Small window of opportunity

Today's post brought more refusals to job applications. Also two phone calls saying their recent part-time posts had been filled. As for my application to be a costumed tour guide for Oxford Castle... they didn't even respond!

What can I do? Surely I can be of some use? Is my age against me or am I just unlucky and if so, is it a temporary thing?

My business idea is on hold due to the encroaching recession and my not wanting to take out a small business loan at the moment.

My other idea is to go back to college and take a course in psychology or hypno-therapy... if nothing else I may understand why I'm being turned down and may be able to convince myself that I am worthy of a job.

I have just turned down a full-time job at a secondary school; the stress of which I really don't want any more, not unless discipline reigns supreme. Surely, someone out there needs a willing, able and fairly intelligent person to work part-time?

What's normal?

The deep crags, swirls and lines of the bark of an old tree shows the effect of time, weather and growth over many years. So too does a person's face, and with that in mind, I have discounted many a picture that pops up on the dating website, having seen no depth, experience or feeling therein.

Now, I'm not saying that I'm looking for a very lined and weather-beaten face along the Tommy Lee Jones variety, although I really don't mind. But I would like to see experience, compassion and openness in a face - which, so far, I haven't.

Then there's the profile blurb; all-important because it is a first indication of whether a person is boring, self-centred, bullish, wimpish or just looking for any female who 'will do'. My renewed interest in the website is due to having posted three new photos, taken one morning last week with my long arm outstretched, in a good light and while in a good mood. Hence, the emails have come flooding in, along with many winks and offers of all sorts from all ages of men, eg 32 to 84 years' of age. I have been called beautiful, gorgeous and sexy; this is a good indication of the type of fifty-something man and his idea of how to chat up a woman. Whereas the thirty and forty-somethings are much better at talking to a woman in an equal and adult way. Some have given me their email addresses and phone numbers during the first contact... while I do not wish to divulge my private contact number with any Tom, Dick or Dirty Harry. I open up my emails each day in the hope that there will be someone out there who is just normal, attractive and of my age and not living in the outer Hebrides. You see... as an eternal optimist I am constantly being disappointed by my own unreasonable expectations.

However, talking about 'normal' - today I saw a man in his thirties walking along Witney High Street, pulling a banana on a dog lead; he even stopped at a litter bin and waited a few seconds before moving on. No-one commented, all ignored him as if his behaviour was perfectly normal. Perhaps I shall have to re-think my idea of normal and go back to the website for a second, less critical look.