It's just like waiting for the axe to fall. Even before I knew what was going on, the decision had been made, and no amount of telling me that I am merely 'at risk' can change the outcome: on or shortly after 18 March, I shall be told that I am going to be made redundant.I am scared.
I am the only person bringing a wage into this household of 1 + cat. There is no fairy godmother to wave a magic wand and make up the difference between Job-Seekers (pitiful) allowance and the salary I totally depend upon. The local paper, which used to boast, 'Hundreds of Jobs in Today's Echo' every Thursday now shyly advertises 'Dozens of Jobs in Today's Echo.' In any given week, one or fewer of those jobs is suitable for me.
Employers may no longer ask your age, but they may ask when you received your qualifications: if you say you got your O levels in 1976 they can easily work out you were born in 1960. That can work two ways: either you are too old for them, or you may be over the age to ask for maternity leave, and that may be in your favour.
I'm 48, going on 49. I have no children, no dependants (unless you count the cat - and she will argue she is independent, although I have yet to see her manage to fill her own water bowl or open a pouch of Gourmet Perle - other cat foods are available) but I do have a mortgage, high credit card bills due to my desire to further my education - four years (part-time) at University has given Visa and Access a lot to be grateful for! I see my salary disappearing on or shortly after 18 March, and I see the president of the European sector of our business gleefully taking his annual bonus of £450,000 while he makes 65+ people redundant in the UK.
This is small beer compared to other companies that are closing, making their entire staff redundant: at least in my (soon-to-be-ex) company over 1,000 will be keeping their jobs. Good for them. Not good for me. It's hard not to be bitter. It's hard not to tell my replacement boss (my own has left - jumped ship before the rats were given their marching orders) to eff off when he asks me a 'favour' (not simply asks me to do something as part of my job, because he's pretending that job no longer exists: it does, he's just giving it to other people).
So I am facing the chop. It's symbolic : my head is to be separated (metaphorically) from my body, and that sums up my working life. My brain has never been fully occupied, my ability and my intelligence have never been fully utilised, so maybe it's fitting that my head is freed.
And, funnily enough, a very dear friend is a professional knitter. It gives me some comfort to know that she will be sitting by the guillotine as the axe falls, knitting furiously and crying, 'Guillotine! Guillotine!'
I shall smile at her as my head hits the basket.
