Every year around New Year’s Eve, I see a bunch of social media posts saying the same thing. “This year was the worst. I’m ready for a new one” (as if bad news respects the boundaries of calendars). “Drama queens,” I roll my eyes.
But this year, 2020, really IS the worst, and it’s barely April.
First on February 13th, my mom passed away. Which was awful, but not totally unexpected (she was 86 and not in the greatest of health).
Then at the end of February, the first whispers of corona virus started popping up in America (and future historians who stumble upon this blog will need no further clarification — it’s already set to take its place on the podium of horrible world afflictions right beside the Black Plague and AIDS). From the safety of my medical transcription duties I’d only seen two potential victims (both awaiting test results). It was this far back in the course of events that people were already considering working from home to prevent spread. “Ha!” I thought smugly. “I’m already on it!” I said to Tery that night how glad I was to already be sitting pretty with all this job security and not a care in the world.
The very next morning I woke to my phone blowing up with missed calls from my employer. My first thought was a bunch of reports had come in and they were looking for people to jump on right away. This barely had time to get across my neural synapses when my phone rang as I sat staring at it.
It was my supervisor, we’ll call him Dick. His first words were, “We need to have a really difficult conversation.” My blood ran cold, thinking I had made another critical error (I don’t make many, but they are deeply unpleasant every single time).
If only it was that.
I’ll spare you the complete transcript. Essentially, my “position had been eliminated.” That’s about all he would tell me. Effective immediately, I was unemployed. I had done nothing wrong, there were just “too many employees and not enough work.” Then there was some yammering about a severance package, but you know how in movies when a character gets blindsided or shocked and sensory input just cuts out for a few seconds? Turns out that’s totally a thing.
I thanked him numbly and hung up the phone, but now I wish I had taken the opportunity to tell him what a complete piece of shit he is to work for (but of course I still need a reference).
Dick is a bit of a perfectionist, and it DRIVES HIM ROUND THE BEND that he has to work with humans. Every day for the past year or more, he sent out an exasperated email detailing each and every one of our errors. Despite them always ending with “You people need to do better!” I suspect he derived a perverse delight at finding yet more evidence of our inferiority. Frankly, I stopped reading them months ago because a) they included everything, even missed commas for fuck’s sake, and for that reason b) they tended to be really really long and mostly pointless. But I’ll bet he had a grand time writing every single one.
Nope, I will not miss working with Dick even a little bit.
Then I saw an email from Dick, quite accidentally I’m sure, looking for volunteers to switch to part time temporarily, “just until the work comes back.” A second gut punch. Then I was locked out of the email system. Then I noticed on the job search sites (where I naturally hopped immediately) a posting for my position (you know, the one that was eliminated) minus the benefits package. I’m no dummy. They don’t want to pay for health insurance anymore, obviously.
I’ve worked for this company for eighteen years (don’t ask me which one; my severance package stipulates I don’t bad mouth them, as much as they deserve it). I’ve been with them through three name changes and twice as many schedule adjustments (always to accommodate their needs, not mine). I stuck with them when we were drowning in work, literally so much overtime that I, a person who will gladly work like a silent draft horse until I drop dead of exhaustion, begged for some hint of when it would go back to normal. I stuck with them through side projects that made me so miserable I sobbed in frustration nearly every day.
I’m here to tell you what most of you probably already knew — don’t bother. None of it fucking matters the minute they think they can save a few bucks by throwing you away. Yes, I’m bitter, but I’ll get over it.
A severance package feels awfully grown-up, and it does take some of the stress off, though not nearly enough. Nineteen weeks are going to go by very fast, especially now with the virus really hitting its stride, whole states in lockdown, and 3 million people applying for unemployment and I’m sure a certain amount of them like me, with no job to go back to at all.
It KILLS me that the world is bitching about being stuck at home where I normally love to be, and I can’t properly enjoy quarantine knowing that my problems will continue even beyond (assuming there is a “beyond”) the life of the virus. Every morning when I wake up, my first thought is “You still don’t have a job.” I can’t stop obsessively refreshing my job search app long enough to read or watch a movie or exercise or do anything. It feels like an enormous boulder over my head all the time. I often feel short of breath with mini panic attacks. I’m told this is what depression feels like, and my apologies to anyone who suffers it all the time for not realizing what hell it truly is.
In fact, I’ve been away too long already and it’s taken all my strength to get this done. I don’t have time for a proper conclusion right now (or to find humorous photos to make this post “pop”).
Miss Elaine eous 