowed halls of academia again. It’ll be good to be around mostly younger people again. It should get the creative juices flowing. You betcha. You are as you think, so it won’t hurt to be around people 20 to 30 years my junior. Maybe my hair will start to grow back? Who needs Rogaine?
I’ve learned so much in the past couple of weeks, including how to take classes on the Internet, registering for classes on the Web and blogging. Now this is what life and learning is about. I have a lot to catch up on. With no offense to Geico, I feel like a cave man re-emerging into the modern world.
I’m pretty sure it was Ray Davies and the Kinks who sang: School days/are the happiest days/though they seem/so far away.
No longer, my friends, no longer.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Just like Mom
April 6, 2009
It’s taking some getting used to, this working out of the home. I know I had dreamed recently of this being the perfect situation, but it is taking time to get accustomed to it. After all, I spent 31 years being like Fred Flintstone, carrying my brown bag off to work in the morning, hoisting words at the paragraph factory and then waiting for the 6 o’clock whistle to sound to return to the homestead.
Weirdly, I thought of my mother as I was making myself a cup of tea and looking out into the yard while I was taking a break from writing a travel story. Here I was all alone, except for the cat, writing, doing a little housecleaning and firing off a resume or two.
I remember my mother always being at home. We only had one car and, of course, my father took that to work. Mom didn’t know how to drive anyway. This was the 1960s. So for most of her life, Mom spent her days in near-isolation on Kelsey Drive in West Seneca. I don’t think she had many friends in the neighborhood. She liked to talk with her sisters on the telephone, but she was mostly limited to conversations with just one sister who lived in the Buffalo area. In the ‘60s, telephone calls to Olean, where her other sisters and her mother lived, required long-distance service and charges.
I never heard Mom complain about staying home. I know she walked to many places, like Gill’s delicatessen, the dentist’s office and she did some substitute teaching at St. Bonaventure Elementary School. But for the most part, she cleaned, cooked, read her books, recited the rosary and waited for Dad to come home at 4 p.m.
As I stood gazing out the kitchen window at the April drizzle which was morphing into snowflakes, I wondered if Mom was watching me, saying, “Like Mother, Like Son.”
I’m keeping myself busy writing and carrying out the flotsam of duties that have to be done before I start school next month. I find it’s important to keep the mind engaged, so as not to dwell on the task-filled future. In my daily reading of Wayne Dyer’s “Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life,” he states: “All we ever get is right now – that’s it. So we must avoid the inclination to magnify tiny events or worry about a future that may never arrive.”
Later, Dyer writes, “After all, how do you pursue a difficult course of study that will take several years to complete? By not projecting yourself into the future or using your present moments to worry.”
Whenever I have doubts about my course of action to leave the 9-to-5 world and delve into school, I think about the unanimous support I am receiving from all the members of my family and all my friends. With so many people providing me with love and energy, how can I not succeed?
It’s taking some getting used to, this working out of the home. I know I had dreamed recently of this being the perfect situation, but it is taking time to get accustomed to it. After all, I spent 31 years being like Fred Flintstone, carrying my brown bag off to work in the morning, hoisting words at the paragraph factory and then waiting for the 6 o’clock whistle to sound to return to the homestead.
Weirdly, I thought of my mother as I was making myself a cup of tea and looking out into the yard while I was taking a break from writing a travel story. Here I was all alone, except for the cat, writing, doing a little housecleaning and firing off a resume or two.
I remember my mother always being at home. We only had one car and, of course, my father took that to work. Mom didn’t know how to drive anyway. This was the 1960s. So for most of her life, Mom spent her days in near-isolation on Kelsey Drive in West Seneca. I don’t think she had many friends in the neighborhood. She liked to talk with her sisters on the telephone, but she was mostly limited to conversations with just one sister who lived in the Buffalo area. In the ‘60s, telephone calls to Olean, where her other sisters and her mother lived, required long-distance service and charges.
I never heard Mom complain about staying home. I know she walked to many places, like Gill’s delicatessen, the dentist’s office and she did some substitute teaching at St. Bonaventure Elementary School. But for the most part, she cleaned, cooked, read her books, recited the rosary and waited for Dad to come home at 4 p.m.
As I stood gazing out the kitchen window at the April drizzle which was morphing into snowflakes, I wondered if Mom was watching me, saying, “Like Mother, Like Son.”
