...again.
Ah graduation day. I plan on getting up early, putting on those special clothes I haven't worn in a while, and getting myself ready for a busy day. The day will be long. It will have its ups and downs. I will get to hang out with a group of people that I've gone to war with over the last while. People that sometimes I disagree with, but generally we're there for the same purpose. Yes, good ol' graduation day.
Yep, I'll be at the Co-op, of course. I'm going back to the lumber yard to work a day or two each week. So I must dig out my old uniform, make a lunch, and get ready for the day ahead.
It's sort of fitting that I will be at the Co-op during my Redeemer B.Ed. graduation (in Ancaster, ON). In a real sense, the Co-op has put me through university. I've worked there 7 full summers. In that time I've managed 2 and a half degrees, 2 years as a registrar, 1 wife, and 1 baby. The place has been good to me. I get Sundays and evenings off. I get to work outside after 8 months of studying. The pay is not bad. And the work is by and large not stressful (though difficult at times).
How did I get this job? From God. Really.
After my first school year at the Academy I returned home to work at a local gas station. The pay kinda sucked. It was evenings and weekends. I was tired of working there. Anyway, as I returned to work there, thanks to being at the Academy, I really noticed that there were bad magazines on sale. I just couldn't, in good conscience, sell those terrible, sinful, family-breaking magazines. Not after all that I learnt in the past year. What a hypocrite I would be!
So I quit. Just like that. And it was hard. I didn't have a backup plan. But I knew working there wasn't the right thing to do.
Just as I quit... I got a phone call. It was from a lady I know whose husband was the lumber manager at the Co-op. She told me they were hiring, and that she'd put in a good word for me. So I drove over to the Co-op. The manager asked me why I quit my job at the gas station. I told him why. He said: "when can you start?" I didn't miss a day in between my gas station job and the Co-op job!
It goes to show that if you do the right thing, even when it is difficult, God gives you even more than you ever could have expected. I was able to get a solid job that put me through all this schooling.
And so, somewhere in Ancaster tomorrow my name will be announced at a special ceremony: "Daniel Joseph Millette... absent..." That's ok. I will be in the right place. Instead it will be: "Daniel Joseph Millette... go to the treated aisle..."
Sigh.
p.s. I also just realized that tomorrow will be the first time Joseph sees his Daddy goes to work. Yikes!