So here it is an hour into the 4th day of the New Year and I sit at the computer freezing, covered in a blanket with tears tracing my cheeks. On my way home from doing laundry I had planned on writing about how I have an interview tomorrow and even though I have to drive to get there (it is in Orlando, I am in Tampa about an hour and a half drive) I felt good about it and from the moment I set up the interview I felt like this was the one. As I turned into a parking spot at my apartment that feeling along with any other hope I had went out the window. You see, as I turn the wheel there was this loud clanking noise of metal hitting metal, it sounded like an over zealous sword fight. I turned it off and immediately called my father, who proceeded to give me scenario after scenario (none of them good) efficiently making things worse… I could not help it my world fell apart. I screamed, I yelled, I said overly nasty things, and most of all I sat in my car at 11:30 at night, sick with the flu in 32 degree weather (in Florida) and cried.
Emotional break down, it was bound to happen. Things had not been good for awhile but on January 16 2009 things went from being not so good to bad. I just had no idea how bad. I worked in banking and I have watched the economy start to drop from before most people really understood that there was a problem. The banking industry was falling apart and like all good companies in times of crisis they look at their payroll and decided who they could replace with someone who would work for less. They did not do a mass layoff like most companies, no they sent out the wolves. No one was safe, the slightest mistake and you were gone. I hung on for awhile but when someone stands behind you and watches you work with the sole purpose is finding a mistake to fired you over you are bound to get nerves and make a mistake. So, yes, I knew I was going to be fired; I was just not lucky enough to find something before it happened… but I was confident. As days turned in to weeks, and weeks into months I began to worry. I was getting lots of interviews but no offers and every time I got one of those nice letters saying I was not the best qualified for the job almost all of them stated my credit rating being the reason…Credit Rating. No one cares that I work hard or that I am good at my job, all they cared about is my credit.
Of course, a year being unemployed tends to put a damper on your outlook financially, emotionally, and even socially (that is a story for another day) and soon it becomes almost impossible to see the bright side in anything. So when my father told me that my car was most likely un-drivable all I could think was no money, no car, no job, no apartment, no cats, and no life. It is a hard thing to come to the realization that you can’t do something on your own, especially when you take pride in the fact that you can make it all by yourself. My father came and looked at the car in the cold, even though the cold is the one thing he hates in this. He reminded me that no matter how bad it gets I am not alone, friends come and go but family is for ever, my father is my rock.
Tears are the safety valve of the heart when too much pressure is laid on it. ~Albert Smith
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