I’m keeping myself busy writing and carrying out the flotsam of duties that have to be done before I start school next month. I find it’s important to keep the mind engaged, so as not to dwell on the task-filled future. In my daily reading of Wayne Dyer’s “Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life,” he states: “All we ever get is right now – that’s it. So we must avoid the inclination to magnify tiny events or worry about a future that may never arrive.”
Later, Dyer writes, “After all, how do you pursue a difficult course of study that will take several years to complete? By not projecting yourself into the future or using your present moments to worry.”
Whenever I have doubts about my course of action to leave the 9-to-5 world and delve into school, I think about the unanimous support I am receiving from all the members of my family and all my friends. With so many people providing me with love and energy, how can I not succeed?
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Year of transition
April 5, 2009
We just spent a weekend at our home away from home – Chautauqua Lake. The one thing that really impressed itself on me during the visit was what a year of change this will be.
There will be three weddings this summer, including our beautiful daughter Jill and her fiancé Colin, and the two children of our good friends, the Andersons. The world seems to be spinning by at an incredible speed with change being the only constant.
Add to the weddings the fact that Jill will be graduating from grad school, James will be a senior in college, Rachel will be headed to Abu Dhabi on another excursion in her global trek and I will be attending grad school in a fresh environment. My wife Judy continues to shoulder incredible burdens at home and at work and does so willingly. On a bigger scale, the country will need to emerge from its economic funk if we are to survive as the United States of America. This calendar year must see an upturn in our economic fortunes.
It will quite the year – 2009.
I was flattered to hear from friends that I am a fabulous role model for my children and those young people I will be attending school with this year. I never think of it that way. Sometimes I think I am a complete kook, having given up a good-paying, stable job to leap into an uncertain future in a new career at age 52.
Our neighbor and confidante, Barb, says I represent what is good about the Baby Boom generation – the generation that at one time seemed to embrace the alternative, the non-material approach to life before it immersed itself in greed and thievery. I shared with her that I have stolen the phrase of author Wayne Dyer as my motto for the next 15 years: How may I serve.
If I end up teaching at a Catholic high school, that will be an honor. If I end up teaching lower socio-economic students at a community college, that will be fine. If I end up being a househusband, then I will fill that role happily.
All I know is that my soul needed a change, and in this year of change I have decided to go for it. My goal now is to keep myself involved, to write and write some more since that seems to be my calling, to keep focused on my schooling and not to be afraid to walk bravely into the unknown.
I see my 22-year-old daughter going undaunted into the unknown as she enters the last rigorous semester of her schooling, preparing to marry and possibly relocate hundreds of miles from her family. How much more change can one person take in less than a year? Now that to me is being a role model.
If I had a prayer for this coming year is would be – Lord, give me courage to stay on this path and see what good and grace I can bring into the world. Amen.
Note to readers: I woke up this morning on Vukote Road and looked at the bedside clock. Yep, it was 7:52.
We just spent a weekend at our home away from home – Chautauqua Lake. The one thing that really impressed itself on me during the visit was what a year of change this will be.
There will be three weddings this summer, including our beautiful daughter Jill and her fiancé Colin, and the two children of our good friends, the Andersons. The world seems to be spinning by at an incredible speed with change being the only constant.
Add to the weddings the fact that Jill will be graduating from grad school, James will be a senior in college, Rachel will be headed to Abu Dhabi on another excursion in her global trek and I will be attending grad school in a fresh environment. My wife Judy continues to shoulder incredible burdens at home and at work and does so willingly. On a bigger scale, the country will need to emerge from its economic funk if we are to survive as the United States of America. This calendar year must see an upturn in our economic fortunes.
It will quite the year – 2009.
I was flattered to hear from friends that I am a fabulous role model for my children and those young people I will be attending school with this year. I never think of it that way. Sometimes I think I am a complete kook, having given up a good-paying, stable job to leap into an uncertain future in a new career at age 52.
Our neighbor and confidante, Barb, says I represent what is good about the Baby Boom generation – the generation that at one time seemed to embrace the alternative, the non-material approach to life before it immersed itself in greed and thievery. I shared with her that I have stolen the phrase of author Wayne Dyer as my motto for the next 15 years: How may I serve.
If I end up teaching at a Catholic high school, that will be an honor. If I end up teaching lower socio-economic students at a community college, that will be fine. If I end up being a househusband, then I will fill that role happily.
