Sherri Cornelius

The house is dirtier than it used to be. While I was a stay-at-home mother I felt unappreciated and resentful about all the housework I had to do. I never felt like I got enough done. Now I'm amazed at how much I was able to accomplish. The soap-making, the knitting, the cooking, the fridge cleaning... It takes less time to hold my breath when I have to get milk out of the fridge than it does to clean it.

I'd like to have the time to finish this website. I wish I could read a book. I'd love to help my friends promote their books. 

When I started taking classes toward my long-postponed bachelor's degree, I truly had no idea the work load would be so heavy. I don't remember doing this much when I was in college full time. Like, maybe one assignment per week per class, with the larger chapters broken up over a couple of weeks. In each of these classes I have a chapter per week with a related lecture, quiz, and discussion, plus several short papers over the semester. It says a lot that I feel more pressed for time now than when I was taking 18 hours and working full time with time to party left over.

But I have kids now--a full time job in itself, running them around. And in online classes they can only track us by our online work, and that means writing and assessments.

It's just the nature of the beast (which apparently lives in my fridge).

This was my diary entry from 2 1/2 years ago. It resonates with me today.

Feeling today...like I need to find a way to release my fear that everyone's out to get me. Like holding back to protect myself doesn't really protect me. How would it feel to go through my day feeling like everyone I interact with has no agenda, no expectations, only a pure desire to connect and share? How would that feel? Everyone has an agenda, of course, because that's how we go through life. But what if I had faith that those agendas contained no secret need that I had to fulfill? What if I stopped looking for the punchline? The irony? The trip wire? What if I went through my day open to possibility, open to helping others when they need it? I'd like to be able to instantly assess when people need my help, even when they don't ask, my real help and not my propping up of their ego. If I get out of the mental fetal position and look people in the eye, what then? I think I'm afraid they WILL need me. I fear looking like a fool--too excited, too enthusiastic, too dumb, too womanly. I fear being myself, because that self has been criticized so much. Today I will stop working on my faults and start finding my strengths, and start working on those.

How about this: Today I will stop trying to hide my flaws. By trying to hide my flaws I'm hiding the good parts of me, too.

I had let the daily practice of this fall away, but I can see how I benefited from it. Maybe I didn’t exactly let it fall away as I simply let it fall inside. It’s been stewing and now it’s ready to come back out. Back then it was a what-if. Now that last sentence feels like a fact. Also, I’ve learned since then that flaws are subjective and forgivable.

I have this story called "I Can Fly". You can see it over there in the sidebar. It's very short, like 2k words or something. When I put it on Smashwords I was hoping I'd get the same kind of closure I got with Mon Petit Ami. I did get some, sort of, but not the same palpable sense of release. I decided to take it off Smashwords and give Amazon's KDP Select a chance to earn me a piece of their Prime lending pot.

(Aside: KDP Select has been a waste of time for me. None of my three publications has ever been borrowed, so basically I'm giving Amazon exclusivity for free. Great racket they have going there. I won't use it again.)

A couple of months ago I read ICF through for the first time in a long time. I downloaded my two shorts to test on different apps, and on the Kindle app I encountered the problem, which was the damn ending! And yes, I'm really mad about it!

I hate writing endings. I struggle with the ending every time and never feel satisfied. If I have an ending in mind when I start, I'm not light on my feet enough to switch it up when the story takes me in a different direction. If I don't have the ending, that keeps me from finishing at all.

I guess that's why I got the closure with MPA. It couldn't be published until I got the ending right. It finally came around, mostly satisfying, published and BOOM, closure. "Oooh, must have been because I published it! It's out of my hair and out of my mind, because I put it out there. This is a sure-fire way to get rid of those nagging stories I can't stop editing!"

Ahem. No.

With ICF, I did fix the ending, but the pacing was bad. And this is why they say let your stories sit a while before you read them again, and to print them out. The different format--a Kindle reader app--and a few weeks gave me the separation I needed to see why I couldn't stop thinking about it.

But so once I was to that point, Skin & Scales was racing down the track. I thought, that's fine because I Can Fly is in KDP Select. It's exclusively on Amazon and at 99 cents. Nobody's borrowing, and it's highly doubtful anyone would pay a dollar for a story of only 2,000 words. ICF could wait while I focused on S&S.

