Making time.

I lost a third of my job last week. To blame: budget cuts from our stupid republican (sorry) governor and legislature who think taxes are so bad that they've cut millions and millions and millions... of dollars from FL education—K-12 and all the universities. In K-12, teachers are being laid off, classrooms are getting more crowded, and "non-academic" classes are being slashed. The schools are turning more and more to parents for needed financial support. In the universities, it has gotten so bad that tenured faculty are being let go. For me, it's a little more complicated. Half of my salary comes from the College. The other half is from grant-funded research projects, "soft money." As we finish those projects, the College picks up the extra percentage of my salary until a new grant that I've been written into comes in. We just finished two huge grant projects, we don't have any to replace them, and the College just cut another 10% from its budget, so there isn't any extra money to pick up the part of my salary that the grants were funding. Sooooo, I'm now 65%. At first I was p-i-s-s-e-d. Mainly because it means I have less money to spend and save but also because of the principle of the whole thing. My salary is for my ideas, not for the number of hours I work. They get the same ideas at 65% as they do at 100%. Seems like a really good deal for them and a not-so-good deal for me.

My dean went through the whole spiel when he told me: "Jennifer, you've been with me through my entire deanship. I want you to know how much you are valued. I couldn't do my job without you. You do so much more than marketing. I depend on you for your ideas. I'll always do everything I can to keep you here and get you back to 100%. Yadah yadah yadah."

Yeah, yeah. So Carter and I sat down yesterday and went through the budget and our new schedule. The only painful thing we had to slash was not what we needed to slash for now, but what we needed to slash for the possibility of me losing my job and Carter not having summer funding. Home improvements were the casualty. Damn it.

So, we start the new schedule tomorrow, and I just have to get used to the idea of not having the control over my life that I like to have. Sometimes it's hard to actually live by our priorities. There are always sacrifices somewhere. My family is my number one priority. I have a job that gives me crazy amounts of flexibility. That's important so I can volunteer and be home after school and take Ains to ballet and be at the Valentine's parties and field day and the walk-a-thon... It allows me to have afternoon playdates and to work out at the gym with Carter before we pick the kids up; it allows us to spend lots of time as a family--the four of us. But the flip side is that I have to give up the big career, and for now, the bigger salary, because I want the crazy flexibility so much more than I want the home remodel.

But, you know I still want that home remodel because what I really want is to have "it all."

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