A New Beginning

I can't believe it. My last post was more than three years ago! I have this strange sense of stepping into an old, dilapidated house filled with dust coated furniture, spider webs, dead rats and insect dropping.

Time to give my blog a total makeover. Well, not a total makeover. Perhaps a little update (before I forget what is there to update!)

Let's see. In the past three years, I've had a short stint as a section editor with a Canadian online magazine (sounded fancy but the pay was peanuts - the cleaning lady was earning much more than I did!), got paid big bucks as my best friend's cleaning lady (best job ever!) and did a course in children's services.

So here I am, a fully qualified early childhood educator (fancy title for what is commonly known as childcare worker). It's a Certificate III qualification but it is a good start for me. At least I'm more employable now. But three weeks after finishing my course and sending out a dozen of resumes, I'm still jobless. Truth told, I'm a bit disheartened that I haven't even got a single interview yet but I know I will find something eventually. Hopefully near the kids' school so that it's more convenient for all of us.

So how did I end up becoming a childhood educator? I had never been known to go crazy over babies and children. In fact, I had a tragic aversion to small human beings. I used to avoid them like the plague. I couldn't stand anything remotely related to children. If I accidentally ventured into the children's area at the departmental store, I would be instantly hit with nausea. If a small child started approaching me, my scowl would automatically appear, eliminating any potential face-to-face encounter or conversation between the wee one and me. That about sums up how much I loved children.

That was then, way before I had my own children. Well, it even took me a while to warm up to my own babies!

Things are very different now, though. I'm actually pretty good with kids. Of course, I'm great with my own kids. The real test, however, came with interacting with other people's kids. My good friend Lina's children were probably the first children outside my family that I spent a lot of time with. Her Joanne and my Joanne (yep, our daughters share the same name) are on-again-off-again besties at school. Her younger one, Arthur, and I bonded almost instantly. Don't know why. I was surprised too. Someone said maybe it was because I looked nice, friendly and approachable. Must have lost that scowl without even realising it!

Sometime late last year, I decided to really do something useful. There were several options - aged care, community care, children's service and TESOL. After some serious thought, I went ahead with children's services. After all, I was the section editor for the parenting section of the abovementioned website. I also used to write healtcare and parenting articles. I was technically already half an expert on child development and care. Why not complete the other half?

So I enrolled in a Certificate II Children's Services course at a local community college near my children's school. I loved every minute of it!

I made many new friends - I had 20 classmates and they came from 10 different countries - and found the course modules very interesting. The teachers were great and supportive. My horizon was widened considerably. For the first time in many years, I felt that I was doing something useful and productive. I had focus and finally could see what I would be doing for the next few years - a diploma in children's services is what I'm aiming for now.

When I started my workplace training one month into the course, I realised I actually had a lot of patience with little children. That was not a trait I was known for. Maybe I had it in me all this while but just never realised it.

Well, let's hope my job hunting will yield some good result soon. In the meantime, I should just enjoy my free time while it lasts.