The last time I tried to post here, I pulled it after a day or so. I was trying something new, and it wasn’t my style. First of all, it was a traveling post, which I should’ve avoided. Traveling isn’t as easy for me as it used to be, and it felt at first like I was reconnecting with the world with that post, but really it was awkward for me. Secondly, because it didn’t resonate with me in the morning. They were just words to “say something” in a void where maybe silence would have sufficed. And partly because it was a late-at-night-to-pass-the-time tone that I didn’t want to have on my site, honestly.

I’m more interested in my work at the co-op than that post revealed, and far less interested in myself as an entity than it proposed. I think the job-learning/acclimation arc is interesting as a perspective for my own journey, or for a leadership conference, but maybe not so much as the raison d’être of an article for my site. What I do want to talk about is the connection that the co-op and I made as we have come together and learned to work with each other. For me, it was a no-brainer: find some place that I care about, whose mission I value and can support, where I can help with organizational changes, leadership, and experience design, and where I could still find time to heal.

I imagine for the co-op, it was a little different. Less of a no-brainer, and more of a curiosity about me, maybe, and serendipitous timing on my part. I was a little brazen to propose they needed me, and they were gracious and welcoming to invite me aboard. The role we’ve created for me is an interesting one: a blend of outright marketing tasks(content/design creation, emails, website updates) and managing experiences and related strategy (member/customer touchpoints, overall tone of messaging, outreach/education). Both of which were aspects that the folks at the co-op felt they needed, so it worked out great! I’m lucky and grateful to find something so close to home that is willing to work with my employment limitations. And I like what I do there and the people I work with.

It’s a fulfilling thing to be in the midst of helping to provide food for people. And being a cooperative owned by the people who shop there, there’s a great dimension of integrity and responsibility, but to something greater than just a place or money. I feel like I was practically born for this: my first year was lived over the co-op at its original location in Hardwick; my mother was bookkeeper at the co-op in Montpelier during my early childhood (and was also hypnotizing me nightly during that time, so the sights and smells of that place were almost psychedelic and made a huge impression on me). So yeah, being able to help guide the voice and tone of something that I seem so karmically attached to is fulfilling, and the more time I spend here, the more I heal, so that’s good, too.

I guess what I’m trying to say (if I’m trying to say anything at all) is that I feel gratitude to be have found a place that I value, that seems to value me and the work I do, and is allowing me the space to find my way to stand on my own feet again, doing something I love doing at a place I can care about. So thank you for that.