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I think the pictures of my favorite summer and future winter pandemic outfits are self explanatory - comfy and loose fitting. But then that has been the way I have dressed most of my life and there certainly is no reason to change now!
--Jeanette
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I have had a lot of jobs over the years! I’ve enjoyed all of them in one way or another, but the very best job was my last one. I loved, really loved, working as a forensic psychologist. The work was so fascinating for me! Every case is different, and each involves the challenge of putting together a cohesive picture from pieces such as medical records, crime scene reports, witness statements and interviews, interviews of the defendant and testing of the defendant. I liked the analytic process and I never got bored. I liked traveling to prisons and jails, even though some of them were pretty awful. I liked interviewing defendants and witnesses. I didn’t always like going through records but I did enjoy finding pertinent information in them. I really liked testifying in court. My legal training gave me an advantage because I’m not intimidated by the setting or the attorneys. I liked being able to lay out my findings and answer questions and challenges about my methods and results. I didn’t especially like the occasional abusive cross-examination and I noticed that the more years I did this the more difficult it was not to show my annoyance. I loved taking on the challenge of getting board certified, and it was a lengthy and difficult process. At the time I did it there were only 200 board certified forensic psychologists in the country and only 12 of them were people who also had a law degree. Because of this credential and the contacts I made while taking classes for it, I had the opportunity to teach workshops all over the country. I was one of a group of five people who taught these classes, and the other four were genuine big shots in the profession. They wrote books and everyone knew their names. I felt like kind of a fraud being part of this group but it was also very fun. I love teaching, and it was very satisfying teaching aspiring forensic psychologists. A lot of people think they can do it without any particular training and they end up doing a terrible job. It felt good to improve the quality of work turned out. It was also fun to go to various places for these workshops, such as San Francisco, Seattle, Philadelphia and Washington D.C. We got a very modest stipend, but we did get to stay in nice hotels and our leader always made reservations at great restaurants every night. Because forensic psychology was such a young profession when I got involved with it more than 20 years ago, I also had opportunities to take on leadership positions in our national association, the American Psychology-Law Society. I helped start a committee for women in the profession and helped get conference speakers for the women at our conferences. I was also selected for one of the most prestigious committees in the American Psychological Association, called the Committee on Legal Issues. We assisted the APA leadership and in-house attorney in a variety of ways, such as reviewing new programs and position statements by various APA committees for legal and ethical issues. We also got to provide input for amicus Supreme Court briefs, which was amazing. Everyone on the committee during my three-year stint was so smart and so much fun to work with! After writing this, I realize it is long and probably boring for others to read. But it’s so meaningful to me that I’m not going to try to shorten it! These are great memories for me, and I feel so blessed to have been able to have such a great job. I think it gave me the opportunity to make a contribution to society, which was always my goal in my work. I miss it so much more than I ever thought I would! If I’m honest I also miss the identity it gave me. I feel a bit lost without it and am still working on figuring out my identity in retirement. But that’s another story! --Terese As a high school student, I planned on becoming a nurse, but after a visit to a physical therapy department as a candy striper, I instantly changed my mind. Was it God speaking to me? I can’t say for sure, but I have never regretted that decision. When I graduated from college, the choices were much more limited than they are today, so I spent my whole career as an acute care therapist, but I would not have had it any other way. I am a person who likes short term projects, with somewhat quick results, so working in the hospital was perfect for me. I spent a large portion of my time working with people who had undergone orthopedic surgery and then, on medical floors, often attempting to help elderly people return home. One of the more positive changes that occurred in the last few years was how the hospitalists depended on our recommendations for discharge planning. Therapists observe patient’s abilities to manage daily activities more than any other healthcare worker, so we became strong patient advocates for whether they were safe to go home or needed further therapies. Other changes in hospital work were difficult for me, so