So that's what I did. And then two days after I received my first real copies of Skin & Scales somebody paid a dollar for I Can Fly! Huzzah! Finally, a sale for this little story. Then I felt guilty as I realized I hadn't fixed the ending yet. Bummer. I hope they don't hold it against me.

Anyway, this lit a fire under me. If people were going to be paying, it better darn well be the best I can make it. I took the laptop to the park with us so the kids could play and I could plug in at the pavilion. I reshaped the ending to I Can Fly with little trouble, much to my relief. Only thing is, now it's pretty obvious that the title for this new story should be "The Girl for Me." Not pretty obvious, really obvious. But I already have a cover I'm satisfied with! People already know it by its old title! What do I do, what do I do??

I already changed Black Veil Angel to Skin & Scales pretty abruptly, but that was before publication. I'm glad I changed it. But I Can Fly is an established title. I guess it can be transitioned a couple of ways--maybe a subtitle, or in the description I can say "formerly I Can Fly"--so as not to confuse those who've already downloaded it.

Maybe I'm making too big a deal out of it.

Here's the real link to the interview I posted yesterday. For some reason I linked to Dane's post about the interview instead of the interview itself, on his author blog. Gotta be smarter than the Internet, Sherri.

Author Interview: Sherri Cornelius | J. Dane Tyler.

What a crazy week it's been! Most of it wasn't good, obviously, what with the Boston Marathon bombing so close to the anniversary of the OKC bombing, and the tornadoes earlier in the week, and friends going through health issues that I can only imagine. I could lose myself in debilitating empathy, which I would have done a few years ago.

What I find happening instead is extreme gratitude. My world is peaceful. I have all my limbs and no cancer. My family is healthy and untouched by violence. I finally feel I've overcome the bulk of my self-destructive tendencies.

So yeah, my life is good. It's not perfect, but at least I'm safe, warm, and fed. Oh, and I was accepted into the Bachelor of General Studies program! Things are moving in the right direction. I have to call the school now and set up my class plan. The only thing I'm concerned about is the money sitch. I can't really afford to pay more than about a dollar out of pocket. This might mean taking fewer classes to stay within the Pell grant I'll be getting. I won't be taking out any loans this time. Learned my lesson on that one.

Time for me to get my day started. I hope you all don't let the week get you down too much. Enjoy what you have while you have it.

Just a quick note to let you know about my first interview EVAR! It's up over at Dane's new place. Go check it out!

Author Interview: Sherri Cornelius | En*DANE*gered.

The first two stories I e-published, I didn’t do any promotion aside from tweeting and facebooking and blogging. And really, not a lot of that. They were short stories, and I intended them to be free from the beginning. This in itself ensured they would be downloaded. People like free stuff.

With SKIN AND SCALES I decided to go a different way. First of all, I decided to charge a book price for it and see what happened. (Very little, of course.) Second, I put it straight into KDP Select instead of offering it on Smashwords first. The benefit of KDP Select is that Amazon Prime members are able to borrow the book for free, but the author still gets a small royalty. I had no borrows on the short stories while they were enrolled, but I thought people would be more likely to borrow a book. (Apparently not my book.) Third, I intended to publish it quietly and just let it sit unpromoted, but I got caught up in the excitement, especially when my mom virtually shoved a couple of twenties in my hand for a Facebook ad. So I tried it, expecting nothing but an education and receiving what I expected. It was an interesting and enlightening experience. The results were definitive, and I quit before I hit $20.

So now I think what I need is some reviews. My theory is that any review is good for business. Even a solid 3-star review would indicate that people were reading it and it isn’t completely awful. A 1-star review would keep people engaged and on the page, though I presume I would need a couple of higher stars to counteract it.

TOMORROW only, April 10, SKIN AND SCALES will be free for download on Kindle. This serves a two-fold purpose: to allow the folks in my acknowledgements to get a free copy and to garner a few reviews. I hope everyone who reads it will at least throw a couple of anonymous stars up there. Don’t be shy! If one person breaks the ice, others will follow.

