The New Normal

My husband and I have settled into a new sort of life.  We are both working – he at his part time job at the library and me at my two jobs substitute teaching and care giving.  We both like what we are doing but, having been cut off at the knees, are making far less money than we were before we lost our jobs. 

Our contract with the realtor will expire in the beginning of July.  People are still looking at our house (three this week) but no takers.  The real estate market has nosedived even since we put our house on the market in September of last year.  We are tired of vacating the house and having people traipse through only to get negative or disinterested comments.   What the market will hold next year is anyone’s guess.   We are not sure what we are going to do about the house, but we do need to move at some point in the near future.  I would like to sell the house to someone we know without a realtor, but don’t know of anyone at this time. 

We are still in a holding pattern for the time being but subsisting.  As I talk with people I am meeting through my work, I am finding that many (young and older) are working at least two jobs to pay their bills.  Recent college graduates are finding the competition very stiff in the workforce with as many as 1,400 applications for one job.  Frankly, I don’t see any improvement in the economy thus far.   Get down in the trenches with real people trying to make a living and see what is really happening right now in this country.

Anyone who thought the world was going to end on May 21 didn’t’ get an easy out and the beat goes on.