Saturday, December 15, 2007

Important Papers

This is sort of about writing.

Do you know where your passport is? Your birth certificate? Your will? Your social security card? Your whatever piece of paper you might need to produce if you are applying for a new job, or you die, or you experience some other major life event? Okay, probably you do. And I do, too. They’re all right here . . . somewhere.

Because I have just accepted a position as an adjunct teacher at the local Community College, I need to produce my social security card. I can’t remember the last time I was required to show anyone that card, but I know I have it. It used to be in this basket where I kept other important stuff. I moved that stuff when I moved into this house 6 years ago but I can’t tell you exactly where. I’m pretty sure it’s in my office. And I hope to find it. I need to dig through all the papers and find other important stuff, too. And I will. But in the meantime I have to have a social security card. Fortunately, it turns out to be a pretty simple matter to get a replacement card. You fill out a form you can download, find some i.d. (fortunately I do know where my passport is), and run down to the Social Security office and they send a you a new one.

That should come in time for my purposes, but it prompts me to make my first New Years Resolution for 2008: get the important papers organized. I’ve even got a fire-proof safe . . .

5 comments:

Elizabeth M. said...

Congrats on the new job! Details?

Rebel Girl said...

Welcome to the wonderful world of community college - I mean it. I've been at it 15 years now and well, it's a good place to make a living. My fiction workshop is full of the usual suspects and beyond. Congratulations.

Unknown said...

It's more of a toe-in-the-water than an actual job. I mean, I think they're (that's Blue Ridge Community College) going to pay me a little, but I'll be teaching one section of Composition I for one semester and we'll see how I feel about it after. As for fiction workshops, that's what I aspire to and the Dean is aware of that. BRCC is small, though, and there isn't always sufficient demand for that.

p.s. when I saw I had comments on this post I thought maybe a psychic was dropping by to tell me where I might find that social security card . . .

Rebel Girl said...

Right, the justice factor in terms of pay and course assignment is generally problematic with adjunct pay 1/3 of a fulltimer's.

Still, check out what kind of union there is - and see what they doing to address issues of equity, job assignment, benefits and security (as you can tell, I've been down that road - now I am fulltime). We have an rather activist union and it helps.

And composition is every English department's bread and butter. I usually teach 2 comp and one fiction every semester. It works out.

What I like best about teaching at a CC it that the world is there - age, ethnicity, national origin, economic class, edcuational background, etc - it makes for a dynamic classroom whatever you are teaching.

Unknown said...

Your last point is really the reason I'm doing it - getting out of my house and meeting a range of folks.