If you don’t read weird stuff but still want to support me, you can recommend the book to your weird-loving friends. If you don’t have a Kindle but still want to read it, you can download a reader for your computer or smart phone here.

Thanks for all your support!

It wasn't supposed supposed to be scary, self-publishing a book on Kindle. I wasn't particularly excited about it. I saw self-publishing as a way to get Black Veil Angel out of my hair for good. It worked so well with the two shorts I published, after all, and I wasn't really nervous about those two. It was really no big deal, and once they were published, even if by myself, they were finalized in my mind. I had struggled so long with BVA--and even after deciding to publish, the process dragged on and on.

But then it just stopped dragging.The instant I saw the image on iStockPhoto I knew it was THE ONE. I had been looking for months, but I'm glad now I didn't try to force it with another image. As the final cover started to come together I got more and more excited.

I'm really happy about the title change. "Black Veil Angel" had a couple of things about it that I thought didn't represent the book. First of all, if you've googled it, you know that the term black veil angel is a common name for a type of angelfish. It wouldn't be a huge leap for a reader to expect at least some symbolism involving a fish tank. Another is that confounding word "angel." It's used in the Christian angel way so freakin' much that I thought it would give potential readers the wrong idea. Especially with the Light on the cover.

Skin and Scales is more descriptive, fits the tone of the story, and plus I think it sounds pretty cool.

I wasn't going to do any promotion beyond a quiet link here on the blog. But once the cover was finished and I started the actual publishing process, I found myself making author pages on Goodreads and Amazon, almost like sleepwalking. I wrote a blurb and all the front matter of the book in a single afternoon. No major problems formatting the manuscript. It was just time, I guess.

I had planned not to care, based on my previous self-pub experiences. What I didn't take into consideration is the fact that this is a full-length novel. A novel I worked on for several years. A novel which ushered me through the hardest time of my writing life thus far. (Hopefully forever.) Maybe I do care, a little.

Skin and Scales will be available exclusively on the Kindle for three months. Woo!

 

BVA has been proofread by a reader with fresh-eyes. Hopefully this will be the day I finalize it and get the ball rolling on the peripherals, like the front and back matter, and make some good progress on the pesky cover. Lofty goals for a single day, especially when I have two DVDs of Downton Abbey waiting, not to mention much housekeeping.

At least I don't have Castleville to distract me anymore. It's felt like housekeeping for a long while, And I finally got the nerve to block it. I thought I would miss it, but when it pops into my head it's a relief to be able to dismiss it and move to something else. So much of this modern Internet-centered life is habit, and I've found my attention span leaving me. I have trouble reading a book or focusing on a home project long enough to get it done. How am I supposed to build back into writing if I can't think about it for more than ten minutes?

The attention span isn't the only symptom, though. It's also lazy thinking. I'm used to taking in other people's creative ideas now, and I have to remember what it's like to call up my own new ideas. Working at the library is helping a lot with that, and I wonder if I would even be considering a re-entry into writing if it weren't for the stimulation I've found there. The atmosphere nurtures open discussion of problems from all level of employees, giving me the opportunity to practice thinking of creative solutions. And looking at all those book covers has prodded my sleeping writer, the dreamer who five years ago knew she would one day see her own book on those shelves.

I think this time my approach to the business side of writing will be different. Shoot, it already has been. I'm trying new things that I wouldn't before for fear of hurting my career. But trying something new and failing doesn't hurt a career, stagnation does. Quitting does. Fear does.

But we all know this.

This time it's been a slow build, going at my own pace and trusting that I'll be at the right place at the right time for the path that is right for me.

 

 

I can feel the weather change right between my eyes. It’s been a spring-like few days—I wore shorts yesterday and today we’ll have a chance for thunderstorms. Not that it’s unusual to have ups and downs through the winter here in Oklahoma, but this year I have whiplash from our quick-change weather pattern. Whiplash and migraines.

But anyway, yesterday was awesome weather, a day not to be wasted by sitting indoors, a day to frolic in grass and flowers (of which there are neither, but our Bradford pear trees did start to bud). Gorgeous day. So what did I do? I sat indoors and got a new li'l shorty* ready to put on Smashwords.

