Then came the second reduction income, really just an adjustment to the first. I began to panic. I admit there were tears and not just about letting the cleaning lady go. But I had a plan. Time to put on my big girl panties and get a full time job that pays actual money. My bonbon-eating life of leisure was coming to an end (’cause two part time jobs is kind of like that). No problem, right? Except for that little recession thingy and those annoying unemployment hoozits. Oh yeah, those things.

While I have had prolonged job searches in the past, this time is different on many levels. This time I am old(er) and it has been some time since I worked in the industry I want to return to. This time I am sending out emails (I said it has been some time, didn’t I?) without contact names with which to follow up. This time I have emailed my resume out a bazillion times for positions that I am confident that I am qualified for and I HAVE NOT RECEIVED ONE RESPONSE. Seriously, not one single response. That sound you hear is my self esteem crashing to the ground and shattering.

So I did what any rational person would do, I checked my spam blocker to see if my settings were too high (the 2010 equivalent of checking to make sure your phone still has a dial tone). They weren’t. I checked my spam folder and found only spam. Then last week I decided to check my home voicemail because, while it is my cell phone number that is listed on my resume, well, I don’t know why actually. Just hoping. And there was a message from a professional sounding person asking me to call him back. I didn’t even listen to the whole message. I sat in traffic, congratulating this person for seeing past my patchy resume and realizing that I was quality people. What a visionary. I began planning the interview in my head; I was overcoming objections and explaining my experience all the way home. When I arrived at home and listened to the message in its entirety, I discovered that I was overdrawn in my checking account.

To add more insult to injury, I busted out all my best interview attire (for the interview that I may get someday) and it appears that I have, in fact, completely let myself go. I fit into none of my suits, the nicest of which still has tags on it. And to be clear I am not a doughnut or two away from fitting into these things, I am a three to six months of Jillian Michaels away. I took the suit with the tags on it to a tailor who politely suggested that I take up running by the lake as there was not enough excess fabric to accommodate my newly enlarged ass. The crunching you hear now is someone in steel toed boots stomping on my shattered self esteem.

I have heard from others, both younger and with better resumes, that this is the most difficult job market they have encountered. I know it is not just me. I also know that my wonky resume isn’t helping and my age may be working against me. But most importantly I know that I will eventually find a job that pays well and that I enjoy. The sound you hear now is me sweeping up the shards of my self esteem in a dust pan. With a patience and faith and a sense of humor, I can put it back together.

Our mortgage broker has been a friend for years. We used her in at least two real estate transactions of our own in the past and I frequently referred her to my clients when I sold real estate. So I, of course, went to her to refinance. I didn’t hesitate even when I discovered that she had moved to the Wisconsin office from Chicago (although clearly I should have). The refinance procedure began simply enough with the usual gathering of every pay stub since Bob’s fourth grade paper route. We  had a couple of bumps in the road as rate lowered further and more people refinanced. Response times got slower, but call were eventually returned, some at 9:00 at night, and it was clear that they were just stretched thin.

The problem with doing business with a busy gal in Wisconsin turned out to be a factor I had not even considered. My friend was pregnant and went on maternity leave after giving birth to her second child. I was pleased as punch for her, but would have appreciated a head’s up before the auto reply email arrived. In her absence the refinancing of our home mortgage had been left in the hooves of a bunch of donkeys. Now we all know how good the equine are with numbers. Who hasn’t seen a horse count with their hooves? But as it turns out they are not so detail oriented and little lacking in the follow through.

I have spent the last two months hunting down the donkeys in the Wisconsin office of one of the only mortgage companies that is not in jeopardy of failure to ask where we are in our process. Phone calls can have gone unreturned, emails unanswered and when I actually got a donkey on the phone, she read notes to me off the computer screen by way of update. I have had to jump through hoops that I had already jumped through and supply paper route pay stubs  again and still no one can tell me when we are going to close.

Yesterday was the straw that almost made me break the donkey’s back. I phoned and was put on hold for my contact donkey. She picked up the phone and when I identified myself she said she was going to transfer me to a different donkey. I, in a naive and hopeful moment, thought I was being transfered to the head of the barn who would have all the answers for me. Instead this new donkey began to read more notes from a computer screen and I lost it. I didn’t yell or use obscenities, which was showing ENORMOUS restraint, but I made it clear that I was not satisfied with the customer service I was receiving. Moreover I found it rude and unprofessional that the first donkey transferred me without an explanation or introduction. He was patient and listened to me rant and asked a few questions (that I had answered at least twice now) and promised to look into my case and call me back.

If this whole process wasn’t such a time suck, I would be tempted to bail and start from scratch. Our interest rate is only locked in for another week, so they will have to make some progress soon or all this will be a moo point (you know, even the cows won’t care).

NPR, while somewhat dry and left leaning, is informational. It provides a great deal of insight into foreign affairs as well as human interest stories locally. Let’s face it, the nightly news keeps drifting closer to Entertainment Tonight both in depth and subject matter. So rather than listen to DJ drivel and lame music and in an effort to get more than the television news offers, I listen to NPR.

Bob recently joined me in this endeavor. He shut down the sports talk radio and the classic rock stations for a little NPR action. (I can deal with the classic rock stations but the sport talk radio makes me completely crazy – a bunch of frustrated ex-jocks with too much time on their hands.) He seemed to be enjoying it at first. He was soaking in all the knowledge, but…well… the economic conditions are affecting everything.

Bob came home the other night with an anxious and depressed look about him and began peppering me with questions. “Can the bank just call in our home equity line of credit and make us pay it back?” “How much debt do we have?” “How much do we pay for ..?” and “Can’t they just stop trading on the stock market to keep it from crashing?”

“I think I have to stop listening to NPR.” Bob said. “It is too depressing.”

I have noticed that there are fewer uplifting stories being reported on NPR (or anywhere else). People are losing their homes and their small businesses and the layoffs just keep coming. I, however, can listen to this and be glad that while we are not immune to this recession, we are going to be OK.  We have had to make some changes to get by in this new economy, but it is nothing compared to what most of the country is going through.

Quickly I responded, “Maybe you should go back to sports talk radio.” As much as it hurt me to do it, it was the right thing to do. Somehow the angst that overcomes me when I listen to fat guys in their underwear drinking warm Budweiser ranting about quarterbacks and pitchers is the same feeling that Bob get when he listens to economic tales of woe. His response is fitting, mine is intolerant.