New Job

(Warning: this is a long post and there is another new post under neath it.)

My desk is white washed from the bright sunlight streaming in from my office window, a giant day lily from a beautiful arrangement of flowers looks over my lap top while I type and my original coffee mug that I made two weeks ago at church sits next to me full of my favorite fair-trade Guatemalan coffee. To the right of my desk is a keyboard that I simply have to swivel my chair to reach. Just right of the keyboard is a moderately complex set-up with MIDI, a G5 PowerMac (with a sweet 24 in. flat screen), head phones on hooks, and few instrument, MIDI, and microphone cables, and a few other boxes and gizmos for recording. I find myself amazed that I sit in the chair that I do for the past 2 and a half weeks as the Director of Music Development for a small children’s book publishing company. In my first week I wrote three original songs and within the first week and a half they were recorded and used in an important client pitch. And I didn’t even know I could write children’s music. It is very possibly the coolest job I’ve had. The story of how I found this job is, as most of my employment stories are, rather odd. I’ll simplify it by saying God provided and I met my boss in Taft Street Coffee on the night of an opening reception at the gallery and she offered me a job as her assistant but when I went to interview I had to admit that even I wouldn’t hire me as an assistant- I’m aware of my limitations. The next thing I knew she was asking me about what title I would like on my business card: Music Director (she thought it sounded too churchy- you know, I’ve never had that title!) or Director of Music Development. As far as I can remember, she had never heard me play, sing, or share any of my compositions with her and when I politely asked her if maybe she should she told me she didn’t need to, she knew it was right. I’ve been trying to decide if that’s faith, discernment or just plan crazy. All the same, I’m grateful and so far, she doesn’t seem disappointed.

Some of the surprising aspects of my job (actually, everything about this job is surprising!) include working two blocks from Taft Street Coffee/church/gallery where Jeremy works, a boss that encourages artistic development beyond what we do for the company putting time, money and resources into her staff, praying before our big meetings, fresh flower arrangements whenever we have an important client come in (which has been every week so far), the opportunity to publish my own children’s book (more on that later), flexible scheduling, meeting clients worship consulting clients (my boss brings them to me), recording our original music, the girls are singing on a children’s CD coming out in September that is mostly my original music, Jeremy is hired on contract for recordings and music presentations in the schools, I can teach from my office (which is beautiful and furnished with mostly antiques), I’m encouraged in my writing, and today I’m going to South Texas and Mexico to do a one person show of one of our books for a schools there. Some of the not-so-surprising but really cool perks including learning software that I’ve wanted to learn but couldn’t afford (Finale, Final Cut Pro, Soundtrack Pro, Pro tools, Reason, and a few others), loads of children’s books, music, videos and games available, toys in the office area (the girls love coming to work with me and they are always welcomed!), free coffee on the company’s credit at Taft Street Coffee, really cool grown-up toys (my computer is amazing, I have a professional recording mic in my office at my disposal, Lots of fun toys and new things to learn, I’m having a blast. This job is an answer to prayer and a great fit.