I’m including background that someone reading my column for the first time might not know. If you read it regularly feel free to skip down a couple of paragraphs.
After working disasters for seven years for The Churches of Christ Disaster Relief effort and traveling all over the country, I decided to stay close to home for a while and took a job as a Partnership Specialist with the US Census Bureau for the 2020 Census. It was basically a Public Relations job and I loved it. I sat in the office of all 38 County Judges in Northeast Texas and encouraged them to get excited about taking the lead in making sure their counties were counted. I had a terrific time until COVID-19 forced me and my colleagues to work from home and stay in touch with our contacts via Email and phone.
I had planned to go back to work for the Church after my commitment to the Census and my boss at COCDRE wanted me back. However, while my position with the Church Disaster Effort was sometimes coordinating disasters, most of the time I travelled all over several states and preach about our ministry. I also attended lectureships and encampments like Red River Family Encampment in New Mexico, Tahoe Family Encampment in California, Yellowstone Bible Camp in Pray Montana, Bible Lectureships in Lubbock, TX, Searcy, Arkansas, Edmund, OK, Abilene, TX, Monterey, CA and Malibu, CA.
My plan to return was thwarted by COVID-19. Lectureships and Encampments were cancelled indefinitely, many Churches have gone to online worship and the crowds at Churches who do meet are very small.
When my job at the Census Bureau ended, it was as much my decision as my old boss that the situation had changed and to go back and pay me to do the same job would not be cost effective. In short adding my salary back to overhead would probably be a drain on resources that would be better held for disaster victims. To be sure, in my tenure we raised enough money for our disaster efforts to continue for years to come. But if fund raising was slow, I just wouldn’t want to draw from reserves to take a salary.
My sweet wife Lori suggested that we are doing well enough for me to retire like she did several years ago after a career with the Government. She bought me a brush chipper for my tractor and a professional grade chain saw to keep me busy clearing brush at our land along Mustang Creek. Together and with the help of a couple of hard working young men, Jeremy Robertson and Dwayne Calvin, we got a lot of trees and underbrush cleared along the creek. Now there are trails through the trees that are absolutely beautiful.
However, retirement isn’t all clearing brush. Lori and I cleaned out closets and the attic, we put new siding on the house, and most recently she painted most of the inside of the house while I moved stuff and put up pictures when she was done.
It’s a big switch to go from traveling all over the country to basically staying home and working on “projects”.
A couple of months ago I was watching one of my favorite movies: “Paint Your Wagon.” And as Lee Marvin’s character, Ben Russom sang: “I was born, under a wandering star.” I got to thinking: I sure would like to go back to work in disaster relief. So I prayed about it and started applying for jobs online.
In December God answered my prayer and I was offered a job as a “Costing Specialist” doing disaster relief work for the govenment. But it turns out God has a sense of humor. On January 5th I started a new job. The first week was training in Denton, TX where they issued me and my incoming class computers and sent us out to work from home. Now, I do Disaster Relief work for eight hours a day, but I do it in front of a computer and never leave home. No traffic, no commute, I just get up in the morning, sign into my computer and I attend meetings, make phone calls and do everything in the little office set up in our home…..and when I get off work, Lori can assign whatever projects she likes to me. As I said, God has a sense of humor. But he sure is good to me.
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