I am no longer employed.

Writing that tiny sentence is more painful that I imagined it would be. I keep telling myself that everything happens for a reason, but I still don’t believe it. I was laid off from my job of almost 8 years last Thursday, and a week later I’m still not sure it’s sunk in yet. Business has been getting bad, and we’d had a lot of layoffs in the last year. But I’d just heard that we were doing “ok” and so I thought that really meant “ok”. I had no idea it meant I’d be out of a job. I also thought there were people who would go before me. People who have been there significantly less years than I had. I was obviously wrong.

My first reaction when they told me was “How could they do this to me?” and still, it’s the one question I keep repeating in my head. I know I can find another job, so I wasn’t as worried about that. But I felt so betrayed. Still feel so betrayed. My favorite part about my job was the people, hands down. It was family owned and operated, and my coworkers came to be part of my family. We had game nights, we went to the movies, we swapped organs.  So when I was abruptly dropped from the family, I was understandably (in my opinion) hurt. I know I’ll get to the point where I’m not as angry, not as hurt, and can understand that this was a financial business decision and not a personal attack. But I’m not there yet.

For the past week I’ve been waffling as to what I want to do with my life. My first instinct was to go back to school and get a masters degree in something useful. A B.A. in Behavioral Sciences isn’t really something I can use.  So I called my old school to see if I could get in there. They’re not talking admissions for anything before Fall of 2010. So that’s out. I checked the local college, because they have a great sign language program (and being an interpreter has always been my dream job). ALL of the classes are full, but I got on the waitlist for a couple. Class starts next week. I’m not holding my breath, but it’s worth a shot. If I don’t get in, well then I put my nose to the grindstone and find a job.

At least now I know that having coworkers that are “family” is not job security.  Next time I just need to make myself irreplaceable.

8-31-09 Edited to Add: I have never felt, and will never feel that donating my kidney should have given me job security. She is my friend, plain and simple. It also happened that she was technically my boss, but that never came to play in my decision. It was the friendship that we have that made me decide to do it. I mentioned it solely to illustrate the close relationship I have with my coworkers. Not working with them will not change that. We are still friends, and will remain friends as long as humanly possible.