Day 25 of being unemployed. I could say this is a unique experience, but I know that it is not. What I can say is that it is an experience I tire of. I've mentioned a variety of emotions, feelings and impressions in other posts about this experience before, so I won't restate them -- because like bad memories -- they are still too fresh and painful, and depressing.
This time around, though it is different in so many ways. I am certain that the past almost two years have been so messed up that I don't even realize HOW much it has affected me, how much it has affected my relationships to family and friends, and how much it has changed my life.
First getting tossed from what had become the best job ever, because I got comfortable and wasn't watching my back. Fine, I think I did well with that -- though it took ten months and a lot of anguish and struggle (and help from people who care about me) to get through that period. I found a job, it was awful. I quit and found a better job, and for the first time in a long time my life seemed to be on somewhat of a positive track. I was contributing to the family, I was learning a new trade, I was getting used to a new existence. I had even rekindled my love of art and seemed to be making new progress with those ventures.
Then, about a year a go, I start getting symptoms of the cancer that would eventually take my colon and rob me of more time, more anguish, more misery and throw me right back into the well of self-doubt that I had been in after I lost my job.
Diagnosis, surgery, very long recovery. Eventually my body healed enough that I was able to return to work. Thankfully my employer held my position while I healed and I was once again able to feel a bit better about contributing to my family and was again, seemingly back on the path. Work was going fine, my cancer treatments weren't too taxing - again, my employer was very accommodating of my medical needs, and things seemed to be getting better. It even seemed like things were getting a bit better at home.
God! Damnit! Why, oh, why, do I EVER try to convince myself that I finally have made it through some kind of barrier of pain and suffering and misery, that I somehow have gotten to a point where things will be o.k.? I have never asked or expected everything to be perfect. I'd settle for o.k. with minimal disasters, just the regular stuff, you know; a flat tire once in a while, a flooded basement from a broken washer, a dog that eats a box of Brillo pads and needs surgery....you know...regular things. But, no, along comes Monday, October 24th, 2011 and I get laid off from my job -- nothing to do with me or job performance or anything... "It's the economy, stupid." and zingo, back to starting over, again.
Once again, I find myself faced with this weird deja-vu-istic feelings, reliving experiences as I went through just over a year ago... I see the same people, who tell me the same things, "One door closes...", "This too will pass...", "Gosh, you have free time again...", "At least you get unemployment this time..."blah, blah, fucking blah... I DON'T CARE! I AM FUCKING SICK OF IT! I am fully aware of how self-centered and selfish it sounds, but I am simply tired of living through the worthless shit-pile that my life has become. Sorry to be so brash with my comments, but a big part of this blog is being able to say and process what is going on in my head. So, as some people have told me ...."Get out your violins...." and play the "Woe Is Scott's Life" requiem...." here it comes.
Getting back to the title of this entry, "The Scarlet Letter?..No...The Invisible Letter 'U' ", and taking the focus off of me for a moment, we all saw in the news the whole "99%" vs "1%" thing that is being touted as what we all need to be paying attention as a nation is these economic times...well I say, BULLSHIT!!! What we NEED to be paying attention to -- as far as I am concerned is the nearly "10%" - the ten percent -that is nearly 30 MILLION PEOPLE....who are out of work...do you realize how big a number that is??? No, probably not...because that number means NOTHING until YOU are ONE of those 30 MILLION. If you can grasp the gravity of this then you can partially understand what a I am trying to get to with this blog.
Back in the day of 'Scarlet Letter' the worse thing a woman could be accused of was Adultery, and she was forced to go through life with the infamousletter 'A' sewn to her dress. Forever the scourge of her community. Fast forward four centuries and, oddly enough adultery is not even a crime, and in some circles (politics? big business? the rich and famous?) it is almost expected. I maintain that the new scourge, the new stigma, the new sin is being unemployed....
I really don't see much difference from the treatment that those with the 'A' sewn to their clothing got back then, than those of us who (ususally) through no 'sin' of their own are forced, in effect, to brandish a glowing 'U' for UNEMPLOYED, UNACCEPTABLE, UNEDUCATED, hell, even UNCLEAN on their person. For me this is EXACTLY how I feel. I have to collect (this is still hard for me to say) UNEMPLOYMENT...my hard working father would be turning over in his grave...
Speaking now, for myself only, I feel invisible...Maybe this fading has been coming for a long time. Maybe even before I lost my first job. Maybe even before I got sick. But, since I have come home from being sick, maybe I have been forced to take a closer look around me and see that the fading continues. For the first few months I needed lots of help - and I got it from family and friends. I cannot stress how important my friends have been in what healing I have accomplished. Yet, as time has gone on as I got physically better, went back to work and then lost my job a few weeks ago, the invisibility increases.
Clearly there are many things I am dealing with, but one of the anchors in our lives --- at least from what I have been forcibly been faced with discovering is that EVERYTHING stems from having a JOB. Some people say that is shallow but making a living is the root of all --- it doesn't even matter WHAT I do anymore, but having SOMETHING that brings in money and makes me a contributor gives me some value. So, I guess I struggle on. Invisibly until I can come home and announce that I have a 'job' and am worthy, once again of SOMETHING. Until then, I will try to hide the embarrassing 'U' floating above my head and just try to deal with miserable invisibility that has has become my life.
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