Soooooooooo
It's a little early, but I'm starting my trip report now. Partly so I can look back in the future and see that everything turned out the way it was meant to....I hope!
I lost my job. After 25 years here, Tuesday 7/31 is my last day. The company is closing after 39 years in business. It's sad. I'm sad. My bosses are sad. I've spend 8 hours a day, 5 days a week (for most of that time) here in these walls. I've had dreams about this place, I've stayed up in the middle of the night worried about where I was getting the cash for payroll. I've woken up in the middle of the night thinking of new auto attendant scripts for my customers. I've worked on marketing strategies and website redesign and work order design and custom data base creation and all forms of customer service and proposal writing, I've done all the AR & AP work for the last 8 years. I've created spreadsheets to calculate our cost & labor to get the end user pricing. I've lived and breathed the telecom industry for 25 years. I've watched my babies grow from infants in playpens in my office (when they weren't feeling well or their daycare centers were closed for random holidays). And that can be seen in all the pictures that used to hang on my walls & filing cabinets. The old ones never came down, the new ones were just added. All 3 kids' 8th grade graduation pics, my daughter's HS & College pics. Everything is here. I met my husband here (well, on my computer here back in the day when AOL was dial-up and pay per minute). I planned my wedding from here, I traced my daughter's feet and drew a ruler next to the trace & faxed that to Ireland to have her Irish Step Dance shoes made. Everything important that has happened in my life has happened here or unfolded here. I AM A MESS.
BUT..... Aruba is already planned and paid for and is happening. AND I am a FIRM believer in "everything happens for a reason". I truly believe that I will find another job and likely have a higher income and not have to stress about where that income is coming from - which would be nice.
It is truly the End of an Era and a (scary) start to a brand new one!