Translated Upon Request

I've had a hard time getting out of bed this week. First I realized that I have now officially been at my "new" job for longer than I was at the job I got laid off from. I like my current job and, more importantly, they like me, but I loved my old job. I felt special being at my old job.

At my old job, I was an editor with my own magazine. My picture was in it with "Editor-in-Chief" in below it in captions. I was responsible for writing the marketing for an entire line of global products. My words were translated in French and Spanish. Sometimes after work I would go into the store and look at the boxes on the shelves and see tangible proof of my work.

My current job is altruistic in nature. I get paid more. My commute is cut in half. I am one link on a very long chain that saves lives. My writing is now translated upon request.

Maybe it's my ego not getting fed. My work goes into a vortex that I'll never see again. Maybe it's that I'm at a job where again nobody really understands what I do and my parents couldn't even tell you my company's name. I just don't feel as special.

Today marks the one-year anniversary from being laid off from my razzle-dazzle job. I'm sad. I miss my co-worker whom I've shared two companies with. He's still there and told me this morning that the company is still laying off people and closing divisions, although he's still employed.

I was worried the first two rounds of lay offs it had, but I made it through them. My V.P. made a huge speech about how he was working with a bare-bones staff and that our division was safe from future cuts. And then the third round came and I was called in my boss's office at 7:30 a.m. and escorted out of the building by 7:45. I was in the unemployment office by 10 am. It turned out that I was the only person in the entire department of 40 people that had been cut.

The pain of being professionally dumped still stings. The company let me down easily with a nice severance package and a promise to answer late-night booty calls. It never stayed over though.