We're coming up on that one year mark. It's hard to believe the way my life has changed in the last year. A year ago I got up everyday and overruled my own objections and went to work no matter how much I hated it. I got paid well so that made it much easier to overrule the objections. I even liked a lot of the people I saw each day at work. Three hundred and sixty days later I am still bitter that after 30 years of my going to a job everyday, many of those days in the more recent years against my will, and working as hard as anyone there and harder than many I was basically told that I wasn't really that important.
I didn't realize how bitter I still was until last Wednesday night when I was at dinner with some former co-workers and one of them asked if I was going to be at a happy hour next week to "commemorate" the big lay-off of April 5, 2012. I think I blurted out something like "Oh HELL no! I'm not getting together with a bunch of people to celebrate the worst day of my life!!!!!" Then I found out that the friend asking was the one who had planned it and I guess I hurt her feelings. So, then I said, something even uglier about possibly celebrating when the company goes under, which I didn't even mean. Of course that kind of got to another friend at the table who still works there..... Oops!
For the record I don't want the former employer who shall not be named to go under. I have a small group of friends who still work there and I would hate for them to lose their jobs too. I wouldn't wish the last year on my worst enemy and I certainly wouldn't wish it on anyone without the benefit of a severance package. What I would like is for one specific CEO to live the next year of his life watching a total obliviate take everything he worked for for 30 years and flush it down a toilet while he sits by, counting pennies hoping that he is able to get a new business off of the ground and making enough money to live on before he runs out of them.
You might wonder why someone who disliked their job as much as I did is so bothered by losing it. Well for one thing, being able to pay the bills is always a good thing. But for another, I used to love my job there. I liked many of the different jobs that I had there. It was just the last two jobs that I hated. Being a number cruncher was never what I bargained for. For the record, I also hate balancing my checkbook.
I'm annoyed by the fact that I talk to friends and family every week who tell me that they can no longer shop in a store that has existed for more than 100 years because they can't get what they go in for. It's not that they don't want to shop there..... They've tried and they can't! I, on the other hand, simply don't want to. I haven't personally been inside of one of their stores in the last year. So I am not sure what you can buy there. But apparently whatever they are selling (or attempting to sell) isn't anything that my friends and family want.
Meanwhile, many of the former associates are working for other retailers helping them to beat our former employer. Others, like me have chosen other avenues. And the clueless CEO and seven or eight of his officers are living in other states and commuting to work via corporate jet every week on the company's dime and throwing away all of that money that they were supposedly going to save by canning all of us. When questioned about this by a member of the press a "spokesperson" said that this weekly corporate jet commute was necessary by the officers because it was good for morale at the retailer for them to be seen in the building regularly. I have two things to say about that.... 1) Yeah, it is kinda nice if you are being paid millions of dollars annually by a failing company and you actually show up for work. 2) If it is actually important that these people are seen there, then they need to move their sorry asses to Texas! It's not that difficult! Get a freakin' apartment! The regular folks without access to corporate jets do it all the time.
So yes, the anniversary of the Easter 2012 layoff is coming up and I will not be either commemorating it or celebrating it. In fact, I will probably wake up next Thursday write a travel blog, watch a webinar and then hopefully work on a trip or two for various clients who are eagerly anticipating travel to a new and exciting place. I wish ALMOST everyone at the former employer who shall not be named a better year than the last one was and I'll leave it at that.
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