retirement came at a perfect time. I was also fortunate because I was able to work part time after my sons were born, and the salary was significant enough to make that worth while. I feel very blessed to have spent 43 years in such a meaningful career! --Jeanette My first job was as a lab assistant in college chemistry labs. It was not high paying, but paid for incidentals so my parents wouldn't have to pay for that, too. They had told me if I made good grades and got a scholarship to college, they would pay most of the rest and they did. I spent almost every afternoon in chem labs, either my own or assisting others. I did like it and it made finding my first job out of college easy in a quality control lab and the next when my husband's job took us to Chicago. The 1960s were a time when I had no problem getting hired and always in my field. Research into protein chemistry and cancer drugs both proved interesting. The one job that literally fell into my lap was reading files for residents who were still at Hissom during the lawsuit. I started as a volunteer and later it paid. That was a surprise and was part of the experiences that led to getting a degree in psychology. By this time, jobs were not so easy to find, but I did happen upon one in the prison system in Oklahoma. I certainly met a lot of interesting people, but not what I think I expected. People in prison are real people, too, many of whom made one mistake that led to their being incarcerated for life. It reminds me that one choice or decision or happening can lead to a very different path in life. I hope it made me a less judgmental person. My last job with a pay check was waiting tables in a buffet at a casino. Someone suggested I try to do this and it turned out to be a good experience. I learned some things about myself that I hadn't known before. I was fortunate to find a friend who gave me some tips on how to do the job, such as how to remember people and what they order for the next time. The best part of this job was getting tips. It is such a rewarding experience, not the delayed gratification of waiting for a monthly paycheck. I've done payroll, taken orders at Taco Bueno, wiped down tables, etc., but the longest job I have had is as a landlord or landlady which means cleaning bathrooms, painting, fixing commodes, mowing lawns, trimming trees and shrubs, cleaning carpets, scrubbing stoves and refrigerators, changing numerous light bulbs, hanging mini-blinds, installing smoke detectors and, what's more, I still have this job. I would like to resign many days, and that may happen in the future. This all comes from one decision to move to a new house and being unable to sell the old one. Which did I like best? That's hard to say, because I liked aspects of each one. Usually something external to me happened that made the job unappealing or unavailable to me. --Carolyn The only job I've ever had, when I consistently looked forward to each day of work as a new adventure, was as a medical research tech at Cancer Treatment Center of Tulsa from 1994 - 1996. I was responsible for creating a Western Blot procedure for oncogene proteins--a technique that would identify specific cancer-causing genes from their protein products in tumor tissue. Such a procedure did not exist prior to my designing one, using traditional tools for identifying plasma proteins in human serum. As a result of my assigned goals, I was dubbed the "Protein Queen" of the research department. I also maintained known cell lines and performed frozen sections on tumor tissues removed from patients who'd undergone surgery to remove them. What made this particular job so interesting was the collegial attitude and the mutual respect of all the techs and the research director. While Dr. Ray (a former molecular biology professor at ORU) often checked in with each of the techs--who also specialized in a particular area of research--and made suggestions when asked, he never interfered with experiments. Sometimes our efforts failed miserably, but Dr. Ray was calm and supportive through it all. When my process finally succeeded, several months after I'd begun working on it, I was encouraged to test as many patient samples as possible for the breast cancer genes we were focusing on, in order to build a database. After working in this lab for about two years, it was clear that CTCT was no longer interested in supporting molecular research and funding began to be cut, little by little. We narrowed our focus and eliminated experiments, but the writing was on the wall, and the lab eventually closed. A multi-million dollar investment in DNA extraction, Southern and Northern Blot, PCR and cell sorting equipment was simply forgotten. The hospital's clinical lab cannibalized whatever they could use, and the research lab wing was shuttered with what was left. I was offered a position in the clinical lab, which took for a short time until I moved on to the American Red Cross Blood Center, but the next two jobs remain the worst jobs of my career--probably owing to the fact that the previous one had been exceptionally rewarding. Leaving research broke my heart, and I made the decision at that point to abandon my science and technology pursuits and enter graduate