All I know is that my soul needed a change, and in this year of change I have decided to go for it. My goal now is to keep myself involved, to write and write some more since that seems to be my calling, to keep focused on my schooling and not to be afraid to walk bravely into the unknown.
I see my 22-year-old daughter going undaunted into the unknown as she enters the last rigorous semester of her schooling, preparing to marry and possibly relocate hundreds of miles from her family. How much more change can one person take in less than a year? Now that to me is being a role model.
If I had a prayer for this coming year is would be – Lord, give me courage to stay on this path and see what good and grace I can bring into the world. Amen.
Note to readers: I woke up this morning on Vukote Road and looked at the bedside clock. Yep, it was 7:52.
Friday, April 3, 2009
New guy on campus
April 3, 2009
It felt pretty good this morning, parking the car on Columbus Avenue and strolling through the rain onto the campus of D’Youville College, knowing that I was to become part of it. I looked down Niagara Street into downtown Buffalo and the business district and thought I won’t miss being part of that scene for the next year or so.
I had to go into the undergraduate dormitory to get to the Health Office for a meningitis waiver and passed bleary-eyed students heading out to their 9 a.m. classes. I made my way to advisement where I got me list of courses to begin my master’s degree. I felt definite exhilaration working with the advisor to get my class schedule set up and devised an ambitious plan to complete my degree in one calendar year.
I’m ready to rock ‘n’ roll - whatever it takes, I will do.
My initial feeling is that this is going to be a lot of hard work, an intense year, but a lot of fun. I can feel the synapses in my brain firing again after years of boredom and inactivity. It’s pretty amazing how we get into ruts and never know it.
Cleaning out some files at the end of the day, I had to laugh because I’d been looking for another job for years. There were resumes, cover letters and “notes to self” spanning 15 years. I knew I wasn’t especially thrilled with my employment at the newspaper, but I never knew it went back so far in my career there. Brain. Dead.
So it was with enthusiasm that I mixed with the young students, watching as they studied, delivered papers under professors’ doors and sat in groups chatting. This is my new world – the world of academia. It seemed oddly calm and civilized. Nobody has had big sniff of the almighty dollar yet, so they’re not half-crazed. Hopefully, they will be able to keep their heads in the right place, unlike the Boomer generation, of which I am a part, which has really turned out to be largely – in the words of the late, great Hunter S. Thompson – a generation of swine.
I definitely sensed a spirit of renewal as I marched around the small, urban campus where, coincidentally my wife and mentor also works. Tee-hee! Who knows, maybe I’ll end up with a job at D’Youville also.
It felt pretty good this morning, parking the car on Columbus Avenue and strolling through the rain onto the campus of D’Youville College, knowing that I was to become part of it. I looked down Niagara Street into downtown Buffalo and the business district and thought I won’t miss being part of that scene for the next year or so.
I had to go into the undergraduate dormitory to get to the Health Office for a meningitis waiver and passed bleary-eyed students heading out to their 9 a.m. classes. I made my way to advisement where I got me list of courses to begin my master’s degree. I felt definite exhilaration working with the advisor to get my class schedule set up and devised an ambitious plan to complete my degree in one calendar year.
I’m ready to rock ‘n’ roll - whatever it takes, I will do.
My initial feeling is that this is going to be a lot of hard work, an intense year, but a lot of fun. I can feel the synapses in my brain firing again after years of boredom and inactivity. It’s pretty amazing how we get into ruts and never know it.
Cleaning out some files at the end of the day, I had to laugh because I’d been looking for another job for years. There were resumes, cover letters and “notes to self” spanning 15 years. I knew I wasn’t especially thrilled with my employment at the newspaper, but I never knew it went back so far in my career there. Brain. Dead.
So it was with enthusiasm that I mixed with the young students, watching as they studied, delivered papers under professors’ doors and sat in groups chatting. This is my new world – the world of academia. It seemed oddly calm and civilized. Nobody has had big sniff of the almighty dollar yet, so they’re not half-crazed. Hopefully, they will be able to keep their heads in the right place, unlike the Boomer generation, of which I am a part, which has really turned out to be largely – in the words of the late, great Hunter S. Thompson – a generation of swine.
I definitely sensed a spirit of renewal as I marched around the small, urban campus where, coincidentally my wife and mentor also works. Tee-hee! Who knows, maybe I’ll end up with a job at D’Youville also.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
A matter of faith
I’m getting ready to head for my advisement meeting tomorrow at D’Youville College for the master’s in education program. This marks my formal re-entrance into academia. I have a course catalog, notes written to myself to ask the proper questions and my trusty notebook at hand. Soon they will be stuffed in the green backpack for the trip in the morning. I have some butterflies in my stomach. It’s been 31 years since I snagged my diploma at Syracuse University.