I CAN FLY: Warren’s pickup line gets him nowhere—until he meets Edith. When he confides his power of flight, they know they’re meant to be together. Too bad not everyone sees it that way, but whatevs.

Since I only uploaded it yesterday it’s still not in the Premium Catalog in Smashwords, which only means it won’t be distributed to other online retailers yet. I manually uploaded it to Amazon this morning, but they also have a review process. So for now it’s only available on Smashwords.

This is an old story, but then again all my stories are old. I haven’t written with any kind of purpose for a couple of years. I feel like getting these old stories out there, for good or for bad, is a turning point for me. A slow awakening of my creativity, long dormant. Clearing the cobwebs. Of course it would be lovely if I got a ton of reviews and shared a million times, but that’s not why I’m self-publishing. Once I have Black Veil Angel on there, that will be the last of the work I would feel comfortable having online. It’s like I can feel new stories waiting for the older ones to be put to bed, and the only way I’ve found to do that is to publish them.

So look for Black Veil Angel to be published soon!

 

*I’ve been calling my short stories “li'l shorties” lately, and the novels are “wordy bastards”. Who knows why, but I like it.

It seems like everyone I know online and in real life has been sick recently, so I guess we were bound to get it. Luckily the worst of it has fallen on my days off, so I haven’t had to jump through any hoops to accommodate the doctor visit and school missed. The children are all at school now, but I won’t relax until they hop off the bus this afternoon, bright-eyed and energetic.

I still have a slight cough but overall feel quite good. Which means I probably won’t be able to sit still long enough to finish the edits on BVA. I’ll try, though, because I need to get it ready for proofreading. I don’t have anyone lined up for this yet, but I know I can’t do it. I would feel comfortable paying someone, is how much I know I can’t do it. Way too close.

So I want to finish editing, and I also want to finish reading “Name of the Wind.” What will probably happen instead is bill-paying, laundry-doing and toilet paper-buying. This is quite apparent now that I’ve tried and failed to write a long, coherent post. Apparently I can’t concentrate on words today. In fact, it’s quite tempting to just let this post sit in the drafts folder like all the other false starts, but I won’t. IF I can sit here long enough to think of a title.

I’ve been rockin’ it at the library. They say I’m a “quick study.” And indeed, much of how they operate hits me right in the instincts. It seems almost too easy. The time I spend there doesn’t feel like work.This is great for the prospects of my being able to handle a second job.

Or maybe when I finally get Black Veil Angel out in the world, I’ll sell a million copies at five bucks a pop and then I’ll just be working at the library for fun.

Haha, I’m so funny.

But even figuring I won’t sell a million copies (or even a hundred) I’m still on track to publish BVA by, oh, say, March-ish. I was thinking about entering the Amazon Breakthrough Whatever, but I realize that this book is not for that contest. And so I’ll continue with my little self-publishing venture.

My main goal here is to finalize BVA in my mind. When I put Mon Petit Ami out there, it was after years of going back to it, over and over, trying to fix it. It rarely left my thoughts. I put it “under the bed” permanently four or five times, only to find it as an itch in my brain some time later. Probably every person reading this has scratched that itch once or twice.

Then when I needed a piece to experiment with on Smashwords, it seemed like the logical choice. Imperfect, yes, but fairly solid and fun. I straightened its hair bow and pushed it onstage, and you know what? The itch left me. I published it over a year ago and not once have I had the urge to edit. NOT ONCE. I rarely even think about it anymore. I’m free! I’m hopeful this will be the case with BVA as well.

And if a few people get a little enjoyment out of it, all the better.

It feels good to be writing again, even if it’s the clinical, critical kind of writing that is editing. This isn’t rewriting. I’ve rewritten enough. This is taking out stuff I’m not sure of and filling in the gaps..with, by the way, fresh and untainted writing. A good piece to stretch my legs on after all this time, and when I’m finished I might even start a new book.

No pressure.

The electricity is out, so this is my excuse to finally write a post. I’ve said it before, the more I have going on the less inclined I am to write about it, and I guess it’s still true.

