Back in the years of deciding what I as a woman would be in the world should I not earn a Mrs. degree soon after a B.ED, the next choice would be a secretary, maybe a telephone operator. In high school I took typing and did fairly well on the old Remington hit the keys hard and throw the carriage with purpose to turn up the next line. In fact, typing, or keyboarding as called today, may have been one of my more useful subjects, much better than hunt and peck. The second part of a good secretary was shorthand, a loser for me. I had to work to have a legible handwriting and couldn’t really understand scribbling and translating being progress. So I took the next opening of teaching, found a good match and never looked back.
Anyway, the tv image of the perky young woman at the front desk who turned out letters to be signed by the end of the day mail soon faded. Titles differed according to what was demanded. This cold rainy part of January I really had the need for an IT Support Specialist. This paragon of necessity would know her (or his) computer more intimately than I know my grammar book and understand moves and lingo to create solutions. After having the same e-mail since the 1980’s when I still had to dial up a connection, it began to have weak spells. At some level it was so undependable that the Museum of Fine Arts would not even verify reservations using it. I could only ask to pick up tickets at their front desk. Yesterday the unspeakable came to pass. I was spoofed. or spammed, or hacked. In a word, totally messed up, People on my contact list came out ot the woodwork to tell me so. Thank goodness, my daughter -in -law didn’t hyperventilate at the problem. With aplomb (one spends one’s life waiting to use that word), she took over my computer using Teamviewer, asked me to put my hands in my lap, and began to kill off and bury the defunct contact with society. At times in the process it was messy and not always quick and easy; however, she took what I could never have done and did it.
According to our needs, each of us wants a special skill available in our family. Maybe your wish is for the great-nephew who knows exactly how to lift the hood of your car and tweak wires, or at least how to get it to a dealership and explain the problem. The longing may be for that one who can set a table worthy of being photographed or with seemingly easy effort create a meal out of three leftovers in the refrigerator. Right now I would settle for someone who could separate papers necessary to start saving for 2023 taxes from those that to be useful need to be sent to the accountant for 2022. At the end of a day, I want to be the child tugging at a skirt, searching for a place of comfort to end the day, and feeling assured that place will be waiting for me.
As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you.
Isaiah 66:13
Let Me Tell Ya 