Hallelujah and pass the pillow, it’s true.  We have a spanking new queen-sized mattress (with a new foundation to boot.) 

Our cancelled Tunisia plane ticket money has come through (mostly.  I am not, currently, a fan of Air France) which paid for the mattress.  And a new computer for our college-bound son. 

Who is moving into his dorm *early* as it turns out.  So I won’t have time to make him a giant flannel board, after all.

 My daughter started back to school today, leaving Almostgotit with an empty house all day again, and what to do next, she wonders?  (the local porn shop adult book store has a “help wanted” sign out front.  How much do you dare me?)

And here’s a little ethical dilemma.  My son has honored me by “friending” me on his Facebook profile, which means I can also read what he and all his other friends are saying to each other.  My policy is to be (almost) invisible, because I get much more information that way, of course!!  However, one of my son’s very active Facebook friends is the daughter of a friend of mine who has forbidden her daughter to use Facebook.   I’m not inclined to play the informer here, both because it would violate my son’s trust and because I think this girl’s parents need to make it their own responsibility to better engage, support, and monitor their daughter.  Besides, it’s only Facebook:   I mean, I would tell them if she were smoking pot.  What do you think, readers?

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Related post:
Once Several Times Upon a Mattress

Dear Everyone,
After long and careful thought, we are sad to tell you that we will not be travelling to Africa next week for the traditional Tunisian wedding of our nephew after all. Mr. Almostgotit will still be there to represent our family, however, and hopes to change the return portion of his ticket so that he can stay for the final event, too (my mistake, getting the dates wrong when I bought the tickets .) We are planning another trip west to see you all in the near future, though.
Warmest wishes to all, The Almostgotits

From: Everyone
Sent: Sun, 20 Jul 2008
Subject: RE: Tunisia plans

Dear Almostgotits,
- We hope everything is OK. - We were so looking forward to the time together. - Will you get a refund?  – We are sure your family knows best. - We hope it’s not anything we did.  - 11 yr old Cousin Q will be devastated. I guess there isn’t a way that 12 yr old could fly over with us and return with her father?
Love, Everyone

From: The Almostgotits
Sent: Sun, 20 Jul 2008
Subject: RE: Tunisia plans

Dear Everyone,
We’re sad, too. But going to Tunisia this particular summer was a big stretch to begin with, even if everything had gone according to plan. And things haven’t gone according to plan . ..<<details, more details>>. . . Sorry again re 12 yr old, but, we’ve already cancelled her ticket too — that one pays for the new mattress.
Love, The Almostgotits

From: Everyone
Sent: Mon, 21 Jul 2008
Subject: RE: Tunisia plans

Dear Almostgotits,
We had a restless night. We’re a bit concerned. We want to reach out to help, but we also don’t want to intrude . . . we could pay for the three of you to go to Tunisia if you could.  If you need to stay home because of work, we could pay for 12 yr old and an adult to fly with her to Cincinnati to connect with us . . . You can simply tell us “no” if you don’t feel comfortable.  You have always been so generous to us when we come to visit and we are thankful to have such a good family.
Love, Everyone

From: The Almostgotits
Sent: Mon, 21 Jul 2008
Subject: RE: Tunisia plans

Dear Everyone,
What a kind and loving offer. Thank you so much. If there weren’t so many good reasons piling up to change our minds, we wouldn’t have changed them (as I’ve told the groom separately, our heads finally had to prevail over our hearts, though our hearts are still very much his — and yours.) We want to be sure you all know we love you, and that we are not in any distress (financial or otherwise)  But we must decline your offer, while fully accepting the great love and generosity with which it was offered. What dears you are. (Or elk, if you prefer!!)

With large hugs, The Almostgotit Mooses

From: Ms. Almostgotit
Sent: Mon, 21 Jul 2008
Subject: RE: Tunisia plans

You better tell them the rest, honey. They’re your family.

From: Mr. Almostgotit
Sent: Mon, 21 Jul 2008
Subject: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Tunisia

After still more thought, I (Mr. A) have decided to call off my Paris-Tunisia trip as well, and will stay here with my family.  I really wanted to be with you all for this wonderful celebration, and I’m very sorry to miss it.  We are doing well–just a little frayed around the edges, and being here, we decided, is where we need to be right now.  We love you all and are going to be thinking about you all in Kasr al-Halal drinking tea with mint and strong coffee.  Take lots of pictures for us!  See you at Christmas.

Love, Mr. Almostgotit

We’re back from our vacation, but I accidentally shut one of our two cats in our bedroom for the entire week we were gone. He’s fine, but our bedroom is not. Imagine what a cat can do, over and over, in seven days. We’ve hauled the mattress into the yard just to get the smell out of our house.

That awful odor speaks more eloquently of squalor and general, personal failure than anything else I know.

Quite a contrast with the borrowed place we stayed in Oregon: a large, airy home with spotless floors and everything perfectly in place. An enormous, fully-equipped kitchen. A triple garage, no oil stains, holding neat rows of sporting equipment: cross country and downhill skis, bicycles, golf gear, a nice boat.

Photos of a happy, athletic family pose on nightstands next to large beds in huge bedrooms, each room decorated according to a theme – golfing. Skiing. Black bears. Pine trees.

Not a single cat, though.

No fluffs of cat hair, either. Also, no random piles of stuff, no old kitchen with chipped counters and divots in the floor. No junk in the laundry room, and certainly no actual laundry — just an expanse of gleaming, maple cabinets holding a very clean box of detergent, a box of trash bags, and one neat little paper bag with crisp-folded cuff to catch the non-existent dryer lint.

