I had a great weekend with Dad last weekend. I drove over to SA and nabbed him, then took him to Corpus Christi, where we spent a year and nine months when I was a kid. We talked a lot about our problems (despite the idea that we were going on the trip to try to get away from them).
Dad had a situation similar to mine in 1964, although I think (as usual) his was much more dire than mine. He had a wife, a 5 year old, a baby, and a dependent mother-in-law when he got "laid off" (he really didn't get laid off; he was in the USAF Reserves and working full-time at Hensley Field in Dallas; the USAF told them they were going to activate them and probably send them to this new hot-spot, Viet-nam. Dad determined that, at 40, he had been to Southeast Asia for two different wars and he'd sit this one out, so he was "retired" from the Air Force). Anyway, he worked 3 jobs till he found a new professional job, which happened to be in Corpus Christi. So away we went.
I was baptized in Corpus Christi, at First Baptist Church. Dad and I visited and it looked very similar to what we remembered, but MUCH smaller. Dr. Vernon O. Elmore baptized me; he also (while at Baptist Temple in San Antonio) baptized my friend Sabra; he also preached a revival in Shreveport where he baptized yet another of our friends. I tell this story to say: we were talking with a nice "church lady" who told us that Dr. Elmore donated his (enormous) library to the local University when he died, and they have a "Vernon O. Elmore" room containing his books. One of them is a large, leather bound, gilded ledger book in which he recorded every one of his baptisms, wedddings, and funerals. So sometime we'll have to go down there and find our names in Dr. Elmore's book.
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It is very, very hard to find a job right now. I have never seen it like this in my 30 years of work; never has there been a time I couldn't find adjuster jobs all over everywhere. Even they are not there. And salary offerings are falling.
One of my fraternity brothers is also unemployed, laid off the same day as I. He, too, is finding it tough sledding, much tougher than he envisioned.
I also just found out that another of my friends, same experience level as me, is looking at a June layoff. She's got two degrees and 30 years experience. Doesn't seem to matter, if they're eliminating your position, they're eliminating it.
Moral: if you have a job, thank them kindly, do what they tell you to do, and quit griping.
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Dad had a fender bender the other day. Nobody hurt but it messed up his front bumper.
So why did I have the same wreck yesterday? Looks like I'd have learned from his example.
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All in all, a less-than-stimulating week. Let's see what the weekend brings.
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Your fault? The fender bender, I mean.
ReplyDeleteNo. Kid in dilapidated P.O.N.T.I.A.C. with $6,000 worth of stereo equipment, talking on his cell phone, sitting at exit from gas station onto access road of freeway. I waited. I waited. He kept sitting and talking as traffic cleared; lights went through 2 complete cycles. People behind us honking. I pulled to the right of him to turn out, thinking there might be something wrong with his car. As I pulled up to the exit, I stopped. He suddenly gassed it (I guess the car horns penetrated his thick skull) and he turned directly across me, scraping my left front fender and bumper. I was leaning on my horn and trying to back up.
ReplyDelete70-30. I'm going to see if it can be buffed out; there's a couple of deep scratches in the plastic and that's it. His car had so many bumps and bruises on the side there was no way you could tell where it even touched me.