A New Beginning

Most, if not all of you (if you're even still reading this!) are aware that I was laid off last week. What a strange, surreal, upsetting, stressful and yet wonderful experience. You all can probably relate or at least understand my first 4 adjectives. But wonderful? Yeah. Wonderful. On many levels. The outpouring of support and well-wishes has been overwhelming. The positive thoughts and prayers heading my way are surprising yet comforting. It was also wonderful because the place I was working was, well, toxic to say the least. I won't go into more, since Eric is still (at least for now) employed there. But many of you know it was not a healthy place to be and have known our frustrations for awhile.

So I am choosing to be upbeat and positive and looking forward to the unknown, yet wonderful future that is ahead. I have been scouring the want ads. Which in this day and age are numerous. I now have about 50 job sites and company websites 'bookmarked' and they are checked daily, often several times daily. I have applied for jobs from Rochester, NY to Hyannis, MA and many places in between. I have had 2 rejections, and one phone call. No interviews. No solid leads. But it's really only been 4 days. I'm thinking positive, staying busy and forging ahead.

On Saturday, I argued with Time Warner for an hour and a half on the phone. For my time, I received a months worth of free cable/tv/internet and a nice credit for next month too. And they lowered my rate by $25/month. (They have been charging us for a box and remote that we didn't have.) Yesterday at Wegmans, I saved $16 on a $27 bill, using coupons and returned bottles.

Last week, I helped Sheila weed her river bank. Eric helped too on Friday when he had the day off. (This was originally a job for Alex, until he realized how much actual work it required. Sigh.) Sheila was generous enough to pay us for the work and we put it towards our groceries for the week.

So for having a week 'off" (well, I was still being paid last week...) I did pretty well with saving/earning a little extra cash. Anything extra will go a long way right now. We'll be ok for awhile, but cut-backs are in progress at the Hayden House. We're not ruling out the possibility of selling the house and downsizing. (We were already thinking that way before this happened.) We also won't rule out the possibility of moving away from Syracuse entirely. Our options are open.

Next up, I'll be clearing out the basement getting ready for a massive yard sale. We have so much junk, we'll probably earn enough for a couple of mortgage payments!