My job at the library has its pros and cons, as every job. Working in the stacks can be lonely, shelving books tedious and dusty. But I also love knowing where everything is. I get to see all the new books as they come in, and feel a bit of pride in being the one to place a new book for the first eager hands. After reshelving the same authors over and over I know who’s popular in a hands-on way, rather than a sales-numbers way. (Looking at you, Roberts and Patterson.)

Straightening a section to perfection satisfies my need to tame chaos. When I come back around an hour later and see that my beautifully aligned books now look like a mouthful of broken teeth do I feel annoyed? Nope. I feel happy that people were there, diving in head first, and I joyfully straighten them again. For some reason I feel this especially in the teen section. I love connecting people with books.Sure, I have to wake up the occasional group of homeless people sprawled in Adult Fiction. But I love love LOVE leading a customer right to her favorite author.

I wish I could work full time, but I don’t think my body could handle shelving 40 hours a week. It’s a physically demanding job what with all the walking and bending and kneeling. And mentally demanding, what with the constant Dewey Decimal figuring.

I rarely think of the sewing factory. When I do, the memory feels more like a dream, one of those awful tedious things that lasts all night and gives me a headache. If my time at the factory served a purpose in my growth, it might have only been to remind me what it feels like to earn a full paycheck. I do miss the money. But I also know that there’s potential to move up in the library to a level I’d never reach at the factory. So it’s a better long-term investment.

The only thing I’m really worried about is my headaches. The migraines are a regular thing again, and when the city installs air fresheners in our building in a month or two, I think they’ll only get worse. (You can bet I cried when I heard that news.) I’ve a renewed determination to find out why my migraines are happening, and going back to work has actually helped to better home in on the likely problem.

I’ll try to keep updating the blog on a more regular basis, since I also have some writing news to share.

I have left the worst (to me) job in the world behind. I know some people work there if not happily then somewhat contentedly, but for me it was pain wrapped in gloom stuffed with cabbage. I left on Friday, to start at the library on Monday.

I took with me some small cuttings of fabric and balls of thread from the trash, along with a button which had been stuck in a crack in the concrete floor beside my machine since about my second day. My intention was to burn these things as a symbol of my freedom. I expected the transition weekend to be spent ridding myself of the sewing factory and welcoming the library into my brain space.

I was surprised to find myself putting off this symbolic burning of denim I’d been looking forward to all week. I didn’t need it after all. The factory was just gone, as soon as I walked out the door. Now and then through the weekend I would remember I never had to go back there, whereupon I would be flooded with relief and I might hoot and/or holler for just a sec, but by Sunday I was pretty much done with the hoots and hollers.

I was also surprised to find that I wasn’t frozen with giddy anticipation for my first day at the library. I sort of thought I might be too nervous to sleep Sunday night. But no, I had a feeling of peace and went to sleep with no trouble. Woke up ready to go, calm. I got a little antsy as the time grew nearer to leave, but it was no worse than any other appointment-nerves. Just trying to calculate the time I need to leave, make sure I have everything, etc. Starting my first day at the library didn’t seem especially significant or electrifying—just right. About time.

Being a shelver means I’m walking a lot. Constant movement, as with sewing, except I’m using my lower body more than my upper body. Once again I have to go through a period of adjustment, but hopefully this time I end up stronger rather than broken. This changing schedule is going to be strange for a while. I’ll be working evening shift sometimes, something I haven’t done since Wal-Mart in college. This means that I’m constantly thinking about what time I’m supposed to go to work, what time it is currently, and checking the schedule to make sure I haven’t gotten the time wrong.

Today I don’t have to go in till four. It’s so strange to be home all alone! Only four months ago this was what I did every day, but it feels like a lifetime.

Thanks for sticking with me through the ups and downs. It’s been a long time since I felt really good about something.

I started calling the sewing factory “the place where dreams go to die.” My brother pointed out that in “Dinner for Schmucks” they say cabbage is the smell of dead dreams. Two days later, early morning, I smelled cabbage. No way, I said to myself and laughed. At lunch I smelled it again, and a feeling of rightness seeped into my being. Cabbage, dead dreams, fits this place to a tee. Apparently, one of the girls can’t get enough cabbage and heats it up in the microwave, sending the smell wafting over to my machine. I told her about the dead dreams line, and she laughed. We shared a moment. One of the few bright spots I’ve experienced there.

