Up like a rosebud

Well, today’s blog is all about me… those of you who have been following know that this past month has been really stressful. Not finding a job (of any kind), bills needing to be paid, internet not working, working on my friend’s legal problems… and dealing with bureaucracy in general.
And if you are long time follower you know that I have a history of clinical depression. I have been un-medicated and self-monitoring for 5 years as of next month; the symptoms were sneaking back and my daughter was offering to send me to Calgary, if that is what I wanted. The biggest contributing factor was not being able to interact with the homeless and street people. My outreach work gives me joy, a reason to be…. Since 2005 this has been the longest I have been separated from my client friends. It is a quirk of the shelter industry… that clients cannot become employees; as I very painfully learned in Ottawa it doesn’t take much contact to be considered a client and ineligible for work. So I have spent the last 6 weeks avoiding my homeless friends.
Happily this week, I started a volunteer position with the food bank…. Many of the clients are working poor. And some are transients, in and out of places every few months, but that is a conversation for another time. It just felt so good to be useful again to be connecting with the clients, but that’s my thing. I hope you all have or find something that makes you feel that way.
Also, I interviewed for a position that has me really excited…. It is creative work with a team developing a brand new educational initiative. Ideas keep hitting me left and right. I am working up a flow chart and researching links, if I don’t get hired I’ll probably still have to throw in my two cents every now and then LOL. I had forgotten how exciting it is to watch a project unfold; to see concrete final results. In human services everything is fluid; circumstances change, people change and addiction recovery is mostly 2 steps forward and 1 step back. Nothing is actually ever “done”; it would be so refreshing to actually complete something. If I am lucky enough to get this job… my weekends will be spent with the homeless either through formal or informal outreach.
Guess I can’t go without talking a bit about the Google Ads. So far most ads are reasonably appropriate and inoffensive, also I have discovered that they have a mechanism whereby I can block anything I find inappropriate (like get rich quick schemes, or dating sites). The ads pay a few cents for every click, but I don’t get paid unless people check out the advertiser’s site. I open each new site at least once and so far I haven’t been spammed by anyone. Angels of the Road will need $6000 dollars to finish our journey, the ads are just one small part of a plan to make that happen… the rest will come from a day job, and whatever other freelance work I can come up with. So thanks for checking out the ads often… every little bit help. Have a joyous day. Bonny