And of selling houses and moving.

After much consideration, prayer, and advice, I have made the hard decision to sell my condo in Virginia and, for the time being, move in with my parents in Wisconsin. Two weeks from tonight I will be sleeping in my folks’ guest bed.

Why? Several reasons.

The web design job market has opened up a little in recent months, but not enough. I have interviewed and sent resumes, but when I have received word back, it has been “thanks, but no thanks.” In one case, I was one of 12 interviewees for a local job that had been posted on Craigslist for less than a week. (I don’t know how many resumes they received overall, but I’m sure it was more than the 12 they called back.)

In the meantime, I have exhausted my unemployment benefits (including the extension for which I was eligible) and am currently paying my bills by the grace of my parents.

This was a difficult decision partly because there’s no obvious right or wrong answer. Whether I stay or leave, the choice requires me to give up some things while gaining others.

On the plus side, as long as I have the relative freedom to do so, I plan on pursuing the art of stained glass. I will be taking 4-6 weeks to focus on the craft on my own time as well as applying to the workshops in SE Wisconsin. I may end up with a new career!

I will probably still be doing some web design on the side. If I decide to return to web design fulltime, I would like to refocus with some classes in human computer interaction. This will bring me up to speed on the latest developments (like mobile apps) as well as support my personal interest in usability and information architecture.

The web job market in Chicago seems fairly healthy, so I won’t be without options. (Frankly, the web job market here is rotten; D.C. has the majority of openings in this region.)

On the down side, I am leaving a lot of friends behind and leaving an area which has been home for nearly ten years (not counting college at ODU).

Obviously, I’ll miss both friends from college and friends I’ve found along the way at work and church. I’ll also miss things like early spring daffodils and gorgeous sunsets.

On the other hand, I will be close to my parents. I’ve had plans in the back of my mind to move closer to them “someday.” I guess “someday” is “now.” I’ll also be near my best friend from high school, who has always lamented that my visits are never long enough. I will be glad to be more involved in the lives of her and her family. Both she and her husband are art school graduates, and just being in their house makes me feel more creative. I know they will be a big support as I try out the stained glass art form.

Oh, and I’ll have access to cheese curds any time I want. Yum!

So that’s my big news. Lots of loose ends to tie up in the next week and a half — not the least of which is visiting as many folks as I can (with camera in tow) for my “final tour.”

Here’s to the next great adventure!

1. The receptionist gets up to help you out of your jacket and hang it up for you, but doesn’t lead you to the office for the interview. Instead, she tells you to head to the first office on the left past the copier. (She already paged the interviewer, who has apparently chosen to remain at their desk.) The office is only 40 feet from the front door.
2. Your interviewer is the VP of Finance and Administration and the CFO (one person).
3. You’re asked if you do print design, because some print designers “don’t like” doing web design, and vice versa, but they are looking for a “well-rounded” designer who will do both.
4. You’re told that they are fortunate to have a full-time IT guy on staff (but he’s not in this interview).
5. The interviewer keeps direct eye contact 95% of the time either one of you is speaking. (Awkward.)
6. The interviewer uses Google to find one of the organization’s microsites.
7. The interviewer mentions two or three times that “we’ve interviewed some good candidates” and flips through all their resumes underneath yours on the desk.
8. You’re given an assignment to complete on your own. The instructions ask for two mock-ups: one of a single-page microsite (may be a .jpg comp), and one of a companion print piece (8.5″x11″, cover and one interior page) for one of their new campaigns. You can use Lorem Ipsum for the text, since you’re not the content writer, after all.  There are also four questions you should be ready to answer when the assignment is submitted, including how much time you spent on each part, your philosophy of microsite design, your opinion of the most important elements in a web site, and which design aspects of this assignment you found most difficult.
9. You ask if there is a deadline when they’ll make a decision. The interviewer says that they hope to make a decision by the end of next week. Oh, so, could you have the assignment back by the middle of next week, then. 
10. The interviewer thanks you for coming in, but doesn’t get up. After a couple of awkward moments, you tuck your papers away, which seems to remind the interviewer to emerge from behind the desk and shake your hand.

This isn’t the first time I’ve thought about this. It’s also not the first time I’ve tried to approach the question carefully, logically and prayerfully.

But I must admit that I’ve never really planned out where I’d like to be in 5 or 10 years, like life coaches tell you to do. The farthest I really look in advance is about three years.

I know some folks will say this is a failing. I’ve come to think of it at either the blessing or burden of being a creative person.

What I like to do

Sure, I enjoy web design. But I also would be just as satisfied if my day job involved making jewelry. I’ve already tried my hand in a stained glass workshop, and I’d do that again in a heartbeat. In fact, I’d like to set up a small workshop for myself so I can cut, grind and assemble glass art.

I spoke on the phone yesterday with someone who was responding to a resume I submitted. He asked what my next ideal job would be. My answer described what my next ideal Web job would be.

