Well, it looks as though my time in Taiwan is coming to an end. The good news is, my eyes are doing well, and as I noted before, I have by now had my cataracts taken care of. Even if everything else falls through, at least I got my eyes done; I’d never have been able to have gotten it done in America. This is a huge deal.

On the other hand, since being out for my surgery, all my classes have already been given over to other teachers. I go in to work, and I have nothing to do. I have heard that in Japan, when a worker has fallen into disfavor, they will sometimes, instead of out-and-out firing the poor soul, simply give them no work to do. I used to wonder how that would be considered a punishment. Believe me, I am no longer puzzled by this attitude.

For now, I sub just in case another teacher is unable to make it in for illness, or other commitments, or whatever. And, I am helping some of the students practice for their speech competitions. And, I do still have (for now) the two mornings a week, from 09:00 to 12:00, with one of the kindergarten classes.

In a way, I don’t mind; the grade school classes I had been saddled with were quite awful. I have noted before that I am not particularly good with middle school, or late elementary level kids. There are behavioral issues, overcrowded classes, and other things I am, frankly, not able to handle well. I much prefer either kindergarten, or high school.

But, though there are many excuses I might make, it all comes down to not doing a very good job at the thing for which I had been hired. I do not expect to be offered another contract for next year.

I am now currently looking for work (and have been, for the past month or two, since before Guonian) in China or at other schools in Taiwan. Alas, I have not heard back much encouraging news. I am forced to wonder whether or not my age is counting against me—I will be sixty this year, and at many schools in East Asia, they seem to prefer young, thin, good-looking and energetic kids, not old, grey academic types. I am casting my net across East and Central Asia, and Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, the online resources like Teachaway, or Tealit, have not been as helpful as I’d like.

I am trying not to panic, but worry comes easily to me. Always has. Angst and Despair and cheerful morbidity have always been my modus operandi. I am trying to take advice from the Stoics, to appropriately assess my situation. Otherwise, I will send myself into a doom-spiral and become completely paralyzed.

Now, on my side, I have a very good friend who has the resources to have been able to promise me a ‘soft landing,’ should it come to the worst, and I am forced to return to the United States—a prospect which fills me with trepidation. Especially with what’s going on domestically. Heck, I even wonder if I might be allowed back in, considering my online history of opposition to, and derision of, our dear Orangefarbenfuhrer.

I am beginning to prepare some of my things to be shipped home by post (or maybe by a mover, if they can handle something as small as a suitcase). I do not want to have to lug too much luggage with me on the plane.

One more major worry is that I need to maintain payments to the storage unit I have had since 2018, when I lost my house, going to China. I began de-junking it the last time I was in, however it costs money to have a company come over to pick up the junk. And it is still full of important pieces of my life from a decade ago. Books, CDs, DVDs, housewares, personal keepsakes, family mementos. That is a big worry of mine. Especially now, since my last year-long sojourn in America essentially drained all my resources. I have no significant savings left, including the small brokerage account I used to have.
Oh, well.

As Kipling once wrote:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,   

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

…Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Am I a man? I dunno. Maybe. If only biologically.

Oh, well. More to come later, I guess.