It’s funny how things turn out. Just when you think you’re finally on the right path, you are once again confronted by a fork on the road, and you have to make the choice to go one way, or the other.

I was happy writing freelance. I was happy running my very own online business. I was happy working on my little Acer laptop seated in front of my equally little yellow desk in our little second bedroom. And yet, here I am right now in an unfamiliar office, blogging on the sly because it’s my first day at this new, oh-so “real” job and everyone’s left me alone to learn the rudiments of my rather ambiguous job description. For the nth time since I was unceremoniously hired by three different people from the company, fired by one, and hired once again in a span of a week (very long story), I am wondering – yet again – if I did the right thing by rejoining the pod and taking on another nine-to-sixer.

So why am I here, despite my plethora of doubts? That is another long story (and I seriously doubt if I could get away with discussing it at length here), but in a nutshell, the world is in recession. I used to get paid above average rates, but now I’m deemed too expensive, especially when desperate Americans are now willing to work for peanuts. I did try to price my services lower, but for stingy clients, it’s unfortunately not enough. So since November, projects became fewer and farther between, and if it wasn’t for my most loyal clients, I wouldn’t have been able to keep afloat.

Also, since we moved to the Philippines, The Fiance’s income has taken a rather considerable dip. It took him quite awhile to find a job, and when he did, it was only just a few hours per week for starters. So even if his hourly rate was pretty good, it still wasn’t enough. Because of that, we relied mostly on my income for a while, and when that started dipping as well, we ended up spending most of our savings. And so it was that we had our own personal recession.

Thankfully, business started picking up a little by mid-January, and The Fiance’s working hours have since tripled. But although we have quite enough to get by, we both decided that we can’t risk going through those harrowing months again. Not only that, we also needed to recoup our depleted savings.

Then this job came up (incidentally, it’s for the same company The Fiance works for), and we both decided that I should go for it. The pay is pretty good, considering that my tasks aren’t really that demanding, and I get benefits, which is important because I get sick every so often. Plus, it’s also a day job (I honestly would’ve died if I had to work nights again like I did for four years), and it gives me enough time to continue running my business if I can just learn to delegate, as well as write for my existing clients.

So after months of almost living hand to mouth (okay, that’s a bit harsh, but that’s what it felt like), we’re hoping to finally regain the lifestyle we gave up for a while, travel some more, replenish our savings, pursue our long-term plans, and maybe get a term life insurance quote, just in case. I still have my doubts about working, yes, but for this sort of security, I think I can live with that.