I guess I had forgotten just how much it sucks out in the job world. I was expecting reason and welcome and cooperation. I had forgotten how everybody gets up in your business while you’re just doing the best work you can, how there’s always someone judging you and strangely willing to tell you how you fall short.

BUT…

I had a job interview at the library. My interview was less nerve-wracking since the interviewer was my volunteer liaison at the library. I don’t know why, but she likes me a lot and is willing to go out of her way to help me. It’s good to have someone on your side.

The next step is waiting for my background check to complete. My advocate called me on Wednesday to make a provisional offer of employment, contingent on the OSBI report coming back clean--which, uh, yeah. No problems there. I had to suppress my joyous noises because I was in the snake den, i.e. the break area of the sewing factory, so I hope she understood how pumped I was. I think she did.

So the only thing I’m worried about is the part-time nature of the job. I’ll be making about as much per hour, but varying hours. It’ll be a challenge to fill in with a supplemental job if I need (or want) more money. That’s a worry that changes nothing in the way of the action I will take, which is to quit the soul-and-hand-crushing sewing job and cannonball right smack in the middle of a part-time question mark.

If everything works out I’ll be a shelver in less than a week’s time. Whenever I remember this tidbit my eyes well up and my body tingles. I belong there. You know how people say “you just know”? I knew from the beginning I didn’t belong at the sewing factory, and despite my natural optimism and every attempt to fake it till I make it, I haven’t had a single moment when I thought I might belong there. It literally smells like cabbage. However, I knew from the first time I set foot in this particular library that it was my place. When I go there I smile. I relax. So what’s the smell of vibrant, living dreams?

I’ve written three posts over the past few weeks and discarded all of them. Too mopey. My mood is on the upswing, though, so let’s see if I can keep the complaining to a minimum.

I’m getting settled as much as I can be in my new job. It’s funny how little the kids’ lives have changed as opposed to how much things have changed for me. The only difference for them is that I leave a few minutes before they get on the bus, and dinner is slightly less healthy. Both their father and I are home before they return, and our evenings go about how they did before, at least from their vantage point. I miss having time to myself and I’m tired, but having money again is fantastic. Between the two new incomes we’re making more than the hubs was making by himself at his old job. We’re caught up on bills and can start working on paying down the credit cards.

If my hands hold up, that is. I mentioned before how hard sewing blue jeans is on the hands. After a month and a half the rest of my body is adjusted, but the fingers and wrists are just going downhill. That’s blue-collar working for ya. You’re just gonna ache, and that’s all there is to it. But seriously, if it doesn’t get better real soon I’m going to start looking for something else

The only thing is, I’m still waiting on the library. Yeah, that’s still in the works! They’re going to need someone “soon”. She doesn’t know when but she will call me because I’m her pick for the job. Part time, probably weekends. It feels like I’ve been waiting forever, but I only started volunteering there at the end of July. Holy crap, it feels like a year but it’s only been three months. I can’t believe so much has changed in that short period.

So my plan is to go to part time at the overalls factory when I get the library gig. I don’t want to find another full-time job only to have to leave when/if the library thing comes through in three months. HOWEVER, all my plans seem to turn to shit, so we’ll see what really happens.

Well that’s enough for now, just wanted to put something up here before someone thinks I died.

Well, I made it through my first week at the sewing factory. As I type this my fingers feel like cooked spaghetti. I did without coffee, worked through gasp-inducing back spasms, endured both the curious stares and complete indifference with which I was greeted.

But I made it.

My head was down; I endured; I coped. That was it. I missed my home and I felt physically crappy. Caffeine withdrawal didn’t help those first couple of days. I wasn’t aware I wouldn’t be able to take my coffee to my machine, and I didn’t have time to make and drink my usual two cups. By Wednesday, I got the bright idea to take Excedrin, which contains delicious caffeine along with the painkillers for my muscles, and drink Mountain Dew at my first break. It helped.

Monday was okay. Tuesday was a monster, because after work there were parent/teacher conferences and band practice. Wednesday was probably the best day, but that’s when the back pain started to get intrusive, and it just got worse until by yesterday afternoon I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. I couldn’t even put my arms out to hold the denim without the muscles on either side of my spine seizing up. So I just gasped and said OMG and sat conspicuously still until I could continue. This happened between each pair of overalls.