Even more amazing was the discovery, in the kitchen, of several half-consumed chocolate bars, foil wrapping neatly folded over the uneaten portions, as well a HALF-EATEN box of expensive chocolates in one of the perfectly-organized kitchen drawers. Which finally proved, of course, that the homeowners are actually ALIENS.

Ah well.

We can’t afford a new mattress. We’ve already over-extended ourselves this summer, assuming I’d have a job by now.  And to think I used to teach financial planning.

Today I called a friend, needing to confess that I have a foul mattress in my yard and no, we didn’t get to the dump with it this morning as planned, so we will have a mattress in our yard forEVER now, probably. Inevitably to be joined, soon, by a nasty old couch. Yes, she agreed gravely, but your need to add a couple of dirty, barefoot children running around in diapers and snotty noses.

We both suffer from severe middle-class anxiety, you see. Certain that we’re each about to slip down to an Unacceptable Class of Human at any minute — if we haven’t already – we expect the news to arrive shortly in some horrible letter.

My friend bravely concluded that tenement living really isn’t that bad.

Another dear friend, feeling a bit more constructive, said she wishes she could fly here from Michigan and help me clean the stinky room and set the contents on fire in the backyard, but

Is your neighborhood zoned for cat pee bonfires?

Therapy for three, please. Preferably with some chocolate-abstaining, wealthy athletes in Oregon.

And another thing.

I’ve developed a pretty keen sense of smell in my old age, and it’s nearly always “right on the nose.”  Last year I turned down a management job at one company just months before the entire company went under; seven months ago I resigned my directorship of another and have watched them lose acres of ground since — as I’d warned them they would.  Nor have the latter found anyone willing to be my replacement. 

Many years ago, I ignored an “icky” smell at another job, until I had to leave that position when we moved to Canada.  I later found out that my boss had sexually assaulted my predecessor. 

My nose knows.

I don’t really want the news my nose is bringing me now, because it’s making me too picky.  I need a job.  I could persevere and take one of these stinky jobs anyway, but I already know the likely outcome: been there, done that.  So for now,  I’m sticking with the schnozz.

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Related posts:
Employers: It’s Your Turn to be Fabulous
Un-Fabulous Employers: Asking for Too Much Upfront
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Well, that was a strange little interlude.

It seems my predecessor wasn’t quite so eager to resign after all, which wouldn’t necessarily be a problem except that the Board of Directors wasn’t quite sure they could do (ANYTHING) without her, either. So I decided they’d have to do without me instead, and here I am.

The “no succession plan” scenario is, unfortunately, far too common in the nonprofit world (most churches require retiring ministers to leave the congregation entirely, for this very reason). Perhaps this Board will do a better job next time; for my part, I suppose I’ll chalk it up to learning how to fail faster; I was just glad I saw the no-win situation for what it was as soon as I did, and got out before there were any actual murders.

My friend Emily has asked me to guest-host her “Rocky Road of Love” blog for the next week or so (starting Monday) while she is in PARIS doing some research (she’s a writer, and does that sort of thing.) I think she mainly wants to see me get off my dark-night-of-the-soul butt, but it’s very kind of her and I think it will be a lot of fun. Stay tuned!

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Related Posts:5 strange things I did to get my job
Working for a nonprofit organization
Career or blog in a rut? Find a Traveler

Creative Commons photo by divinemisscopa

This delicious if doleful affair nearly always falls.

Which is why, in my extended family, we refer to it as “chocolate goo cake.”

Perfectly sympathetic fare for the joylessly jobless.

Sweet Sorrow Sourdough Chocolate Cake

2/3 cup shortening
1 2/3 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 cup sourdough starter
1 ¾ cup all purpose flour
2/3 cup sweet ground chocolate or cocoa
½ tsp. baking powder
1 ½ tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
¾ cup water
1 tsp. vanilla

Cream shortening and sugar; beat in eggs one at a time. Blend in the starter. Sift flour, measure, and sift again with other dry ingredients. Add to shortening mixture alternating with water and vanilla. Mix at low speed. Bake 350 degrees (for two 9” layers, bake 35 minutes; for one 9” square, bake 60 minutes)

The world recordholder for number of extended-play rejections for jobs at The Institution Which Shall Not Be Named? That would be me.

I’m nobody! Who are you?

I’m nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?

Then there’s a pair of us — don’t tell!
They’d banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

Photos by Almostgotit

Poem by Emily Dickinson

Maybe I’ll blog about it later, but first, I have to hold my fingers in my ears for a while.  See,  the toad people and vinegar-faced ladies are massing on my borders, ready to launch a major attack.  The people under the house are muttering obscenities.  The thugs on my bus are beginning to shift in their seats, stealthily reaching for their weapons.

Photo by Yodi Ann

Drat it all.  I already know everything they want to tell me. 

It may be my last chance, it may mean major financial hardship.  People may think badly of me.  I can already think of several who will think I’m making a mistake.  Let them. 

Yes.  Statistically, women who have stayed home with their children can’t expect to be paid better than this or treated more professionally than this when they go back to work, particularly if they aren’t willing to play the game by starting from rock bottom.

Statistically, women must settle.  In real life, there is no beautiful soundtrack that plays when you make difficult, brave decisions.  There is no audience that gasps with admiration.  There’s not even a guaranteed happy ending.  In real life, bills need to be paid, obligations must be met, and compromises made.  Life plods on.  Very few people would keep working at their current jobs if they won the lottery.

And in real life, you never win the lottery. 

Instead, you learn that the difference between the right and wrong choices is rarely crystal clear.  Usually there are several options, all of them problematic, and all of them with great potential. 

Usually, you just have to do your best and choose.  And this chick chooses not to settle.

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Related Posts:
How (not) to interview for a job (this story begins)
Confusion Cookies (this story continues)
Woman vs. Rabbit Hole
Toad People