Earlier today I went to the Newspaper Guild office in the historic Larkin Building to attend a seminar on navigating the unemployment insurance process. It sounds like a relatively easy procedure, but it’ll be a weekly event to register and report any income. Big Brother likes to keep tabs on you when he’s doling out your tax money.
It made for a day that was anxious at times as I start down this road. There are so many uncertainties, but that’s what makes journeys interesting. I keep thinking of the advice I received from our neighbor in Chautauqua who advised me on “taking this leap of faith.”
“There’s something great out there waiting for you. You just can’t see it right now,” she told me several weeks before I took the buyout from my employer in order to pursue my education and devote the rest of my life to teaching – and learning.
It really is a matter of faith. I believe I will be successful at this, regardless of how daunting a task it seems as I write this on a mild April evening in Buffalo. Keep the faith. Remain positive. Take one day at a time. That really is the key: to refrain from looking ahead too far. Just handle the task at hand.
Self-help author Wayne Dyer would probably tell me to believe in abundance, and that the universe will provide what I need when it is needed.
So be it.
Earlier today I went to the Newspaper Guild office in the historic Larkin Building to attend a seminar on navigating the unemployment insurance process. It sounds like a relatively easy procedure, but it’ll be a weekly event to register and report any income. Big Brother likes to keep tabs on you when he’s doling out your tax money.
It made for a day that was anxious at times as I start down this road. There are so many uncertainties, but that’s what makes journeys interesting. I keep thinking of the advice I received from our neighbor in Chautauqua who advised me on “taking this leap of faith.”
“There’s something great out there waiting for you. You just can’t see it right now,” she told me several weeks before I took the buyout from my employer in order to pursue my education and devote the rest of my life to teaching – and learning.
It really is a matter of faith. I believe I will be successful at this, regardless of how daunting a task it seems as I write this on a mild April evening in Buffalo. Keep the faith. Remain positive. Take one day at a time. That really is the key: to refrain from looking ahead too far. Just handle the task at hand.
Self-help author Wayne Dyer would probably tell me to believe in abundance, and that the universe will provide what I need when it is needed.
So be it.
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
752
April 1, 2009
For the past decade or so, a puzzling phenomenon has been happening to me.
The number 752 keeps cropping up. Most mornings and evenings when I look at the clock, it says 7:52. When I’m on the treadmill or cross-trainer, I’ll look down and see on the timer – 7:52. At a hockey game, I'll look at the game clock and see 7:52. I’ve played the Pick Three Lotto with lucky 752 several times, but without success.
I’ve heard other people talk about seeing the same number all the time – 911 is a popular one, and in fact I do see that sequence quite often and it’s not in news accounts of the most famous terrorist event in history. They say 911 means to live for the moment. So what does 752 mean?
Especially in the last few years, I’ve been wondering about the significance of 752 in my life. I came to the conclusion that it had something to do with the seventh month of my 52nd year, like something momentous might happen to me. Since I was born in October of 1956, this month that we just entered – April of 2009 – happens to be the seventh month of my 52nd year. Sure enough, something major has occurred in my life. I’ve left a job that I worked at for more than two decades and have taken a new path in life.
I moribundly had been thinking for a while that maybe 752 signaled my demise, as in the appointed time for the grim reaper to come calling for me. There’s still 29 days to go for that, but I don’t think that’s what the number gods had in mind. I think it pointed to this as the time for a major life change.
As for today, it was calm and without much of the mental and emotional turmoil of the past couple of months. I busied myself tying up some loose ends, making some telephone calls to a couple of old friends, doing some housework and mostly trying to get my plans together for the coming 12 months.
I had to laugh when Judy called from D’Youville College, where she is a nursing professor, about 4:30 in the afternoon to say she’d be late for dinner. Here, I’d been slaving over a hot stove for an hour, fashioning some turkey balls out of egg, bread crumbs, milk and, of course, turkey meat to flavor the jarred pasta sauce and spaghetti. Mr. Domestic!
I told her, “Don’t worry, honey, I’ll keep the dinner warm." I actually enjoyed whipping up the evening grub. I think my calling may be as a househusband. A man slave.
Judy loved the dinner, by the way.
