Friday Feast #4

Hi, ya'll!

I'm sneaking in with a just-past-midnight Friday Feast - enjoy, leave me your link, and I'll come visit you later in the day! :-)

Appetizer
What was your first “real” job?
My first paying job started at age 5, working in my Dad's grocery store as a bagger - he'd pay me like .50 an hour to bag, since my Mom used his store as a babysitter. By age 10, I was running the cash register for a couple bucks an hour like an old pro. By early middle school, Dad was also paying me to "help" his older checkergirls with their term papers - in the process of typing their notes for them, I also did some pretty heavy editing...I'm pretty sure all of his checkers got straight A's because of MOI. Haha!

The first few times I made money outside of my family was with music - I performed my violin and piano at a variety of church-based events in the greater Scranton/Poconos area throughout middle school and high school and made around $35 for an hour's performance...my highest per hour pay, to date! :-) My first "punch the timeclock" job was as a salesgirl/jewelry buyer for Cloud 9, a funky little apparel/jewelry/trinket shop on the boardwalk in Ocean City, New Jersey. I worked there the summers of '98 and '99.

My first "real" post-college job was in IT/Compliance/Clinical Ops with a radiology company in downtown Dallas. Fun times! Add a few years and jobs and I'm finally in my ideal job as an HR Analyst/Project Manager with American Airlines - now that really is a good time! :-) (Have I mentioned that I have the world's best boss?)

Soup
Where would you go if you wanted to spark your creativity?
The beach - seeing the water pound against the sand does things for my soul that I can't quite describe. That's probably part of my problem these days...haven't seen the ocean in far too long. (And no, the ocean hitting the rocks in Vancouver in September doesn't count - I'm talking "go to the beach and sunbathe" ocean - think NJ/FL/CA coasts. The last I experienced that was Ang's wedding last November. BTW, Happy First Anniversary, dear old friend! :-)

Salad
Complete this sentence: I am embarrassed when…
My husband brags on me. He does it to be sweet and supportive, but it makes me go tongue-tied, which is something that rarely happens in my world.

Main Course
What values did your parents instill in you?
Eh, I have a *slight* problem with this wording. One of the leadership courses I teach deals with the differentiation between morals, ethics and values, and using the definition of values from that course, values are something that you hold dear above anything else. I believe values come from a personal decision, not from "instillation", which means that you didn't have a choice in choosing what you hold dear. (Other definitions from that course: morals are a person's personal beliefs of right versus wrong, whereas ethics are the result of several individuals banding together and agreeing upon morals and values that define their population.)

Having said all of that (I'm feeling wordy tonight), I would have to argue that my parents modeled certain moral beliefs and value preferences that I've chosen to live in my own life as well. (In some cases, I've chosen the opposite of that modeled!) Some of my beliefs, quite honestly, make me feel very "old-fashioned", but ah, well...we all know that morals have gone to hell in society. I don't think I'll ever live long enough to outlive my Catholic guilt, but on the other hand, I know quite a few people who could use a big ol' dose of that.

My greatest value is independence. No matter the issues I may have with portions of my upbringing, the greatest gift my parents ever gave me was the ability to make decisions that would affect my life from the time I was very young; to travel and live independently; and to always rely first upon myself before ever asking for the help of another - this to the point where I find that I can barely ever bring myself to ask for help, even when I may desperately need it. So perhaps my independence is a value to the point of a flaw at times, but I'd far rather be able to always do for myself than feel beholden to another to do for me. As was said in my Audrey Hepburn quote from last week's Thursday Thirteen, (paraphrasing) we are given two hands for a reason - one hand to help ourselves and the other to help those around us. Unfortunately for our world, too many people believe that they are given two hands so that they can use both to reach for a handout.

Dessert
Name 3 fads from your teenage years.
Yeesh. This one's hard...I went to a high school that required a uniform, so fashion fads never registered with me...perhaps why I still care so little about clothing to this day. (But I was a damn good clothing and jewelry salesperson!) So let's think...
1. Pagers - we all had 'em! Funny stuff. We thought we were so cool. (Bear in mind that cell phones were mostly still hardwired into cars at that point - my first one was! My second cell phone was so damn big that I could have used it to kill a rat. Text messages definitely did not exist back then - we were lucky the phones dialed! Caller ID on a cell phone? Not unless you were psychic! I should post up the link to my first published freelancing article which talked about the progression of cell phones...it was funny stuff. Article: How I Learned to Use My Cell Phone When the guy published it, apparently it lost all formatting - sorry that it's a bit hard to read!)
2. Cut jeans - we'd cut either side of the ends of the pantlegs of our jeans to fit around boots and such. Crazy stuff.
3. Ying yang symbols - I had necklaces, earrings, etc. that had this crap on it. Stupid stuff!


Sorry for the sermon, folks. Some things just get me talking!

Dad update: surgery afternoon of 11/15, rehab to start 11/20, cleared to come to Texas near the beginning of the year. All going well so far. Thanks for the prayers - keep 'em coming!

Happy Weekend!

Tiffany