where's my crystal ball?

So, it's been over a year since we've moved to Saudi Arabia for Chris's new job, and it's becoming obvious that as much as this place runs on oil, it's powered just as much by rumours. Of course, one of those rumours is, "The company is going to send all of the expats home because look at the price of oil!" And, of course, so many other companies in the industry have cut their staffing levels. At least half of my friends who were overseas have been sent home. We can't help but feel like this company is going to announce something any minute, and this feeling has been lingering for at least the last four months!

Chris doesn't like living with this sort of uncertainty and copes a little by keeping an eye on real estate listings back in our hometown in Canada, just in case we have to buy a house in a hurry or whatnot. He also has a few notions of what he'd like to do, career-wise.

Sometimes he asks me what my plans are. 

Which is interesting, because for as long as I can remember now, I've slotted my volunteering/work/continuing education  into whatever space was left after he and the kids had their routines established. And if we move back to Canada this year, I'd face no such restrictions. I won't have the expectation of running the household on me alone, I won't have to worry about not having a work permit. I'm not used to imagining a version of my future after moving somewhere looking any different than it has all the other times, but this time it would be different, and it's taken me many weeks to shake that and figure out what I'd like to do with myself. But here they are, current as of today:

• Start work on a MLIS and work in a library system. This has been on my radar screen for nearly a decade, and while I wasn't too comfortable about the future outlook back them, I'm okay with it now. Despite the growth of  digital media, this is an exciting time for the written word.
• Yarn shop. I don't have to explain why this would be perfect!
• Food prep for catering. The order and repetitiveness of churning out hundreds of identical hors d’oeuvres or tiny vessels of kale and kumquat sorbet actually fits into my definition of "fun" ...
• Editing, but I'm worried that there would be too many years back in post-secondary for me to pursue this to make it a practical choice. But I can still dream of playing with other peoples' words ...
• Interior design for retail spaces. Though I am already a whiz at putting together IKEA furniture, I need to read more about the necessary credentials. 
• School-based social work
• Garden centre. Maybe the spring weather and beds of petunias that are everywhere on the main compound have been brainwashing me a lot recently, but this type of work is really appealing right now.

I love photography, but I think I'll keep that firmly in the "hobby" category.