Mrs. S, my "everything lady,"* also needed someone to grade for both of her World Views of the Western World year two class. That was once a week on Tuesday. So when I started working for Christar on the day after Labor Day, my typical weekly schedule was as follows:
- M/W/F: Christar in the morning, Insurance in the afternoon (and re:generation at Watermark on Mondays)
- Tues.: Mrs. S's classes, morning and afternoon
- Thurs.: Christar all day!
At Christar, my official title was that of "Project Coordinator" - managing the personnel and calendar so that all of our Creative Services department's major projects would get done in time. Thanks to my amazing boss who knew what I loved, I also had the opportunity to write for the Christar blog!!! :D The first stories I did were based on pre-recorded sharing times - but before long I was interviewing our workers (my sources) more like a real journalist!
The insurance work was more challenging, as I had to learn all the new terminology, systems, etc. That boss had a memory like a steel trap, though, so he was a HUGE help in navigating through various things.
To begin with, grading for Mrs. S took the full six hours of the two classes. But eventually, I got it down to a system--and I knew which students I could trust to do well and which ones I had to watch out for!
It was definitely a lot of juggling, thus the title to this post, but it worked surprisingly well through January and February. It didn't take me too long to realize, however, that the insurance position was not something I wanted to do long-term. And so in December I gave my boss three month's notice. He was scheduled to have a surgery that we were hopeful would restore his sight .... but even when that didn't work, I chose to stick to my word and leave that position.
That was partly because Christar had offered me the opportunity to help full-time on a short-term project: Launching a new website!!! So as soon as the date I had told my insurance boss arrived, I bid farewell to him and turned my full attention on M, W, Th, F to learning Site Stacker, Christar's new website platform.
And then March 2020 arrived. And we all know what that meant! COVID-19 officially reached the U.S., changing life as we knew it.
Like everyone else, I worked from home while Christar was totally shut down, which was about six weeks I believe. I was still living in my parents' home, and I sorely missed my Christar desk & computer while I tried to work from my personal laptop! The World View classes suddenly switched to virtual as well, meaning I could do the grading in the evenings and work on Tuesdays for Christar too. I was also so very thankful that I was no longer working for the insurance guy .... I can't imagine the extra challenges that would have presented themselves there!
On April 1st, Christar's new website launched! In the weeks after that, there were still some cleanup sort of tasks to do with the launch, so I ended up remaining full-time until the middle of July. Also, in May, the World Views class responsibilities ended.
In April or May, I decided I was finally ready to start looking for a new place to live. I'd been living at home for most of two years, and was ready for a little more independence!! Praise God, through a string of connections I found a three-bedroom duplex where a gal was living on her own (well, with her large dog! 😉). We met a couple of times, and decided to move forward with things. So in early June, a couple folks from church and my dad helped me moved all my earthly possessions about 15 minutes away.
The same weekend that I first met with my new roommate, she was meeting a guy in person for the first time who she had met online. Keep note of that for the next blog post! 😁 But we hit it off pretty well, mostly stayed out of each other's hair, and had frequent nice chats. And I was so grateful to have a little space and a kitchen to call at least partly "my own"!
In July and August, I once again hit the job searching hard - knowing that Christar was back down to part-time work, and that since I was now paying rent I needed continued income! (Though I did have a pretty nice savings pot from all the time of working the equivalent of full-time and not having many expenses!) I know I applied for two, if not three part-time jobs ... but all of them fell through.
Along the way, my Christar boss had made the offer that I could work full-time for her!! And while I loved the idea, I wasn't sure I could make it work financially as it would involve a decrease in my hourly wage. But naturally there were benefits to being a full-time employee of Christar!! So once I was told that I didn't get the last part-time job I applied for, I called my boss on Zoom and let her know. And then I said "But you know what this means? It means I'm all yours!!" She was quite excited!
As it worked out, I started working as an official full-time employee at Christar within days of my first anniversary of beginning work there! I like anniversaries, so that made it fun for me. The juggling multiple jobs routine was officially over!
Written Jan. 25, 2022
*I call Mrs. S that because she was first my high school teacher for a three-year co-op class, after the first year she asked me to do some work for her (becoming my boss), and when I went away to college she became more of a mentor figure/friend who I met with each time I was back in town. I am so very blessed by my relationship with her! :)
No comments:
Post a Comment