Deep breath and off we go.
I fell asleep catching up on news last night. Think it infuriated this morning. I kept trying to fight it, but in the end it won.
Friday, March 14th: The day had been brutal.
The day had been brutal. All Alice wanted was to get home, run a bath with the hottest water she could manage add some bath salts and sink into the pleasant smelling liquid. ‘Forgetting the rest of the world exists.’ She decided.
She had been up early and at her desk. Her boss declared cost cutting measures the order of the day and made his decisions of who to fire on criteria that had nothing to do with their actual jobs.
Or the necessity of those jobs.
Those let go left and the cracks began appearing immediately. Every person left found themselves doing everything they could to keep things afloat. For the last month it had been chaos and the work load had been increased. Upper management, untouched by the cuts, seemed to believe all was well. In fact they were so pleased by the cuts that they felt there were more people the company could do without.
After racing around all day to do what should have been assigned to others, Alice returned to her desk to find she was one of the latest to be let go. Because of the contract they were required to give her the designated severance package. There was some consternation about that but the threat of legal action had them agreeing to the official contract.
Once that was cleared, Alice left the building with the few things she kept in her office stowed in her bag. She stayed an hour later than necessary to make sure her duties were transferred. She didn’t care for the company one way or the other, but she didn’t want those she left behind to be swamped any more than they already were.
Of those she passed work too, many were already contemplating leaving. She suspected that once the firing was done, there would be people leaving just because they could no longer take it. Many already had resumes out. When Alice left the building, she found she was more relieved than anything else. She called the head hunter she knew on her way home.
By the time she reached her drive way, there were three offers. She looked them over while parked in the drive. All three offered her employment before and she knew them. She selected the one that most worked for her and let everyone know. By the time she made dinner, the contract was e-mailed and electronically signed. She had a week off before she started her new job and all she wanted to do was to soak away thoughts of the old one.
As she let the hot water sooth her tense muscles and exhausted bones, she found her thoughts drifting back to the company. While she had the week off, she knew that she would spend the week making certain her severance option was honored, the money transferred as arranged.
While she wasn’t that trusting of the company, she also thought that there was a good chance that in the near future they might declare bankruptcy. She wanted to get what she was owed before that point came.
‘But not tonight,’ she decided. She leaned back and tried to put it behind her. She was luckier than many even with the way things went down. Still, she couldn’t help worrying about those she left behind. Their schedules were likely to get even worse, the stress levels skyrocketing.
‘Not my problem,’ she tried telling herself again. It didn’t help. The water cooled and she extracted herself from the tub.
Ten til Midnight 