With the exception of Monday's piece, I have been avoiding the topic of the economy for months because I didn't want to add to the panic so many of us feel, which, in turn, contributes to the crisis: because we stop buying ice-cream cones for our kids, which causes the local ice-cream shop to have to lay off a few of the high school kids who scoop and wash the floors for some change, and so on and so forth.
But it's time to discuss the massive elephant in our living room.
This last Monday morning, I talked on Gus Lloyd's "Seize the Day" radio show (Sirius/XM Satellite) about the pressure of having to generate more income from my writing projects now that, as an architect, my husband has little work. Gus and I chatted about how difficult it is to know when to pursue new work, to be an aggressive businesswoman or man, and brainstorm about future projects, and when it's time to hang up the phone and put away the computer and fold our hands. Because we have done our part.
Two hours after the radio show I headed to David's prayer service, where I told Deacon Moore I needed to light candles for all my friends who have lost their jobs or have had their salaries cut in half. He relayed yet more stories ... of real estate agents with young kids that were in debt, of graduating seniors that are home watching Oprah, of senior citizens whose retirement funds have evaporated and are now job hunting (with the Oprah watchers), at ages 65 and 70.
And I wondered how many of these people are like me: a tad challenged when it comes time to say the serenity prayer. What do I have to accept as something that I cannot change? The recession and economic disaster in this country? The industries that Eric and I have chosen? My dad always said I should have gone into sales, darn it. What can I change? The intensity with which I pound the pavement? The extra hours I work to try to compensate for the loss?
Moreover, I keep asking myself lately: what is God's will, and what is my will?
Is it my will to live in a nice three-bedroom home and send my kids to a fantastic Catholic school? Is it my will to want to go Florida next month? Is it my will to drink Starbucks coffee? Because, as Gus mentioned on his show, so often we look back and can clearly see God's hand in a tragedy or a during very difficult time, even though at the time it was happening, we were clueless and despondent.
I told the radio host about my friend, Michelle, who was fired two years before her husband died, allowing her that time--the best two years of her life, she vows--to be with him as he travelled across the world as an army chaplain. Had she not been fired, she would have missed out.
But I want to understand it (the economic crisis or problem of the day) in present tense: why it's happening, how it ends, and the secret gold in there.
At the end of our radio segment, Gus asked me to give him my 15-second prayer for today.
"I guess it would be this," I said, "God, please help me to keep you in charge today and not to ask so many why's."
"I like that," he replied. "I think I'll say the same."
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