A Month of Thanksgiving - Day 5 (Thursday)

    A Month of Thanksgiving - Day 5 (Thursday)

""Gratitude turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity...it makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow." Melody Beattie

Today I am grateful for having a vision of my future in God's purposes for my life and allowing Him to move me in directions I might not have chosen consciously.

My Career progression

Through the years each challenge I faced led me into growth and learning new skills I had no idea I could do. In the late 1990's I faced my first layoff from a job I loved at Boeing. I was a bit scared, but jumped out there ahead of the curve and took a voluntary layoff instead of waiting for the dreaded pink slip. It was a leap of faith - one that paid off in an unprecedented way. I had gone to work for a game software development company in Bellevue in their HR department, and I faced the awful 167/I-405 corridor commute again. After about nine months there, I was contacted by a former co-worker - an instructor from my Boeing training department days, who had gone to work for this little IT consulting firm in Kent, WA. They were looking for an IT Project Coordinator and he wanted to know if I was interested. 

This was my first chance to break into the more technical opportunities of the Information Technology industry and having had several years of administrative work and mad computer skills behind me, I was ready for a new challenge. Opportunities come knocking in unusual places, and one needs to have their eyes and ears open to see them - but also be ready to make that leap towards new possibilities. Gary had been working in his field - Technology and system repair services and things were looking up for us. We began to budget, and save, and planned and dreamed. 

The kids were getting older and no longer needed so much childcare after school. Gary was home early in the afternoons and we were able to save more money. These years of financial and home stability up til 2001 led us to be enabled to buy our first home, in Bonney Lake, WA. We were able to plan a move from the chaotic apartment life in downtown Kent to the idyllic suburban life in East Pierce County. We were building a new construction home through a developer and it took time to build, so we spent summer and fall preparing for our coming move. That sense of security would soon be shaken again, and this time I was more prepared for it.

The dot-gone era (internet boom and bust) was upon us and I had been laid off again due to the economic shift and recession, one month before we were due to close the sale on our new house. and move to our new neighborhood shortly after Christmas, 2001. I knew God would provide for us and He did. With lots of prayers and faith, and a little luck. We had gone from homeless to hopeful - to owning our own home, and a new era was upon us.

(to be continued...)