school for a journalism degree. I've tried to marry my love of science and love of language/writing ever since. --Janice I started working at age 10, babysitting my neighbors 4 kids after school, then maid jobs weekends and vacation days for years after that. I never stopped working until my first child was born. I did have fun at some of those early jobs. When I worked for a wealthy neighbor, as nanny for their 4 children (different from the other family with 4 kids) I washed clothes, ironed them, changed and made beds, made breakfast and lunch for them, and then every afternoon from 1-3 we watched old movies together on tv. After that we would go swimming in their lake from 3-5, before me cooking supper for the whole family. (It’s where I learned to make pies!) Another fun job was working for a professional photographer, who took the portraits for the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis. I got to meet many famous actors there, one who is the current grandfather on the tv show Blue Bloods. The photographer also followed me at my high school graduation, taking all kinds of pictures, and then using them in dozens of stories his wife wrote for magazines. A third fun job was working at AT&T in the summer before college. I was hired to be a file clerk, but when I had finished with all the filing after the first hour, they decided to teach me how to do drafting. I spent the summer drafting maps for telephone wires and poles. I was trained to be a teacher, but I hated it. I loved teaching, I just didn’t know how to discipline. I thought kids would just respond to me if I was excited about a subject. That didn’t work, for many reasons. I did like being a preschool teacher and director, however, because I sang with them (with my guitar) and set up little plays for them, such as the 3 Billy Goats Gruff. But when I became a psychotherapist, I truly loved my job (my profession.) I enjoyed every person, especially if I could help them in any way. I was even able to incorporate my love of poetry in my counseling. The best thing about that job was that I could give seminars and talks about therapy and how I used poetry in it. How lucky I was to be able to use all my gifts in the service of others. But I also have to say that I didn’t make much money at it, because I had mostly clients at the bottom of the sliding fee scale. I was lucky to be able to do it as a calling and not as a living. --Cynthia The pandemic has provided opportunity to use new skills, since most of my day-to-day activities came to a halt in March. I don't mind the shutdown as much as some people might, because I've viewed it as a time to reassess how I want to spend my time. Some of the new activities I've done are:
During Co-Vid 19 my son Kent set me up with the equipment to create my own podcasts via Facebook. A few years ago I used to do audio podcasts, but this is done live with audio and video. It has been fun putting together my In-Versing Your Life podcasts, and deciding each week’s topic. His company, Blooming Twig Books is editing them and will put them (as audio) on my www.cynthiagustavson.com website along with my old audio podcasts. I like to do it because I feel there is not enough poetry in the world, and this is my way of promoting it. And there is nothing more fun for me than reading my own poetry aloud. This staying home has gotten really boring, and I’m so glad I have this to divert my attention. --Cynthia When I first started thinking about this, I could only remember one thing. I canned peaches for the first time. When I had had fresh peaches to put up before, they would have been frozen. Thanks to Livesay Orchards in Porter, good peaches are only about an hour away during the season. I had given up on peaches that came from far away because they never seemed to have any taste or juice. Of course, the very first thing should have been that I have never contributed to a blog before. It's not something I had thought about doing at all. That was for someone else to do and for me, maybe, to read. I hadn't done Zoom before, but now that seems old hat. For one other invitation to talk about the pandemic and its impact on people like me, I used Google Meet. It is different in the way people appear on the screen. The other two people had young children with compromised immune systems. Even though I am also in a more vulnerable group, I was glad I didn't have to try to explain or help children who were really vulnerable. I became a notary and that was due to the pandemic as the Oklahoma legislature decided ballots would have to be notarized, until the governor declared a state of emergency. I still think it will come in handy in the future when the pandemic is over or, at least, abates. I did a couple of outdoor notary events. I was in on the planning for two virtual accountability sessions. I am glad I didn't have to figure out the logistics of the meeting. It is quite different to be in a Zoom meeting with 200 people as opposed to the six we usually are. I am pretty sure none of this would have happened if life had continued to go on the way it was. Challenges due also present opportunities. I am good on challenges for now. --Carolyn |
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