Dear Family and Friends,
As most of you know, after working 2 1/2 years in Iraq, I have been working from home for almost a year. I am working contract close-down issues and now am assisting the Director of Contracts on sub-contractor close-outs. Most of the Iraq team have long since left or were asked to leave the company, but me and three others still are with the company. However, only two of us are still working on the Iraq project.
While this is of great benefit to us, since being without a job is difficult especially in these trying economic times, working out of the home has brought unique challenges. In Iraq, I had day-to-day contact with international as well as Iraqi national staff. Now, other than Lily (Katie’s chocolate lab), K-K (Katie’s cat), and Bernie (my Golden Retriever) my day-to-day contact with other living, breathing creatures is with my wife Ann and any other person I talk to from the cashier at Krogers to the counter person at the tire place. You would think any person I talk to is one of my long-lost relatives the way I interact with them and care about what they have to say to me.
As I was writing this I realized that my day-to-day work-loneliness led me to a new respect and caring for people to whom I would not normally have paid much attention. Is this a bad thing? No, on the contrary, my life has changed now even more because I really pay attention to people to whom I should have been paying attention to before.
Isn’t it amazing how life changes for the better even when you least expect it?
Love,
Jimmy
The Great Adventure 