The last two years have been a rollercoaster in my life. First I quit AEP for a job with Scientech in Florida. After surviving Hurricane Andrew in 1992 I really had no desire to return to Florida. However I was lured with a manager position and the slick recruiting talk of my future boss. I quit AEP in Dec 2008 and moved to Palm Harbor. My family moved down a month later and the fun began.
The first week I was with Scientech I could tell the entire recruiting pitch had been based on a beautiful facade with nothing to back it up. I was a manager managing a mirage. My blood pressure shot up to 185/140 and would not come down despite doubling my blood pressure medicine. When my family moved down, and my favorite lazy boy chair, my blood pressure returned to normal.
To make a long story extremely short I did the best I could, but it was like trying to make cold molasses flow uphill in this economy. I knew I was doomed from the beginning. Back home our house did not sell and then we had the water damage incident. A realtor flushed a toilet which overflowed for two weeks. Over ninety percent of our house was damaged and the insurance company, despite being paid $3000 for the policy, had a loophole and did not pay a red cent. Never buy Farmers Insurance.
Eventually I was let go and moved back to our house in Michigan. My brother and his friends came to our rescue and fixed our main floor and they actually made it better than the original. We ended up putting $40,000 on our credit cards to fix the house. Florida unemployment was about the lowest in the nation and I only received $1200 a month. I had a few job interviews, but nothing substantial. The severance from Scientech was only two weeks pay and I had to promise never to say anything bad about them, so I won’t. Neither will I say anything good about them.
Now I am in Washington, with my family back home in Michigan. The contract position I have is a temporary one, although it could last years. I am working as a Radiological Control Technician and helping clean up the huge environmental nightmare the government created from years of making atomic weapons. Seems there idea of controls was to bury material and then hope for the best. The best didn’t happen and the stuff started getting into the groundwater, so now we spend billions to clean up the mess. I like the guys I am working with and I like the area I am in. Although the area I work is desert, the beautiful snow capped mountains are only a ninety minute drive away.
Though all the trials and tribulations I have kept my faith. My faith sustains me, on most days faith is all that keeps me going. When I came here I inquired about an old friend and was told he committed suicide in 2004. That has affected my emotional state as well as being away from home. But I know, I really do know, that God is with me wherever I am. When I had open heart surgery in 1998 I actually died after the operation and had to go under the knife and be opened up again. Thankfully it happened in intensive care and not later. But I survived and what I saw sustains me to this day. I may not want to die, and I’m trying not to hurry it along, but I do not fear death.
Occasionally I think that being terminated from Scientech was a good thing. I started writing again, and had the chance to preach again, and my faith and my passion kept the demon of depression at bay. I have experienced the love that passes all understanding; I knocked and the door was opened. Remember you are what you believe, and if you believe in nothing, then nothing you will be.
