And so it begins... again!

I am copying a message I sent to a friend on FB, explaining how I got to enjoy my present adventure. *I have changed the names of places & people for security/privacy reasons:

3 Mondays ago (July 22) I was called in for an interview at NC* Community College. It was for an English Instructor position. I drove for 9 hrs that day because it was just over 4hrs from Columbia. The following Monday (July 29), I hadn't heard anything, so I phoned (because the original start date for this job was a week ago (Aug 1)!) They told me the job had been offered to someone else. So I got out my lists, phoned and arranged an interview for the next day, texted my family to tell them the sad news, phoned my grandpa and he was heartbroken, went downstairs to make myself a protein shake & told my roommate.

20min after the original phone call, HR phoned back saying the person who received the original offer had withdrawn his application, and asked if I would still be interested... umm... YES, PLEASE! Since the start date was supposed to be 3 days later, they extended my start date to this past Monday (Aug 5). And I went back and told everyone about the change in plans!

My niece arrived a couple hours later to help me move. We drove for 13.5hrs on Tuesday up to RR* to find a place for me to live. I FELL IN LOVE with a farm house just outside the city because I could see the horizon, but it wouldn't be available until Wed (6 Aug) at the earliest and they were still renovating the floors & counters. Wednesday, Niece & I packed up my entire house & brought all of my belongings, except what I would need for the next couple weeks, downstairs & Niece went home.

I spent Thursday sleeping in & phoning moving companies, but I decided not to go that route because my family offered to drive down to Columbia and pick up car loads of my belongings and come visit me to see my new place and get a feel for RR. (It feels almost exactly like Saskatoon, except with African Americans instead of Natives). And Thursday evening, I had a goodbye supper with some of my close friends in SC.

Friday morning, I packed up my car and drove to Charlotte to visit my family & celebrate my Grandpa's bday on Sunday before I moved. Sunday night, I stayed in a really sketchy motel and didn't sleep a wink because my entire life was packed in my car & I was terrified someone would break into it. Monday, I worked in the morning, but since I was still homeless, they let me take the rest of the day off to get settled.

The crazy part is that on my way to the sketchy motel, my GPS took me out of the way and I passed by apartments I hadn't seen before that were about 2miles from the college. I had been stressing about my budget for 3 days by then, so I figured that, since I hadn't signed a lease, I should go check them out. No one was in the office, so I ordered some rental furniture and went to check on the progress at the farm house... and what I found was DISGUSTING. The bathtub had a black crust and a thick layer of dead insects in it and there were piles of matted hair in most of the closets & medicine cabinet. I was so grossed out. So I went back to those apartments. And they were PERFECT! I was able to get the keys to a 1-bedroom newly renovated apartment for $500/mo with 1 free month's rent within 30min. The previous renter had only lived there for 3months before breaking his lease with no notice the weekend before I arrived. Talk about TIMING!?!

Then I went out and bought a new mattress set. Best Decision Ever.

On Tuesday, Niece & her boyfriend brought me a truckload of boxes, the furniture arrived, and we had supper together before they returned to Charlotte. And yesterday, my grandpa made the trip. He is very happy with my decision to choose the apartment over the farm house. There is even a little field right beside my bldg, so I still get to breathe in a tiny bit of horizon-line oxygen

I got my course schedule yesterday afternoon: Developmental English M-F 8-8:50am + MW 9-9:50am; Expository Writing TR 10-11:20am; Professional Writing Tuesdays 6-9:20pm; and 3 online courses (2 sections of Expository Writing + 1 American Lit course).

I get paid way more than I expected - they gave me credit for the past 2 yrs teaching at the U of SC!

So, as usual, God's timing is perfect. My mom reminded me that, just because I wasn't the college's 1st choice, I was GOD's 1st choice, and HE made it happen

If I hadn't planned on moving into the farmhouse, I wouldn't have gone to the motel & I wouldn't have seen these apartments. And if I had found the apartments on Tuesday when Niece & I drove up to look for places, it wouldn't have been available because the guy was still living here! AND I had been looking at rental furniture for the first month or 2 and beds were about $80, but the morning that I moved, an ad popped up on one of the furniture stores' websites offering a 5-pc bedroom set, a 7-pc living room set, and a tv, all for $140+tax!

The CC is a 2-yr college that offers both technical and pre-university programs. Its population is over 50% african-american and the poverty level is pretty high, so I feel like I can actually change the world, one person at a time, here

So far, I like everything about this experience, except a couple minor stories I'll eventually post on here. But for now, I just wanted to get the ball rolling with a foundational piece on how I wound up back in NC!