Experience in the job market is non-existent if you are over 50 years old. I have applied to open positions that I qualify for (how many librarians are floating around out there?) and I did not even receive a emailed No Thank You. As I have reflected on this today, it seems that the business and school world of politics demand you to be the loyal employee. Example, in business you sign a contract in which you can not work in the industry for so many years after they let you off. A recent example of this was a VP in a large, large company. Seems he owned the rights to a certain patented food product and now the company's exclusive right is over, he has left to start another company. My guess would be a competitor company.
I had a ex-principal (she is just a friend) who discussed with me my astonishment about not being called or even given a no thank you email. She said that it was probably my age holding me back. Now I am 54 years old and I still think I have many many good years left to teach. But I feel like an old horse being put out to pasture, just to wait for the glue factory or dog food factory to come and get me.
Yea I know that there are people older than me who are out of work. They probably feel like me. Maybe they have some retirement money to live off of. Then again, why does WalMart hire so many folks that should be at home watching tv or playing with their grandchildren or even traveling. I met a woman the other day that worked for the post office. Although a tad bit older than me, she said that she was offered early retirement. She took it. She also said that the post office is no longer a service thingy. That the post office is only interested in how many pieces of mail you can handle in a few minutes. Now she worries about having enough retirement money to finish her life out with.
I don't worry about that. I figure that I will pass on to a better position between the ages of 62 thru 65. I have diabetes and several other things wrong with me. I don't test often. I have gotten better about taking meds at night but not during the day. I watch how others treat their elderly parents. Or how they don't treat their parents. Day after day, these wonderful folks sit in front of a tv staring aimlessly, dozing in the living room chair. I go to some of their parties. Many of the people who live in this type of caretaking home, well, I have not met any of their children. You would think that at some point - birthdays, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter - I would have met their adult children. I know one lady who has adult children that don't even live in this state!
I have one daughter who lives in Denver. Since living so far north, she has only made it home twice in three or four years. Like she would visit me often if I was in a home. My middle child is severe bipolar, with a young child. Yea, she'll visit me. She manages to take care of herself, barely on some days. The youngest child is 19 and barely tolerates living at home. In fact, she is so desperate to leave home, she has chosen a town 3 hour drive away. She has no job although she is looking. She has no car to use when she gets there. She has no place to live. But she doesn't care, she just feels this frantic need to leave. So like she would visit me often. We drove to San Anotnio the other day for her to have a job interview. She wanted me to drive. She slept most of the way. She went to the interview, leaving me to walk around. After the interview, I suggested that we walk along the river walk. After all, we were not in a hurry to get back and it was only 11:30am. We walked for about 30 minutes when she said that she wanted to go home. That walking was boring, my stopping to take a few pictures of the river walk or the ducks was embarrassing and it was too hot. So we drove for 3 hours over there, spent 45 minutes and then drove home another 3 hours.
Somehow, I have screwed up in raising the girls. I thought I set a living example of how to take care of an elderly parent. Sure, sometimes it was really tough, sometimes I messed that up too. Still, I did do right with both of my parents. My dad never had to spend one minute in a nursing home. My mom lived in a absolutely beautiful retirement center till she fell and broke her hip. She did not want to learn to walk again and so my brother place her in a nursing home. I took my 3 kids every day over there to see her. Took her out to eat as often as I could which was a couple times a week. I always heard to be a living example to my children. Guess that example went over their heads or they just trampled on it. Now the question that I think often of, is how will I spend my "elderly" years?
I don't have any retirement money. Spent that on medicines, psychologists, hospitalizations for the middle child. Money spent of sending both children to church camp in the summer. I wanted to do that for her. I don't regret one penny spent. Spent alot of money on the youngest daughter trying to compensate for having a sister that was hard to live with. I even spent money fixing cars and trying to help the oldest daughter out but I just didn't have enough money to go around. So the oldest daughter got the short end of the stick as far as helping her out in adult hood. I have to say, that the oldest had a much better childhood than the other two. Maybe it all evens out in the long run of things.
I have no answers to anything any more. Our world is not a simple place, our time is getting shorter even though it is the same 24 hours in a day. What worked for me as a young person or a young adult doesn't come close to working now. One salary just does not make it all around the table. I need to go back to work. But 54 is such an old age. I have nothing to contribute any more. I don't Twitter. I don't have a FaceBook page nor a MySpace. Don't have an avitar either.
Oh yea, I don't have a UTube video. Like that is what I am going to do tomorrow.
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