peaknix

My being caught in the economic collapse last fall, was laid off in December, has submerged me into a internally reflective world. I have oscillated through the anxieties you might imagine and fully felt and processed the depression that comes with being unemployed during such a malignantly depressed job market.

No job in sight.

I have had my homesteading life to distract me.

I spent the early winter ordering seed catalogs, I spent the mid winter starting seeds (we have such a small growing season here have to give the plants a head start indoors), I spent the very cold early spring trying to build semi-warm environments in my garden for some of my starts and then spent mid spring lamenting the fiercely rainy and cold weather.

During that early spring (snow, ice) we experienced our first kidding season so I was also busy being a midwife doing on the job training. We lost one momma goat and gained 10 baby goats, whew. I wish these animals didnt do this when its still frozen solid outside.

We are now milking with a mechanical milker and getting between 2 and 3 gallons of fresh goat milk a day. I am starting to make all sorts of cheese and we are sharing these with friends who appreciate raw goat milk cheese and other products.

We are now dreaming of the possibility of a dairy to make raw goat milk cheese for sale. We dont have the money for this but, who knows, perhaps there are people who love our goats milk who might want to help us out.

Still no job in sight. Our unemployment benefits are running perilously close to out for both my husband and I (did I mention that we were both laid off?).

There is this massive cognitive dissonance – we have built a fantastic homestead that gets better every day but it seems we could easily lose it all if we dont find some gainful employment soon!

Most of the time I shut all of these thoughts out. Today, I decided to spill them out there for you to read.

I feel like am at the bottom of the curve in terms of fiscal and emotional resilience. I know that its not helpful to feel hopeless but you dont really have much of a choice, when you do or do not feel hopeless. There are so many external factors that I am not able to beat into shape.

I know I am talented in MANY different ways but I still find myself unemployed. Many of my talents and passions lie outside of my schooling so my resume is rather toxic when I try for jobs that do not require a PhD.

It really doesnt matter how smart you are but rather the types of connections you have and my network is as brown and shriveled as you might find at the end of the growing season after a few frosts and storms.

I am not asking for sympathy, just opening a window into my world at the moment. Who knows. Maybe I will win the lottery or, gasp, actually get a job (lottery seems more likely) and my next story will be about starting my dream – a self-sustaining life boat community in a far away land.