Breath of Fresh Air
The beginning of this year was perhaps one of the most stressful times of my life. Moving in with your significant other is supposed to be an exciting experience but not so much in this case. Although I was thrilled to move in with Hiroshi (although I dearly miss my times with Pauline and the kitties), the main reason is to help him out financially since his unemployment benefit can’t be extended. And regardless how I still have a job, the company I was working for wasn’t doing so well and the pay was straight out horrible. It didn’t help that we live in Irvine, which is an expensive community and couldn’t afford to move so we had no choice but to suck it up. So yeah, there was a lot to think about.
This was perhaps our biggest test on our relationship. One of the things I’ve learned from my previous relationship is to never let money control you. Hiroshi was unemployed and the last thing I want is for him to go through what I went through when I was broke: constantly worrying about money and practically stop growing because of it. So the first thing I encouraged him to do is to be physically active and since he had a bad knee I suggested cycling. He was hesitant at first thinking he might get a phone interview but once he started he became fit, healthy, and even adventurous by taking different and longer bike trails. Next was to motivate him to take on a different interest other than computers. Since he likes to cook, he thought about baking and man was he a fast learner. I still remember those sweet days when I came home to homemade cream puffs, tiramisu, macarons, meringues, cookies or other goodies that practically sabotaged my workouts. He would always check with me first if he can include the ingredients in our groceries since I was paying and I would always tell him yes in spite of my increasing credit card balance (he didn’t need to know that part). Besides, money comes and goes and his happiness is what’s more important.
On the flip side, he was also taking good care of me. He knew I was under a lot of pressure from both work and home so he took on all of the housework: most of the dishes (I do it sometimes to relieve stress), the laundry, cleaned my car every other week, and started waking up early in the morning to make me bento lunches. Also, he covered all the bills to make sure I don’t take up all of the financial work even when his unemployment benefit ended. For the most part, his homemade sweets were our primary indulgence. So yeah, we were taking care of each other under dire situation.
Just when we were reaching our financial limit at the middle of the year, we finally got a break. On May I finally got a new job as a graphic designer. However, it was still difficult for one person to support two people living in a pricey community despite my salary increase. June came and so did our second break: Hiroshi got an interview. On paper, he was the perfect candidate for the job. They were looking for a technical writer with a product management background and he pretty much fits the bill. We didn’t want to bring our hopes up but I had a good feeling about this one compared to the other interviews. One week after the interview he got the job. Aside from finally getting a job, we were also happy that he maintained his salary pay. Things were starting to look up for us.
Months later we have passed our introductory period and are now full-time employees. Even though we’re still recovering financially from the first couple of months, at least we now have stable jobs that we’re happy with and more relaxed with our spending. It’s just so strange how things can change in one year. I can't say things just fell into place because we both worked really hard looking for a job. But that worried feeling and stress at the beginning seemed so foreign because everything is going great now. All in all, I’m very grateful we made it through this ordeal and instead of dreading the future we can now look forward to a better life together.
This was perhaps our biggest test on our relationship. One of the things I’ve learned from my previous relationship is to never let money control you. Hiroshi was unemployed and the last thing I want is for him to go through what I went through when I was broke: constantly worrying about money and practically stop growing because of it. So the first thing I encouraged him to do is to be physically active and since he had a bad knee I suggested cycling. He was hesitant at first thinking he might get a phone interview but once he started he became fit, healthy, and even adventurous by taking different and longer bike trails. Next was to motivate him to take on a different interest other than computers. Since he likes to cook, he thought about baking and man was he a fast learner. I still remember those sweet days when I came home to homemade cream puffs, tiramisu, macarons, meringues, cookies or other goodies that practically sabotaged my workouts. He would always check with me first if he can include the ingredients in our groceries since I was paying and I would always tell him yes in spite of my increasing credit card balance (he didn’t need to know that part). Besides, money comes and goes and his happiness is what’s more important.
On the flip side, he was also taking good care of me. He knew I was under a lot of pressure from both work and home so he took on all of the housework: most of the dishes (I do it sometimes to relieve stress), the laundry, cleaned my car every other week, and started waking up early in the morning to make me bento lunches. Also, he covered all the bills to make sure I don’t take up all of the financial work even when his unemployment benefit ended. For the most part, his homemade sweets were our primary indulgence. So yeah, we were taking care of each other under dire situation.
Just when we were reaching our financial limit at the middle of the year, we finally got a break. On May I finally got a new job as a graphic designer. However, it was still difficult for one person to support two people living in a pricey community despite my salary increase. June came and so did our second break: Hiroshi got an interview. On paper, he was the perfect candidate for the job. They were looking for a technical writer with a product management background and he pretty much fits the bill. We didn’t want to bring our hopes up but I had a good feeling about this one compared to the other interviews. One week after the interview he got the job. Aside from finally getting a job, we were also happy that he maintained his salary pay. Things were starting to look up for us.
Months later we have passed our introductory period and are now full-time employees. Even though we’re still recovering financially from the first couple of months, at least we now have stable jobs that we’re happy with and more relaxed with our spending. It’s just so strange how things can change in one year. I can't say things just fell into place because we both worked really hard looking for a job. But that worried feeling and stress at the beginning seemed so foreign because everything is going great now. All in all, I’m very grateful we made it through this ordeal and instead of dreading the future we can now look forward to a better life together.