But I made it!

Oh, and the fragrance. It’s a factory, so one would assume the fragrance would be better. I was surprised to realize it was worse than in the library. Each stall of the bathroom had a can of spray disinfectant that apparently everyone used on the seat before they sat down. Nightmare. My machine happens to sit right near the bathroom, the break area, and a couple of repair machines that everyone uses to fix their rejects. Plenty of people nearby with their smelly detergent, lingering air freshener, perfume and shampoo. Then Friday the weird old janitor dude mopped behind me and sprayed the tables in the break area. I thought I was going to die.

But I did not die!

Yes, I was miserable for an average of 92.7% of every day last week. But the good thing is that the first week is OVER! I know what each day will bring and how to prepare, and at the end of next week there will be a paycheck waiting for me for the work I did this week. Positive thoughts, Sherri, positive thoughts!

Rain is going to barely miss us, and for once I am grateful. My girl’s marching band will play at their first home game tonight, and I don’t want anything to mess it up. The boy is at a sleepover. Oh, and also…I am employed, as of this afternoon.

Nine years it’s been since I worked for someone else, except for a little editing and some volunteer work. I feel vulnerable, resigned, relieved, excited, dreadful (dreadful?). The job is at a factory that makes overalls. Here’s a video of the type of machine I’ll be running.

 

I did this job for several years at another factory before it closed. I swore I’d never sew in a factory again. Early on I even turned down a good job because I wanted to make a new path for myself. Somehow, I lost my way, and went in a big ol’ circle. It kind of sucks.

The job is dirty, and my hands will ache all the time, but working again is going to rock. After I stopped being depressed about the two-steps-back thing, I realized it will be much easier to rejoin the workforce in a job I’m comfortable doing, rather than adding to my stress by doing something completely new. This isn’t the beginning I’d hoped for, but it’ll do. For now.

I often post about my half-hearted job search—like how I need money, or how hard it is to find a job after being a stay-at-home mom for eight years, or how I don’t know if I can work in a public place with all the smells, or not knowing what field to go into with my non-specific set of skills. I’ve known I needed to get a job for money, yes, but also for my sanity. Volunteering at the library was supposed to help me segue into a paying job, but not for another month or so.

At least, that was the plan. But God laughs while we make plans. The hubs lost his job last week.

Obviously, my need to make some dough is suddenly all-important. Not something I can put off till I’m comfortable, which is to say, unafraid. It probably never would have happened that way anyway.

So. Money-making propositions.

Selling soap would be good, if I had listened to my instincts earlier in the year, when those batches would be nicely cured by now and ready to package. But no. The soap I made the other day will be ready in a month, and even then it’s not a sure sale. Plus, I can’t really wait a month to see some income.

Freelance editing is still an option, except many previous attempts to break the ice on that failed, leading me to believe it might not be the job for me after all. Plus, it also would take too long to see a significant amount of money.

My library isn’t hiring right now, unfortunately. I’ve decided to visit libraries in neighboring towns to see if any of them are fragrance-free. I did this last year but stopped after three. At each one, the smell was strong enough to knock me over as soon as I opened the door. I will extend my search, I guess, although any commute over a half hour will be impractical.

A factory job might be ideal, if they don’t produce something toxic. Last year, when I was looking for a job in earnest, they were sparse. All in the medical or sales fields, two fields I will only attempt if I’m desperate and hungry. I had plenty to eat last fall, so after a few unsuccessful interviews, I put off the job search. This year I’m seeing more variety, so a traditional job is a better possibility.

I feel strongly that a way is opening for me, and that it will be clear soon which way that is. It will probably be something I’ve never considered. The Wheel turns. Meanwhile, the hubs is hitting the pavement and I’m editing a book to put on Amazon, maybe two, and getting my resume in order. Whatever happens, things will never be the same.

Scary, but good.

My friends on Facebook might remember a few weeks ago when my bike was stolen, the idiot rode it right by my house, and I went down there to confront the gang of kids and retrieve my bike

Drama.

