Freedom!

Sorry, it seemed much easier to snag a scene from Braveheart to illustrate the "Freedom!" cry than to paint me face, don a wig and re-enact it.

I barely know where to begin for my first posting on my new iMac (more about that next post) and first since we got our internet back. This has been quite a week, very much a "That was the Week That Was" one. In between the earthquake and the hurricane came an event that surely has seismographic effects on my personal life.

I lost my job.

Well, I didn't exactly lose it. I know where it is. Right there where I left it last Friday. The work I did didn't go away...at least, not yet. No, I didn't misplace my occupation in a senior moment, lay it down somewhere and forget where I put it. Officially, my position was eliminated. I suppose it sounds better to say, "Your position has been eliminated" rather that "You have been eliminated", although the latter is more the truth.
Technically, I guess, nothing has been eliminated. I'm still here, although no longer there. the work I did is still there, though. So the work wasn't eliminated, just the position. Now the work must be done by someone who already has another job to do. My lighter burden becomes their heavier burden. They're up the creek with one less oar in the cold water to help row. (There are some hints there, those who have eyes, see.)

It didn't take me by surprise. I was on the bottom rung, stock person. Always the first to go when a company begins tanking. First they come for the stock person, then for the sales clerk, then for the store manager and then they give the CEO a $40 million  pension and call it a day. In other words, the people in the trenches, who do the real work, who know the customer, know the product pretty darn well, too, and know what the product lacks, get the boot first. The people who run all these businesses into the ground are never the first cast overboard, when they should be at the head of the plank. Heck, they should never have been whistled board ship to begin with. Most places these days are run by a bunch of MBA (that is a degree in Moronic Boobish Activity) who wouldn't know how to sit down if it wasn't a theory in a textbook written by a person who never sat down. And of course they would miss the chair, because after all, it is only a theory. (By the way, there is another three-letter acronym for CEO, but this is a family Blog so I won't mention it.)

Anyway, they eliminated my position across the board so I'm told. Yeah, that'll save the company, we all made so much.

See, this is what I mean by freedom. I would never have spoken so bluntly if I was working or expected to look for another job. It may be a bit tighter financially, we may have to draw in our belts, but as far as I am concerned I am retired. Now I can speak more freely about what is in my mind. I don't have to worry some one at work will read it and fire me. Oh boy, I've kept a lot of stuff pent up inside me for fifty-plus years. This should supply me with posting for a while.

It is very interesting that I walked in on Thursday and walked out Friday set free. At Wilmington Trust (remember them, around over a hundred years before Moronic Boobish Activity did them in) I got told on a Wednesday and was out the door on Friday. That event was almost exactly 10 years ago. My current ex-employer missed that anniversary by 10 days. I was lucky in a way. Everyone else I saw get terminated at WTC was escorted out the door by security on the day the axe fell. I was asked to stay about for two more days and walked out at the end alone with my dignity. Both that bank and this company harped a bit on loyalty. Where is the loyalty when they cast you aside like a damaged glass vase. If I had quit, I would have always given two weeks notice. I would be considerate, which of course the Corporation would expect, although consideration is a concept they don't understand when it is expected of them.

But don't think I am upset or unhappy with this turn of events. Remember, freedom! I've craved this freedom for such a long time. So here it is and I m adjusting. You may see a different tone going forward, but hopefully I will still write in good taste and Christian love.

And let me tell you, my direct boss was one of the best, a wonderful person who deserves better that she has received over the last several years. The people I worked with were all great, too. The problems in the company are not these people, not those who are the faces the public sees and deals with. You gotta go higher to the invisible elite who think they actually know what their doing. I wonder what company they will be ruining next year?