Real Job

Since the second semester of my second year in optometry school I've been hoping for a "real job". It has taken 8 years to obtain said "real job".

The jobs Swell and I are moving around the world to take will pay well less than half of what we could make being optometrists here in North America but to be honest we haven't really been making a whole tonne of money the last two years. Working very part-time will do that to you.

I work on Saturday. I haven't worked since October 8th.

We leave Atlanta on December 13th to drive to Edmonton, Alberta for my brother's wedding/Christmas. During the 4 weeks between now and then I work 7 times and Swell works twice. Not a lot of fill-in work to be found in these terrible economic times.

After Edmonton we're going to drive to Washougal to spend some time with Swell's folks. I was very fortunate to find 4 days of work in Washington while we're there visiting. Rather than sit around doing nothing I'll be spending four of my days working for one of my classmates (we worked for her before we moved here to Atlanta). If our departure for the South Pacific is later than we expect I may be able to pick up a few other days from her as well.

This work, in the words of the lovely Martha Stewart, "is a good thing". We need the money to pay for 2008 taxes and to cover our moving expenses (for much of which we'll be reimbursed).

On Thursday, a week from today, I have to go to our condo's HOA meeting as I've submitted an application for the ability to lease our place under the undue hardship clause. I'll just be there to answer any questions and hopefully move the process along quickly. As soon as we have official permission we'll be listing our place for lease furnished. If it is not wanted furnished we'll have to move a bunch of stuff into storage.

Well first we'll have to rent a bigger storage unit and move our already stored stuff into the bigger unit and add our not yet stored stuff to the same unit.

Fun.

We hope to rent it furnished.

Our new jobs come complete with job descriptions. Mine is four pages long.

Swell's is three pages long.

Each description comes complete with a "reports to" section.

Swell reports to me.

I've already put her on notice.

I consider this my first real job as it is organized. Requires specific reports to be written and things to be done.

The job description has words like "liase", "implement", "monitor", "evaluate", "capacity building", and "collaborate" in it.

On the surface these seem like buzz words but they are words that are important to me. They are public health words.

It was in the second semester of my second year of optometry school that I went to rural Honduras to do an eyecare "mission". We stayed in tents and worked in unlit school rooms doing rudimentary eye exams and distributing recycled spectacles.

An eye opener for me.

I don't think its necessary for me to again espouse my disdain for eyecare missions. Suffice it to say this trip, in addition to my first trip to the occupied territories and reading about social justice, started me down the path to my first "real job".

It won't be easy but I feel very fortunate to be stepping into something that has a lot of groundwork already laid. I can do good work while learning from people who have already been doing good work. I can take what I know and apply it to a job that specifically states that it is designed with a public health perspective in mind.

I asked the group we're going to work with for a copy of the curriculum and was sent a 60 page document outlining the how and why of not only our jobs but the entire program. It is well written and it quickly becomes evident that this is not a fly by night operation but rather something that is designed to leave lasting change.

Better than that is that they ask themselves if what they are doing is working and if it isn't they hope to learn why not and make changes.

I've been communicating with a fellow who quit his optometry job here in the US to go to Haiti to start a clinic in an under served area. I applaud his intention but the more I think about it the happier I am that Swell and I are not off doing that somewhere. I have absolutely no desire to run a clinic in a developing country. This guy will be doing good work and I'm sure it will grow into something that helps a lot of people but I'd much rather try to teach 10 people to go out and do what I know how to do so that my efforts can be multiplied.

Not only do I not want to have a clinic in a developing country but I'm very happy to be taking a break from seeing patients here in the US. Its a tedious career. Tedious simply for the type of work Swell and I have been doing. In other situations optometry is less tedious but our opportunities have really been difficult. In only 6 years I've probably worked in more than 20 offices in 4 states. I'm burned out even though I had a 6 month break when in Palestine and have worked VERY part-time the last year.

I think Swell is to.

This will be a great change of pace.

We're both excited but a little wary at the same time. Worried about money. Worried about being so far away from home.

We expect a lot of visitors and hope to be in North America next December and January.

I'm sure I'll write a lot more about this "first real job" in the coming weeks. I hope you all don't get tired of it. This is more than a job to me it's the realization of a dream that started 8 years ago.

Not much else to talk about as we're just packing and wasting time.