I am in a dilemma.

I drove truck for 25 years. Those years took their toll on my back. I acquired a herniated disc. The state of Oregon told me that I could never drive a truck again.

They said that they would retrain me for a different occupation. Since I am a person who likes numbers, the state told me that they would train me to be an accountant. The only problem is that they only gave me 16 months to train. I attended Southwestern Oregon Community College for five straight terms, which adds up to 16 months. I received an accounting certificate. I then entered the job market and found out to get a job as an accountant, you must have a bachelor’s degree, a certified public accountant license and about 100 years of experience.

I decided to try my luck at general bookkeeping since most of the classes I took at SOCC were bookkeeping classes as well as accounting. This turned out to be another farce. If a person does not have four or five years experience and isn’t able to do about five or six different jobs, he will not be hired.

I have been relegated to being a substitute at the schools. Since I don’t have a bachelor’s degree I can only sub for classified jobs, which include the resource room, the RBD room, the library, custodian, office worker, etc. I very much enjoy working with children who have special needs or behavior problems, but being a substitute barely pays the bills since I don’t even get close to 40 hours a week. It’s more like 18 to 25 hours. With gasoline out of control, I barely can afford to look for a job, but I still do.

The three major problems going against me acquiring a job are: First, I do not have a CPA license. Second, I have very little experience. And finally, the kicker; I am 58 years old and even though the law says you can’t discriminate because of age, it happens every day.

So the problem is that I have worked all of my life, I get injured and then I get punished. It seems that my 16 months of schooling, six months of rehabilitation and seven-month internship have went for naught. I don’t understand our system. I want to work for at least 10 more years.

My question is why does a person get punished for sustaining an injury through no fault of his own?