The Big New Job
One more year of college for son Ben. His girlfriend has already graduated and gotten her first job. Son Chris has one more year of classwork in his Ph.D. program. After that he prepares for his comps and outlines his dissertation. So next summer will be a time fraught with life-changing decisions and commitments for those 3 young adults. It reminds me a little of my own story when I was in Kentucky sometime in late 1980. I had a wonderful job as a Geologic Draftsperson for the Kentucky Geological Survey, located on the U.K. campus in Lexington, KY. I loved what I did, where I worked, and who I worked with. The problem was that I was listed as a Teacher's Aid and I made the same salary. I was grindingly poor. Life was like quick sand. Pull one foot out and the other sinks. I lived with a cat named Mugsy in a small trailer in a trailer park. The park had its own ambiance which wasn't entirely unpleasant, but I could barely afford to feed the two of us and keep the trailer is bas...