Thankful Thursday

This week, I am thankful for many things, but I will write about one particular one.

A week ago today, I was frantically getting a C. V. together. I had not applied for a job in 18 years, but I was going to take the leap and apply for a new job.

First, I need to establish something: I love my job. I had not been scanning the employment pages for weeks, desperately seeking a way out of my dead-end job. That was not my situation at all.

However, a job had materialised that I was interested in. It was with the same school division I have been teaching in for almost 20 years, and it would mean no report cards to fill out, no parent-teacher interviews to smile through, and virtually no marking to take up my weekends. It was an itinerant position in which I would visit six specific schools and help their staffs design and carry out "literacy programs". Basically, lots of work with teachers, some work with students, and none of the stuff listed above which is burning me out. There would be a fair bit of driving involved, but I like driving. And in this position, I would get paid for my mileage, as driving is a requisite for the job.

I worked really hard on getting this job. My Mother's Day weekend was completely engulfed in preparations for the interview: buying just the right outfit and shoes (not easy among all those Pussycat Doll shoes!), reading up on theories and methodologies of teaching reading and writing, anticipating questions and preparing the perfect answer for each one.

Well, folks, I didn't even get an interview for the job.

And I can honestly say that I am grateful.

As I already wrote, I love my job. I really do. And I think I love my job even more now.

Every day the kids I work with make me smile.

And over the past few days, every time I've smiled at work, I've said to myself, "How could you have considered giving this up?"

Really, how could I have considered giving it all up?