Non-Company that I Worked For But Was Never Really One Of Them...Or What I Learned and How I Learned It

So fast forward...hello 2015.

I missed the beginning of 2015 and most of 2014...
No I wasn't in a coma or anything, but I might as well have been.

Nearly three weeks ago, on a Thursday, I was called to my manager's office to as he put it, "Discuss a few things".
 
I grab my steno and a pen, dismiss the faint feeling of unease in the pit of my stomach and I walk to his office. As I enter, I see my manager seated at his desk and then as I open the door wider, I see the Sr. HR Rep. In later appraisals of the moment, two scenes from movies come to mind, in Empire Strikes Back, when Han Solo, Leia, Chewy and gang are on Cloud City and invited to break bread with Lando Calrissian and Co, the door swings wide, then you hear the ominous low breaths of James Earl Jones as Vader welcomes them into the dining room with a malevolent hiss, "Please join me". The second being in Jurassic Park, when the velociraptors put their heads around the door, in a 'didn't expect to see us, did you?' pose.

I see an envelope on the desk, it's for me...my 'separation papers'.
I feel just like a wife who is being served divorce papers for the termination of a marriage she didn't even know was in trouble until that moment. Laid off...economic circumstances you understand, corporate restructuring, you are uninstalled, downsized, no longer an acceptable risk...you are out.

So the gist of all of this is, I am once again, unemployed...
It was hard for me to type this out, seeing it in black and white on the page makes it seem so final.
It does however, make all of the resumes sent, the interview clothes purchased and the hairdresser visit seem more worthwhile.

Fast forward to last Monday and I am headed out the door when my phone beeps to let me know I have a message. It's from a former co-worker. At first, I figure it is just another person reaching out, another "Hey man, sucks to be you, keep in touch, k,", both of us knowing all along that it is lip service and that neither of us will really be...in touch.

It's not...
What is on my phone, is a message telling me that a former co-worker is well...no other way to put it...dead.
I find myself thinking...
This time last month, this co-worker (let's call him Greg)Greg and I were having daily discussions about the training of a temp. Less than a month later, I no longer work there and he is...gone.
Really gone.

It doesn't seem possible...doesn't compute, add up, make sense...incomprehensible. My mind won't accept it.
Greg was 52 when he died and apparently he was alone when it happened. No one knew he was gone until he quit answering his cell phone and someone went to investigate. A coronary, no one there to dial 911, to talk to him...to hold his hand, to tell him he was cared about...loved.

I kept wondering, hoping that at least, in his last moments he called out to God and He, as he promised he would, sent an angel to take him the final steps...
"Leave it to Me, I'll lead you Home".

I spent the last 2 years or so living as if already dead. I went everyday to a job and I worked, and I worked and I took the work home with me, both literally and figuratively. I ate, slept, breathed and dreamt about it. I fought anxiety, anger, and depression constantly. Every morning as I drove myself to work, I would cry and beg God not to let me fail. I never prayed for joy or peace or happiness.
I prayed and prayed and I begged God, "All I have is this job, okay, All I am IS this job. Don't let me fail, let me be good at it, let me be the best at it. Please let them want me, please let them accept me, then I'd say again as if God forgot, PLEASE DON'T LET ME FAIL" .

I sat in my therapist's office week after week crying to the point I couldn't form words, could barely breathe. When I could, I'd laugh through tears about my job, that I loved so much I had to go to therapy every week.

I craved success and monetary rewards like a drug. One of the wake up calls is a moment of clarity I had when I told my therapist that the only joy I derived from my work was checking my bank account.

Saturday morning came, I woke, did my hair, spent time doing my nails and makeup. I put on my best Sunday go to meeting clothes and I went to Greg's memorial. As I was entering the church, I saw a few former managers and I heard a familiar voice call my name, "Hi Jill, how're you doing?", and it was if I were passing them in the hall on a Monday morning, as if nothing had ever happened. I was astounded,
"Really, you're going to ask me, how am I doing when you know damn well that you let me go quicker than it takes me to send an email...as if I were a smelly old cat that you were putting down?"

Then a light went on and I realized that for them, this is how they have to be, to make it in a corporate world, you have to divorce yourself from pesky emotions, like compassion, empathy, caring.

I ponder, how much longer would it have taken me to get that numb, that dead inside?

Later in the memorial, people reminisced about Greg.
But not about his work...
About how much he loved baseball, coaching, his son...how passionate he was about both these things. The church altar was literally filled with photos of him in baseball uniforms, and with his son.

I realized that I had nothing like that. No passion...that I been living as dead for years now.

I wonder how much of Greg's coronary was the result of life at Non Company, did he too experience the anxiety, depression, sadness...anger?

I don't want to be dead at 52.

And so, I thank God today that he loved me enough to let me fail.
To fail, so I that I might finally really live.