I'm Official, and Possible Plans!

I survived the midnight shift, which I fully expected to do despite my co-worker's attempts to worry me with her harrowing story of crashing her car on the way home after her first midnight...
I believe that the last five minutes of the shift lasted longer than the entire shift did!

I am now official staff(!), and will work my first "real" shift Saturday. Fox and I have plans to see each other before I head in for the evening since that's our usual day to spend together, so I am looking forward to that. I get along with the kids well. One calls me her "new best friend" or "twin" since we have so many similarities. The first day I earned one of the boys respect because, in his words, I'm "quick with those comebacks." The youngest likes me, I think, because I give him attention, something the older kids don't do. The others like me well enough, especially the gamer because a) I can rock on Guitar Hero, and b) I "blend in with the residents."

I really like it there, and hope that I can stay on long-term. I also hope that once Fox and I solidify our wedding plans that I will be able to focus my hours toward the mornings. I know they are hard to come by, but I would hate to be married to a man I never see as he works five days a week, all mornings to evenings, and currently my schedule is predominantly evening!

I am also rather excited, because if my younger sister and I can get the money together, and I can get the time off, we're thinking of doing some traveling next month before the semester starts. Summer break doesn't last as long as it used to, I'm afraid.

I got a job!!!

The economy has not been my friend in the last eleven months that I have been job hunting, but then a former classmate offered to get me an interview where he worked, an at-risk children shelter. My dream job since I plan to go into Social Work, and psychology. I have wanted to help at-risk children, and someday adopt, since I went on mission week as a kid, helping at soup kitchens and children shelters. It was there that my group leader commented on how good I was with the kids, and told me that the social worker had spoken to him about how the girl I had been paired with had not talked to anyone, or even smiled, until I came.

Later, I worked at Boy Scout/Girl Scout camp for several summers, mainly as counselor to children of all ages. The camp also served as an outreach to at-risk and poverty stricken children. We washed their clothes, shod them, fed them, etc. One in my charge had never had a birthday cake and was the sole provider for his family at just nine years old. He mowed lawns for money to feed his family. From that time on I dreamed of working at, or starting, a shelter someday. I have plenty of dreams and aspirations, but this has been paramount.

I got the job, and on Monday will go in for manual reading and shift shadowing, already having completed First Aid and CPR training. I cannot wait, and hope that it will be as fulfilling as I have always dreamed it would be...