Becoming a Statistic

We had a management meeting in November, when my manager wanted to assuage the fears of his direct reports. "I know times are tough," he said, "But the company is doing fine." We talked about metrics and revenue and such, and then had a brief session of sharing our feelings. My two colleagues said that they were worried and talked about that some. Then it was my turn.

"I'm not the worrying type," I said.

It's true. I'm not. I like to know where my next meal will come from, and I want a comfortable place to sleep and a hot shower in the morning. Beyond that, I'm flexible about where I am and what's going on.

I'd pooh-poohed the idea of a recession for a while. I know the economic definition, but my real wages rose tremendously in the past decade. I was much better off than I was in the Clinton years.

Now... perhaps it's good in the personal growth sense that every new "Unemployment Numbers on the Rise" story means a little bit more to me. I'm a tiny blip in that sea of people without a job at the moment. I'm still very fortunate in that my mortgage is secure and my skills are fresh and my resume is strong, but I'm a statistic.

That's also horribly insulting. I'm not the guy people ask about specific subjects at work. I'm not the person who gets tricky assignments because I work hard and I do things well. I'm not the expert who's been around for several years and is reliable and responsible and insightful.

I'm just a line on an expense report that the company no longer has to pay.

I'm just one more job loss added to a sea of confused and angry and hurting people.

I'm just one more entry in the state's unemployment register.

I'm just one more resume in a stack of 800 people applying for 30 open positions.

I was proud of my job. I was proud of the company. I was proud to give people my business card.

Now I'm insulted and embarrassed that for all of my pride and all of my hard work and all of my loyalty, I was just a statistic to them.