Tough Times

We laid off 1,100 people this week. Some of them hadn't even completed training when they received word that they had been terminated. We had expected the operation to continue until mid-July, but the Field workers finished two months ahead of schedule so there's no work to do until July or August...or whenever. It changes all the time.

In any case, the office was filled with bustling gloom all day as sad-faced employees returned their badges and materials. At one point, I was given the unlikely task of "keeping an eye" on newly-unauthorized personnel as they stood in line.

Over the last couple days I have called the temp agency folks, but they didn't sound hopeful. One former boss is now answering her own phone due to down-sizing.

So I'm sitting here, feeling sorry for myself because I'm lonely, poor and facing some hard times, when I get an email from my DJ pal G.
He is caretakerof his dying mother and now he needs a substitute for his Saturday show, so I fear that his mom may have passed away. From what I understand, it will be a mercy for her and her family, but a family death is never easy, even when it's for the best.

I'd like to write about how my empathy and compassion for my friend and what he is going through have put my job problems and personality disorders in perspective, but that's not exactly how my brain works.

I sat motionless for (an hour?) a time, lost in melancholy thoughts about my own mother. I was the one who found her body and it was bad. My uncle S, who was with me, left me alone with her body while he went off to work on his own suicide, which came a year or three later. I try not to remember any of this, but I do anyway.

Waaah. I miss my mother. I really do.

Eventually, I snapped out of it.
G! His mother!
I wrote back and told him I'd do it. One good thing about my demotion is I have normal 9-5 hours again and will be able to do more radio-related work as a result.

I need to re-engage with life or I will never escape this depression. I have never been depressed on-air. I don't think it's possible...well, my voice was shaky after my grandmother died, but that was grief, not depression. Big difference. Grief can be healthy, depression cannot.

I don't know what happens next. Does anyone?

*************************

Recent News I Like:

I like the idea of mandatory high-mileage cars! Much too late, but better now than never!

I like consumer protection against lenders! About time.

And props on the $250 of stimulus money given to persons on fixed disability income. I didn't even see that on the news, a friend who received one of the checks told me about it. I guess good news doesn't travel so well.