Tag Archives: job

Workin’ at the good ol’ ENT

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A few highlights from the past 3 weeks at my new job:

  • Having fun getting to know the 3-4 ladies I work with the most and doing my best to stay neutral when each of them tells me stuff about one of the other ones.  They are friendly and have been great to me.
  • Trying to figure out what to do when one person trains you to do a task one way and then another trains you a little differently.  Do I do it all ways at once so that whoever is watching over me at the moment is satisfied with my work?  Good stretching exercise for my pea brain!
  • Getting tickled when patients walk up to the counter, tell me the doctor they came to see and then just look at me.  I look back and say, “and you are?”  Being psychic would help, either that or having a photographic memory for more than a few thousand patient names!
  • Realizing that a smile goes a long way in helping people feel welcome or better about their day.
  • Wishing there was so much more I could do for a patient besides smile when they’ve come in for a biopsy report or have been disfigured by surgery for cancer.
  • Trying to remember that many of the patients are not raising their voices at me because they’re angry, it’s because they’re hard of hearing.
  • Learning a big lesson today after making a mistake that upset one of the docs so much he dropped the “F” bomb in the back office.  Woops.
  • Making cookies tonight to take tomorrow to help make the back office a happier place.
  • Realizing there are so many people in the world who have very little people skills, even intelligent people.
  • Knowing now more than ever how important people skills are.  Taking time to learn them is time well-spent.
  • Also realizing there are many people in the world who care most about their preferences and being considerate of others isn’t always a priority.
  • Being so thankful to have already met a few other co-workers who are believers.
  • Being thankful for a job in which I can be with people and hopefully make a difference.
  • So extremely thankful for Friday afternoons off!

 

Just a little timid

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I mean, if you played the trust game with someone – you know when you fall backwards and they catch you – but they let you fall or dropped you, you probably wouldn’t jump up to do it again with the same person right?  Or with anyone for that matter.  It’s a little harder to be “gung ho” when you’re about to do something you’ve done before and gotten hurt.  I get irritated with myself for being such an emotional person.  I’m working on decreasing the frequency of my knee-jerk emotional reactions to things but they still happen.

I keep telling myself – this is another chance to keep trusting God, people are people and no matter where you go or work there will be times of conflict you have to work through, no person or place or church or job is perfect, blah, blah, blah.  Continue reading →

The Joy of Cleaning Toilets

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I still refer to it as one of the best, most life-changing summers of my life.  It was the summer of 1985 and I was on staff at a family camp in the San Bernardino mountains of California.  “Forest Home” was my home for almost three months and I loved it there among the tall pine trees and rugged rocky slopes.  Each week a different group of families would come through so there was constant activity and life happening all around.  I was assigned to the “Accomo” crew, which is short for “Accommodations”, which means housekeeping.  My crew mates and I would travel by pick-up trucks to the various cabins and dorms where the people stayed, changing bed sheets, vacuuming, cleaning the bathrooms, and all that kind of stuff.   We would load up with canvas bags of clean sheets, bags for the dirty sheets, cleaning supplies, vacuum cleaners, mops, buckets, you name it and work all day.  It was hard work and tiring.  There were times my feet would hurt from standing in showers being in tennis shoes wet with cleaning solution and disinfectant all day.  I went through lots of hand lotion from all the washing we did.  I did learn how to drive using side rearview mirrors – navigating out of narrow gravel driveways without going off a ledge (Actually I did go off a ledge once but no one got hurt).  Continue reading →

The Buck Does Not Stop Here

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I know God doesn’t have an actual desk, but if He did, there’d be one of those signs on it that reads “The Buck Stops Here.”  He gave me that image the other day when I was letting myself get weighed down with concerns.  How often I forget that I’m supposed to pass burdens on up to Him, I’m not supposed to try to carry them all by myself.  Have you ever seen a little child wanting to help or prove how big they are by dragging a suitcase or carrying a bag too heavy for them?  “Here let me take that,” the mom says.  “No,” the child says as they strain and grunt to pull it along, “I got it.” They eventually have to give in because they just can’t do it without help.

Jesus said to come to Him when I’m worn out from trying to lug heavy stuff along.  He said that His way of life is light and easier to carry and besides that He’ll be with me, helping the whole time.   (Matt. 11:28)  The buck of burdens doesn’t stop with me, it stops with Him.  He’s the only One who really knows what to do with them.  He is the only One strong enough, wise enough, patient enough.

The buck of decision-making doesn’t stop with me either.  I used to work in a doctor’s office as receptionist and enjoyed greeting the patients and getting to know the “regulars.”  Continue reading →

Do we really know?

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When I woke up, honestly my first thought was that Jesus was coming back.  I slept in the top bunk in the staff dormitory at Forest Home Family Camp in the San Bernardino mountains that summer.  It was the middle of the night and my bed was jolting forward and backward so severely that all I could do was grip the sides of the bed and look over to see my roommates standing in the middle of the room clutching each other and screaming while bottles and brushes slid off the bathroom counter.   It was my first earthquake experience and was quite the eye-opener!  The rest of the night we all huddled together on sleeping bags on the floor, stiffening a little each time an aftershock rumbled under the floor.  More than any other time before then, I felt very small. Continue reading →

Workin for a livin

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Middle daughter is about to get driver’s license.

Middle daughter wants a car.

After parents laugh hysterically they tell her they are broke.

Middle daughter realizes that to make money you must work.

Middle daughter gets a job!

Congrats Kaikin!  She’ll be bagging your groceries at the local store starting soon and savin’ her way to an automobile.  Looking back, I wish I would have gone to a grocery store or restaurant for my first job.  I worked in a quiet clothing store and was pretty much bored to tears every evening.  Those were the days when you really dressed up for work, too, so I’d be standing around in high heels, whistling and changing the clothes on the mannequins every night just to make the time go by.