Well, the good news is that Tim has a job… sort of. He has the promise of a job, to be more exact.

About four days after Tim was officially hired, the manager called him back and said there had been a change in plans. Due to slow summer business, she couldn’t hire him until some time in September. That’s the month that “snowbirds” start coming down and business picks up. (To her credit, she did say she’d understand if he wanted to find something sooner.)

And, in a weird way, this might be for the best. The first two months on the job would be probationary. While he wouldn’t be expected to give the hard sell, Tim will need to prove that he can get people to buy the product. If there are no customers, that’s not going help his case for long-term employment.

Also, there’s a rather large chunk of information to digest regarding various foot problems. He’s been directed to a website. He now has a daily appointment to sit down and read up.

Of course, there’s the most obvious problem: It could be anywhere from 4-8 weeks before Tim even starts working. She wasn’t too specific about when in September he’d have hours.

That’s kind of a big deal, especially since I’m about to stop getting overtime. That will cut our current income in half. In other words, we’ll be making less than when we were paying down debt. Not a prospect that has me jumping for joy.

On the other hand, this job has a lot going for it. It is sales, but it’s very low-key sales. These are high-end products — orthotic shoes and inserts, to be exact — so the company is about customer satisfaction rather than pure quantity-driven sales. To that end, there’s no commission, which takes a lot of stress off Tim.

There’s also location: It’s more or less across the street from us. Tim can walk there in under five minutes. And the starting wage, $10, is quite good for the area.

So we’re in a bit of quandary.

I told Tim that I don’t want him to give up on that job altogether, but I’m also not comfortable with the idea of just twiddling our thumbs for two months in the hope that the manager will call.

To that end, we sent out his resume to a bunch of temp agencies. So far, not even a nibble.

My current suggestion is to find a disposable job. By which I mean, find a job he can tolerate for two months and then quit it when the other position becomes available. It sounds horrible, but there it is.

While this is our best option at the moment, it’s frustrating in its own right. It basically guarantees that he’ll be doing one of three things: fast food, sales or construction. None of which are good options.

Construction exacerbates old injuries and, if he’s doing drywall, it wreaks havoc on his skin.

Sales has all the pressure that upsets his skin, plus apparently he’s a total jackass when he gets into sales mode. His own mother didn’t like him when he was in sales.

Fast food is really awful work for little pay and, you guessed it, is bad for his skin. All the grease coats it and… yuck.

But there really aren’t a whole lot of other options out there right now. It took us the better part of four months to find the job across the street. While I’ll definitely keep my eyes peeled for any regular jobs he could turn into full-time work, we may just have run out of choices.

I think maybe it’s time to squeeze our eyes shut, spin around and choose something. And hope that we can minimize the impact on his skin.

What would you guys do in our situation?

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