The Unemployment Diaries: No Love This Week

I cannot believe I am going to be so feeble and pathetic but might as well fess up to it, right?

I’ve been thinking about this post and browsing my photos for 2 hours and I cannot find any happy, cheerful thoughts. Of course, I have things I love in my life- and more importantly people I love- but I can’t muster the gratitude right now.

Instead my pea-sized primordial brain is seized up like an engine with no oil- grinding away on the same series of thoughts:

1. Unemployment rate is rising again.
2. New jobs data is GRIM
3. Portland may be fun but has almost no economy
4. My chosen career is fading into obsolescence
5. I’m too old to find a job but too young (and poor) to retire
6. I could maybe find a job somewhere else in the U.S. but it would mean selling our house at a loss and ending up back in an apartment thus marking yet another step on my downward mobility trend.

To change metaphors these thoughts begin to spiral until I’ve moved from concern to full blown panic attack. Which is not fun or interesting for anyone so I’ll stop now.

I’m sure this will pass and I’ll get my blogging groove back on so don’t give up on me! Oh, and no need to send happy thoughts or positive reinforcement- my mother is saying novenas and has lit candles so, according to her, it's all taken care of.