Up to that point the kids mainly messed with mailboxes up and down the street. Like, you’d see too many doors hanging open to be coincidence. The knob on my plastic mailbox was broken off and thrown on the ground. But we’d never be able to catch them in the act because it happened in the wee hours of the morning.

Then my bike was stolen, and it seemed to escalate from there.

A friend who lives across the street from the bike-thief’s house (their apparent base of operations) had things stolen out of his pickup the same night they took my bike. I told him who to talk to, and he was able to retrieve his items from the disinterested parents. We agreed we needed to start keeping our homes and cars locked, something I’ve never had to do before, and I started rebuilding the broken shed door.

It was quiet at my house for the next couple of weeks, but apparently they were still causing mayhem at other places, because the bike-thief girl got arrested last week. A few days later they ripped the door off my mailbox, and went through and stole items my friend had set out for a garage sale. On my way into town to get a new mailbox, I saw another family standing around their mailbox, which was lying on the ground next to its post.

Since my friend’s house is the only other one on that stretch of road, he’s an obvious target. Well the other night he caught two of the boys red-handed and had them arrested.

In a perfect world, this would be the end of it. The parents would step in, finally, or being arrested would scare the kids straight…but I doubt that will happen. If I’m not mistaken, a couple of the boys are the same ones I saw writing on the playground equipment a couple of years ago. They’re just old enough to do actual damage now, and bolder with their years of small crime successes behind them.

In the meantime, I spent a good chunk of change on a vandal-proof mailbox, and when they learn to drive they won’t bother with us anymore. With a vehicle, the mailbox smashing possibilities will be endless.

Suddenly I’m very busy. I’ve gotten used to having no schedule conflicts—indeed, little schedule at all—because for the past few years almost everything I do is school-related, and they don’t overlap things. I’ve also gotten to the point where if I get showered and brushed by lunch I’m doing well. It’s not that I sit around all morning, but only that I have nowhere to be.

I can feel this changing permanently.

Part of it’s my choice, like tackling some big repair projects around the house, and part of it is out of my control. My daughter has become involved in more extra-curricular activities in middle school, and my son will be there next year. This is on top of the back-to-school season. Another commitment I’ve made is to take charge of my health, which means appointments with various doctors. (I had my first lady doctor visit in about eight years, which tells you something.)

One small (and yet huge) step is volunteering at the library. I started Tuesday, and today it seems like it could have been a dream. I often dream I’m straightening shelves at public places for no pay. Really. I fear I’ll go back in there and they have no recollection of me.

My regular times are Tuesday and Thursday mornings. I have a name tag and my own drawer and everything. On my first day, the lady in charge of volunteers showed me around backstage. It felt strange to pass through that doorway, the one that reveals just a glimpse of the library machinery, and one I’d never considered I might enter. Turns out the working part of the library is almost as big as the public part, only instead of wide spaces and neat shelves, the rooms are stuffed with desks, and papers plaster every surface, horizontal and vertical. It’s wonderfully shabby; clean but impossibly cluttered.

After my tour I was handed off to my boss, (Darlene? Deborah? Oh crap, I’ve already forgotten her name…Yay, got it!) Dorothy. She showed me how to read the shelves, which is basically fixing all the books the patrons thought they were putting back in the right place but didn’t even get close. I will be working in the children’s section, where the shelves are always in flux. So my normal job is to read the shelves, but the each employee I met seemed gleeful about the possibility of using me for her own special projects.

I always suspected my hodgepodge of skills and interests would be useful in a library, and now I know for sure I should have been a librarian from the beginning.

This is a big step, knowing that I can work around people. As far as I can tell, they don’t use any air freshener anywhere in the building, aside from the public restroom. The employee restroom smells faintly of cleaner, but not air freshener. When I finished reading the Beginning Reader shelves my eyes were googly from the shelf reading, but otherwise I felt fine. It could change, I suppose, but at the moment I think I could spend all day in that building and feel fine.

Of course, I would like to work full time at the library someday. But for now, I’ll call it an internship. At least it’s something to put on my resume, and I get to help out a favorite institution.

Now I just have to hope ebooks don’t make libraries obsolete. Would be just my luck to find my perfect job only to have it stop existing. *crosses fingers*