And that got me to thinking about where I should focus my energy. Do I focus on HTML and CSS, adding to my knowledge about coding great design? Do I lean further to the psychology side of things and teach myself more principles of usability, human-computer interaction, and user experience? Do I build up my graphic web design side, delving deeper into Photoshop and seriously learning Flash?

And yet, these aren’t my only options. These are just the web-related options. I’ve saved job ads for jewelry artists and photographers, too. I want to try selling my own creations and see if people like them. I’ve even tossed around the idea of boarding with my folks for a short while so I can focus on one of these things for 4-6 weeks and see if I can’t make a go of it as an artist.

This doesn’t even touch on my love of music or my simmering urge to go back to college to further develop the sheer mechanics of drawing and painting.

Back to the beginning?

All this rambling just brings me back to my original thought: Where do I go next?

And, most importantly, where does God want me next?

All these ideas and decisions are weighted with the overarching presence and plan of my Lover and Father. Really, the most important thing is not where I want to go or what I want to do, but whether God has directed me into one path or another.

Even as I once again carefully consider all my options, I am asking God to point me to my next gig. The paths available are still numerous, but to take one against His direction — or, to take one before He tells me where to go — will never satisfy me or fulfill my desires.

Does this take faith? Yes. And my faith has been confirmed in the past when God has arranged circumstances to put me in a particular place — a city, a home, even a dorm room. I have had a small taste of what more experienced Christians tell me: sometimes the road God points you to makes no sense, or what seemed like the perfect opportunity is suddenly barred, but God is true to His promise not to harm us.

Does it take prayer? Yes. And I know that I need to develop discipline here. Prayer is not telling God what I want or begging Him for it. I could launch into another whole post about prayer, so let me just say that I need the discipline to listen to God regularly.

I had a gut feeling yesterday that this was going to happen, exactly like the gut feeling I had a couple of weeks before Ferguson let me go.

I’m not freaking out. I’ve been down this road before, and God has taken very good care of me over the last 14 months. I’m bummed, certainly; no one likes losing their job.

But to be honest, things weren’t working out like I had hoped and expected. I was clear to the owner when she interviewed me that I really wanted to learn the business, and that I have design, branding, marketing, communications, and web experience that I thought I could use for her company’s benefit.

I knew that I would be starting in the shop, working from the ground up, as it were. So I’ve been ready, willing and able to mud and clean windows, sweep, trace patterns, and perform whatever tasks I was asked to do. This even included helping move and connect their computers, since this is a new location for them.

The personalities are interesting and varied, and none really interfered with me. Some people just like things a certain way; that’s how they are. When they get bent out of shape, it doesn’t change me. It might change how I interact with them, but I’m not responsible for their quirks or obsessions.

I didn’t learn as much as I wanted simply because people were very busy, but the instruction I did get was well done. Clear, not patronizing. And with an assumption that I will take responsibility to do it right. I like that.

I liked a lot of things about the job, maybe because it was such a change from my corporate gig: clear feedback (either it’s right or you make it right); concrete progress and successes; wearing what you please as long as it doesn’t interfere with work; focusing on the job and results and not playing politics.

However, after working there for a couple of weeks and getting the chance to chat with the other fulltime people, I had the distinct impression that I would probably be kept in the shop much longer than I would like. In fact, since they hired a designer/admin person who has turned out to be a kind of “mini me” of the owner, I have begun doubting that I would be pulled into the rest of the business at all.

The reason I was given for being let go is “cash flow.” A big job they’re waiting on has not come through as quickly as planned, and they don’t need and can’t afford to keep me. I know that there are a lot of contracts coming down the pipe, but that doesn’t help if the cash isn’t there to pay me now. It’s partly the nature of the business: you get payouts upon completion of a contract, so the flow is not steady. Plus, if they need part-timers, the owner’s son and his best friend are readily available and able to be on “stand-by.”

The plusses of this experience have been the satisfaction of the work, the things I’ve learned about glass and leading, gettting way outside my normal routine of being a “desk jockey,” and of course, having a job at all. Whether it was the environment or simply the change from my career path, I feel more confident about pursuing my own ideas in stained glass jewelry. I can do this. All I need is discipline.

I don’t know where I’ll go from here. The door is wide open again as far as job type and location. I may end up as a web designer again, which is not a bad thing. After leaving the corporate world, I found that my creativity with web stuff and the desire to work with it has come back. I had hardly even noticed how much it had been quashed while I was corporate, but I certainly noticed when it started to rise again. I am just not cut out to be a cog in the corporate machine.

My parents will be arriving in town this weekend for a week-long visit. I’m very excited to see them. And frankly, I’m sort of glad that I’ll have the whole week free to spend with them. Previously, I thought I would only be able to take Monday off. With the job ending, I’m full of free time again.

Now I just have to straighten up the house so everyone has a place to sleep. LOL!