One of the lucky ones

February, 2009. 

Will this be the month that we'll look back on and realize that, "wow... yeah. America really hit the crapper THAT month?". Or was it October of '08? December? Hard to say. 

But there's no question that things are getting much worse before they get better, despite Obama's best intentions and earnest efforts. My ex still can't find work, and is at the end of her proverbial rope. We put our condo on the market, and amazingly, got an offer in 6 days. There are some people out there with money, but not many. Now fingers crossed that the deal holds. No guarantees in this world.

Further, it feels like a day doesn't go by where I don't hear about someone I personally know getting laid off. Two weeks ago it was good friends, married, a baby due in May. Both got laid off on the same day. Yesterday, it was the boyfriend of my closest co-worker.

And today it was my co-workers. A lot of them. We're an amazingly profitable company ($60+m in '08) with 300 employees, but even we can't weather the storm. 50 workers were fired, downsized, eliminated, let go, shown the door, today. Whatever euphamism you want to throw out there. It doesn't change the fact that 50 people were marched into rooms, told "it's the economy, stupid" and shown the door. 50 more people sucking up California unemployment in a state that's nearly bankrupt. 50 less people to accomplish the "mission critical" job that we've been tasked to do in a major re-invention year for our business. 

I've been on my new team for 3 weeks. For the second time in 3 months (since we downsized 10% only 2 months ago, when I was in an awkward "transition" period), I danced through the raindrops. In pretty eerie fashion though. I am one of two "product managers" in my department. I've been a product manager all of 3 weeks. My counterpart's been with the company 9 years, but she happens to work out of Connectticut in a sweetheart deal she was able to get a few years ago; we've managed to operate with a lot of conference calls and email. And she's a sweetheart, and competent, and likely an asset to the company (though I didn't work with her long enough to really know). But... guess who got fired?

It wasn't me. 

Maybe it's being cynical to just presume that geography was the deciding factor. I am well-liked at the company, so it could've been a real view of potential, value or something like that. That'd be nice to think, and I actually thanked my department head for keeping me on the team, and he seemed to really appreciate that, and also said that he thought highly of me. So on a very grim day, that was a nice emotional boost for me, and probably somewhat cathartic for him. 

It's all headlines until it's you. Until it's the person in the cube next to you. The husband who can't find work. The ex-wife who can't get an interview. The father who's forced into early retirement. The sister who can't get a job out of college because there are no jobs to be had. 

It's going to get worse before it gets better. A lot worse.