Tomorrow I’m headed to a seminar about filing for unemployment. That, in itself, is a new experience for me. (Do one new thing every day!) Today I tried filing for benefits but the state’s Department of Labor computer stated that the two days I’d worked this week made me ineligible. Try again Monday, the computer told me.
As a longtime breadwinner, I still had some minor anxiety about not shuffling off to work (what a bunch of robots we are!) at the appointed hour, and then I started thinking about paying bills a year from now. Ugh. I hope that ugly beast stops rearing its head.
Anyway, I’ve got to teach myself to enjoy these five weeks before school begins – to make it entertaining yet productive. Why not just relax? That’s difficult for a man who has been a worker bee for 31 years, gathering honey for the queen bee’s hive.
For the past decade or so, a puzzling phenomenon has been happening to me.
The number 752 keeps cropping up. Most mornings and evenings when I look at the clock, it says 7:52. When I’m on the treadmill or cross-trainer, I’ll look down and see on the timer – 7:52. At a hockey game, I'll look at the game clock and see 7:52. I’ve played the Pick Three Lotto with lucky 752 several times, but without success.
I’ve heard other people talk about seeing the same number all the time – 911 is a popular one, and in fact I do see that sequence quite often and it’s not in news accounts of the most famous terrorist event in history. They say 911 means to live for the moment. So what does 752 mean?
Especially in the last few years, I’ve been wondering about the significance of 752 in my life. I came to the conclusion that it had something to do with the seventh month of my 52nd year, like something momentous might happen to me. Since I was born in October of 1956, this month that we just entered – April of 2009 – happens to be the seventh month of my 52nd year. Sure enough, something major has occurred in my life. I’ve left a job that I worked at for more than two decades and have taken a new path in life.
I moribundly had been thinking for a while that maybe 752 signaled my demise, as in the appointed time for the grim reaper to come calling for me. There’s still 29 days to go for that, but I don’t think that’s what the number gods had in mind. I think it pointed to this as the time for a major life change.
As for today, it was calm and without much of the mental and emotional turmoil of the past couple of months. I busied myself tying up some loose ends, making some telephone calls to a couple of old friends, doing some housework and mostly trying to get my plans together for the coming 12 months.
I had to laugh when Judy called from D’Youville College, where she is a nursing professor, about 4:30 in the afternoon to say she’d be late for dinner. Here, I’d been slaving over a hot stove for an hour, fashioning some turkey balls out of egg, bread crumbs, milk and, of course, turkey meat to flavor the jarred pasta sauce and spaghetti. Mr. Domestic!
I told her, “Don’t worry, honey, I’ll keep the dinner warm." I actually enjoyed whipping up the evening grub. I think my calling may be as a househusband. A man slave.
Judy loved the dinner, by the way.
Tomorrow I’m headed to a seminar about filing for unemployment. That, in itself, is a new experience for me. (Do one new thing every day!) Today I tried filing for benefits but the state’s Department of Labor computer stated that the two days I’d worked this week made me ineligible. Try again Monday, the computer told me.
As a longtime breadwinner, I still had some minor anxiety about not shuffling off to work (what a bunch of robots we are!) at the appointed hour, and then I started thinking about paying bills a year from now. Ugh. I hope that ugly beast stops rearing its head.
Anyway, I’ve got to teach myself to enjoy these five weeks before school begins – to make it entertaining yet productive. Why not just relax? That’s difficult for a man who has been a worker bee for 31 years, gathering honey for the queen bee’s hive.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
One door closes, another opens
March 31, 2009
It’s been an amazing two weeks in my life.
Last week, under the guidance of our daughter Rachel, Judy (blessed wife) and I explored the wonders of Southern California: The beaches of Hermosa, the esplanade of Santa Monica, the boardwalk of Manhattan Beach, the splendor and natural power of Joshua Tree National Park in the high desert, the snow-capped mountains of San Jacinto State Park and the desert oasis of Palm Springs. We even experienced a 4.8 temblor as we slept one night.
Today, I experienced one of the most humbling and moving events of my life. As I walked out of the newsroom where I’ve labored for 24 years, carrying my green backpack as usual, most in the room of 100-plus reporters, editors and managers rose to give me a standing ovation. I paused to blow kisses, wave and give them my "Popeye victory pose" with hands clenched above my head. I managed to hold back the tears of appreciation until I reached the car in the parking lot.
