I’ve been wavering on whether or not to write this post. I see so many people who are out of work showing humble honesty in how they feel and it gives me the strength every day to keep going. I’ve probably applied for a hundred jobs and each time I don’t get a response I’m sorely disappointed. This is a terrible time for so many. For those who have been laid off, my heart goes out to you. We all need to figure out how to ride out this storm, in our own unique ways. My situation is actually quite unique. I was not laid off per se. In fact when the pandemic hit I was living in a wintery paradise in western Montana. My husband and I had taken a sabbatical of sorts. After going through a traumatic course of chemo & radiation for breast cancer in 2014 and working through it all we decided life is short. So we left the comforts of life, and for the last three years we have traveled and explored the country from coast to coast. We lived in our van, we parked in truck plazas for the night, we lived in cabins, we stayed with friends and family, we had jobs. Trust me, it was unconventional and at times we were stressed but mostly it was magical. How many people do you know who have a college degree, has worked in corporate America, but says “let’s live off the grid for a while”. I know, it sounds completely nuts. Our friends and family thought so. We have lived on every side of the country. From Arizona to Portland to Florida to Georgia to Montana, and now we’re back to where we consider our real home- Arizona. To say the least these last 3 years have been eye opening. It has given me a sense of humbling and acceptance. Closely interacting with so many different people of various cultures and creeds is the best school of life I could ever imagine. Which brings me to present day- unemployed in the middle of a pandemic. We couldn’t have ever imagined our world would be turned upside down like this. Before the pandemic hit I had organized a good plan for our life moving forward. Our time for living uprooted had finally come to a close. This was a plan that got side swiped, blind-sided. Our time in Montana was already scheduled to end May 1st. The pandemic hit in March and I got laid off from my seasonal job there, working at a hot springs resort. May 1st comes around and it’s time to leave, for the PLAN to start. The PLAN was to move back “home” for good, find good jobs, eventually buy a house. We were ready to finally settle down. It was perfect...
Well the PLAN is still in action, however maybe we’ll achieve our goals a little later than expected. Now everything is weird. Unpredictable. We (like so many others) are doing our very best to get through this. Although we have our challenges right now, and after my Montana unemployment ran out in June, trust me there were a couple of times we could only afford to eat ramen noodles. But I have to be grateful for what I do have and having so much more than others who live in complete poverty. Others who don’t have the friends & family like we do.
