Everything Corps

Last night I had a dream in which a woman had a bumper sticker on her desk that said: "Everything Corps". It was a joke on people who are always joining this organization or corps such as the Peace Corps. Of course the joke fell flat once I was awake, but it seemed funny to everyone in the dream last night including me.

When I stood up, I thought about the Peace Corps. At one time when I was in my early 20's, I thought about joining it; but I could not think of anything I could teach anyone in a third world country and just gave up. Now, since being here in Korea, I know I can teach English and if I joined them maybe they would help me get some training on teaching English as a second language. I felt so ill prepared here because my training consisted of one semester of ESL. I also thought about my age. Would they take me on? They took Lillian Carter, mother of Jimmy Carter, president of the United States. She was in her 80's but then she was a registered nurse.

But that was the joke. I am always trying to get a job because that is what I have always done over the years. I have worked full time since the age of 15 and never stopped. Am I one of those people who are trying to be a member of the Everything Corps when I already have a job. I am a writer. It is so hard to be self-employed when one has spent the better part of 50 years working full time and looking for better jobs.

When I was in the last few years of my job working for a state employment office, employees retired from their job and then still came to work and sat in their cars in the parking lot. They started to look for other employment. They didn't know anything else. I laughed to myself that when I retired I would not be that way, but I have been for the most part.

It really isn't funny when you change something that has been ingrained in you for so many years. I have hobbies and something I really want to do full time. yet, I look up from my laptop or my notebooks and think about getting a job somewhere, anywhere. Look where I am. I am in Korea where I had taught English and writing in an university. I almost got an overpayment in my Social Security.

That bumper sticker should have read 'anything corps' and maybe it did and I remembered it wrong. I need to sit and evaluate things and learn to do what it is I really want to do. It is not easy doing that. Some of me is willing to do anything but that.