The J-O-B

I'm getting to the job part, but I have to explain how the job came to be! So, Summer, 1988 we moved from Texas City, TX to Broken Arrow, OK. Jordan started 1st grade and Hailey went to pre-school at our church. We bought a house, met friends and got involved with soccer with both kids. Life was good and full! January, 1997, Jim was told that they were going to move the office to Conroe, TX. We finished out the school year...Jordan was in 9th grade and Hailey in 6th...and moved to The Woodlands, TX. Jim was working in the office, but traveling a lot...mostly international...Taiwan, India, The Phillipines, Chile, Peru...etc. It was our "normal". When we moved to Texas, we moved back "home". The summer we moved, Jim was in The Phillipines working. I sold a house, moved us (2 kids, 2 dogs, a cat and a fish) to a rent house and continued building a house...not ME, but you know. Jim came home in October so we could close on the house and move in and back to The Phillipines he went! He was gone a lot that year. Our "normal" continued and soon enough Jordan graduated from high school and went to college. Soon after Hailey graduated and went to college, too. We had 2 kids in college at the same time for 3 semesters. May, 2007 Hailey graduated from college, Jordan was getting married in a few months and Jim was offered a job with Welded Construction. It would be a domestic job with no international travel. He accepted the job and so we were back where we started when we got married. We bought another travel trailer and hit the road. First job location was in Wisconsin for about 10 months and then to Louisiana, Missouri for a year. THAT was a great year! I met some really good friends, Jim was getting more intune with Welded and the people and the kids were adults! When the job in Missouri was over we moved to Perrysburg, Ohio so Jim could work in the main office for Welded. He was in charge of the construction business...building pipelines. After about a year, he was named the Vice President of Operations. He travelled to different job sites and I made a new home for us (still in our trailer). After living there for about a year and a half we bought a house and put the trailer in storage. 2011 was a busy year for Jim and also for me...I painted, furnished, and decorated our new (1955) house! We are almost to current time...! I went to Europe in May for 3 weeks this year with my Dad. It was a great trip! When I returned in mid June Jim was busy with a job going on in Kentucky. They got another job about 15 miles away and so Carol (lady that worked in the office with Brad) was moved over there to run the office. I knew Brad was going to need some clerical help, so I offered! First I mentioned it to Jim and he was receptive! THAT surprised me. I thought he would wrinkle his nose...meaning he didn't think it was a good idea! He mentioned it to Brad and told him that he (Jim) had nothing to do with it. So, Brad called and asked if I was serious and BAM...I had a job! I went to Kentuck on July 4 and started working on July 5. I've been working M, T, W, and TH 10 hours a day. It has felt so good to do something that earned $$!! So, here it is almost 4 weeks later and I'm still working! I'm doing clerical work and enjoying it! The running joke is that my boss reports directly to Jim so I'm "sleeping with my boss's boss!" I love saying that! Ha! I still have more Europe pictures to post and will get to them...I'm just too busy working right now!!!

J-O-B

Yep, I'm working. Believe it. Me, who hasn't had a full time job since January 1980! Jim and I got married December 8, 1979 and I was working for a title company. His job kept him traveling for extended periods at a time, so I quit work in January, 1980 to travel with him. The first couple of years he worked in south Louisiana, St. Louis, Vicksburg, MS, but mostly south Louisiana. We loved it. We were close to my family in Louisiana and close to CAJUN food! We bought a house in Texas City, TX and traveled. We stayed in hotels...really, it was Motels!, or rented apartments. Life was good. We eventually bought a travel trailer to call home while we were away on the road. We met some really great people and still have many of those friends all these years later. In June, 1981 we went to Marshall, MN for a mainline (pipeline) job. (He had been working for the directional crossing division for a good while). Mid summer I was pregnant, but had a miscarriage at 3 months. Jim was so upset about it, but I was not. Not that I hadn't wanted the baby, I just knew that God was taking care of a situation that was not meant to be. Found myself pregnant a few months later and Jordan was born in August, 1982. HE WILL BE THIRTY IN A FEW SHORT WEEKS! We continued life on the road and then back to home base in TC, TX between jobs. Jim had a job to go to in Virginia in June, 1984. I was pregnant when we left home heading to Big Stone Gap, Virginia. We lived there for a couple of months and then the job moved to another location, so we moved to Pound, Virginia. We lived in a holler! Coal trucks, hillbillies, mountains...we actually lived in the county that Coal Miner's Daughter was filmed in. It was very interesting to live amongst people that I really had never been around. I mean, it's not that often that the sheriff pulls up, opens his trunk and gives you a gallon of moonshine! True story! We headed back to Texas mid-fall. Jim went on a few short jobs and Jordan and I stayed home. Hailey was born in February, 1985. We left when she was a week old to go to Jim's job in Longview, TX. Life continued like that for several more years. When Jordan started kindergarten, we decided that I would stay home so he could go to school like normal kids. Jim's Dad was a pipeline welder (he worked on the Alaskan pipeline in the mid '70's). Jim and his brothers had gone to different schools all over the country and he did not want our kids doing that. So, he started looking for a job where we lived so that we would ALL be home. During Jordan's kindergarten year he had several interviews with some local companies, but was told he was overqualified. In the spring of 1988 the company he worked for offered him a job in their main office...in Tulsa, OK. So, we packed up and moved to Oklahoma! ...to be continued...