I’ve always appreciated my colleagues and workmates, but if I’ve ever thought ill of them, all is forgiven. That standing ovation was a real honor, especially since I was trying to sneak out unnoticed at 1:30 in the afternoon. I guess I thought wrongly about my status in the newsroom – I always tried to keep a low profile, so I assumed most reporters and editors didn’t know me very well or what I did.
Earlier in the day, as I made my "goodbye tour"of the building, I heard no malice or wisecracks about jettisoning a good job. Everyone wished me well. Columnist Donn Esmonde said: “It’s a pretty big risk you’re taking, but three years from now, I’ll bet you’ll be saying it’s the best thing you ever did.”
My friend Vince in graphics said: “Rico, I’m in denial that you’re leaving.”
So I thank them all and appreciate the good years we had together producing a really good daily newspaper. (That said, management still has to take strides to improve morale in the building. That's my last bit of advice)
So I came home, and under sunny skies with a spring nip in the air, I raised a toast to myself and then to my deceased colleagues Jay and Irene who, although they don’t know it, were instrumental in my decision to leave my longtime job and pursue a second career. (Then again, maybe they do know it.)
In the morning, before I left for work, I picked up a note my wife had left on the kitchen table. It said, “What an amazing day it is. Love you.” To that, I added, “It’s spring, a time for new beginnings and fresh growth. It’s almost Easter, too, time for resurrection and new hope.”
Later, as I sat down in the sparsely populated second-floor lunchroom of The News to eat my last meal there, I opened my brown bag and between the ham-and-rye sandwich, two-week-old orange and chocolate cookies, there was another note: “Be aware. Be glad. Love you.”
What a fabulous wife – and life! I couldn’t have done this without her.
And with that day done, one door closes. Tomorrow, another one opens, hopefully with many wonderful adventures.
It’s been an amazing two weeks in my life.
Last week, under the guidance of our daughter Rachel, Judy (blessed wife) and I explored the wonders of Southern California: The beaches of Hermosa, the esplanade of Santa Monica, the boardwalk of Manhattan Beach, the splendor and natural power of Joshua Tree National Park in the high desert, the snow-capped mountains of San Jacinto State Park and the desert oasis of Palm Springs. We even experienced a 4.8 temblor as we slept one night.
Today, I experienced one of the most humbling and moving events of my life. As I walked out of the newsroom where I’ve labored for 24 years, carrying my green backpack as usual, most in the room of 100-plus reporters, editors and managers rose to give me a standing ovation. I paused to blow kisses, wave and give them my "Popeye victory pose" with hands clenched above my head. I managed to hold back the tears of appreciation until I reached the car in the parking lot.
I’ve always appreciated my colleagues and workmates, but if I’ve ever thought ill of them, all is forgiven. That standing ovation was a real honor, especially since I was trying to sneak out unnoticed at 1:30 in the afternoon. I guess I thought wrongly about my status in the newsroom – I always tried to keep a low profile, so I assumed most reporters and editors didn’t know me very well or what I did.
Earlier in the day, as I made my "goodbye tour"of the building, I heard no malice or wisecracks about jettisoning a good job. Everyone wished me well. Columnist Donn Esmonde said: “It’s a pretty big risk you’re taking, but three years from now, I’ll bet you’ll be saying it’s the best thing you ever did.”
My friend Vince in graphics said: “Rico, I’m in denial that you’re leaving.”
So I thank them all and appreciate the good years we had together producing a really good daily newspaper. (That said, management still has to take strides to improve morale in the building. That's my last bit of advice)
So I came home, and under sunny skies with a spring nip in the air, I raised a toast to myself and then to my deceased colleagues Jay and Irene who, although they don’t know it, were instrumental in my decision to leave my longtime job and pursue a second career. (Then again, maybe they do know it.)
In the morning, before I left for work, I picked up a note my wife had left on the kitchen table. It said, “What an amazing day it is. Love you.” To that, I added, “It’s spring, a time for new beginnings and fresh growth. It’s almost Easter, too, time for resurrection and new hope.”
Later, as I sat down in the sparsely populated second-floor lunchroom of The News to eat my last meal there, I opened my brown bag and between the ham-and-rye sandwich, two-week-old orange and chocolate cookies, there was another note: “Be aware. Be glad. Love you.”
What a fabulous wife – and life! I couldn’t have done this without her.
And with that day done, one door closes. Tomorrow, another one opens, hopefully with many wonderful adventures.
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