Shirped Myself

I feel like I should be wearing a tee shirt that says “I survived the ’09 layoffs.” The last two months have been a roller coaster ride, and I’m not a fan of roller coasters. Being a little bit on the short side, my head happens to be positioned perfectly, so that it bounces between the over the shoulder restraints like a super ball. Not much fun. When word came out that my company was going to be laying off a significant portion of the work force, the rumors and emotions started flying.

“I have a family, there are no jobs out there, we just moved, and what the fuck am I going to do if I’m on the list?” Pretty much covers the flow of my thoughts on 18 second intervals for the first two weeks. Then I sat down with excel and crunched the numbers. I made pivot tables, I had formulas and on paper, I saw that we’d be fine for almost a year. I slept a little better. Then the company started talking about notification dates. Originally we were to find out March 13th, a Friday no less. I mentally circled that date on my mental calendar, and told the wife that I wouldn’t be sleeping at all on the 12th, and probably not much more on the few days before either.

So a month goes by, and I’m more scared of any calendar showing that week than George Clooney is scared of commitment. And then we get an email that announcements will come either on the 12th or 13th. That’s just mean, how about giving us real info, or nothing at all. Don’t tell me just so I can readjust how much to worry. And then this Monday we find out that it’ll be Wednesday, Thursday or Friday. That’s just fantastic. I can just write off the idea of sleeping for the rest of the week. Thanks, suit.

At a meeting yesterday, my boss said that word would be coming out later in the day. Depending on if he gets the final cut list in time, and then it might not be till tomorrow. I’m pale, but I went to a new level of pure-white when I heard that. Around 2pm word gets out, they’re calling people and having them go to meet with their managers in conference rooms. It took another two and a half hours before I got the call, and to make me sweat a little more, the call was to tell me that I’d be getting THE call in another 5 or 10 minutes. Lucky me, I got two calls rather than one. So what if I sharted my pants twice? Finally I get the call, head to the conference room and get the good news. I still have a job.

I may have lost a few years off my life, grew hair just to see it fall to my desk and soiled myself four times. But hey, there are a lot of good people who aren’t as well off as I am today. Good luck to all of them.