Memories and worries

There was a guy named Bob Lassiter who used to work at WFLA, the main talk station here in Tampa. His radio career effectively ended when his contract wasn't renewed at the end of 1999. I've been reading his blog recently and now I'm listening to his last show from December 1999.

At the time, I couldn't stand this guy. Now, with the benefit of experience and the last six years, my view of him has changed. And my view of his last day has changed.

I got laid off on May 25, 2001 by a company that badly miscalculated in the high-tech bubble. They got a whiff of the gold fever that was floating around then, when the new economy was supposed to get you rich without making any money. They ate from the venture capital trough and were forced into some really bad decisions. All the while, there were promises of incredible riches, but in reality, you knew who would participate in the riches and who wouldn't.

A couple months after the bubble burst, I got two weeks' severance, which is half the package that the woman I had to fire a few months earlier got. After that, I worked for whatever I could get and managed to stay afloat for nearly two years before I landed with my current employer.

When my current employer hired me, they told me that I would be there in my current position for 12-18 months, then they were going to let me go when the project was over. I appreciated their honesty, and it helped motivate me to find another position to move to before that day came.

I'm doing a good job for my current employer. The people I work for currently seem to appreciate the work that I'm doing. I might even get promoted next fiscal year. Some days, I even enjoy the work. But what happened that Friday has changed my viewpoint forever. The first second someone decides that there's too much overhead, and that we need to cut back, it doesn't matter how good a job I've done. When that day arrives, the only thing that will happen is that someone barked about the amount that's being spent in the backoffice function. Some will stay, and some will go. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, and for a few weeks, sadness and fear. And then people will adjust to the new reality and go forward. Before long, they'll be thinking about the bonus pool. And after a while, the threat of that day happening to them will seem very small.

Until the next time.

Meanwhile, the big guys will walk out to their reserved parking spots, hop into their overpriced foreign convertibles, and drive home to their gated community, lamenting how difficult the day has been. Maybe they'll have an extra Tom Collins that night to take the edge off. Then, drowsied from the extra little nip, they'll go to sleep next to their trophy wife because they need to be at the office the next day. Or maybe out on the golf course, cutting the next deal.

Across town, or maybe half a mile away, another person will get up and walk through the living room, the light of suburbia illuminating the living room. They'll look in on their second-grader, who has hopes and dreams and worries that don't include paying the mortgage. They'll wonder if they'll be able to provide for the child they brought into the world. Then they'll go back to bed and stare at the ceiling until the sky starts to brighten. And sit in the kitchen because there's no job to go to.

I guess that's life. Pardon me if it doesn't excite me.

Class warfare? Maybe. But you've got to be blind to not understand how much closer most people are to being the guy who didn't sleep, than they are to being the guy drinking the Tom Collins.