Time Passes Slowly

We're not even a month into the new year, and I really think it's going to be a hell of a year! For those of you who follow this blog (and yes, Sarah, there are more than family among our readers), I have never mentioned either my occupation or my employer, and that's not going to change today; but I will say that I moved on to a new employer (my choosing) and I couldn't be happier. It was as if the clouds parted and allowed the sun to shine through. Combine this news with Sarah's success and happiness with her self-employment venture, and I relish the coming year.

But the real reason I believe 2011 will be special is, of course, Elijah. Although sometimes it feels as if his autism is dominating his brain (his insistence on telling everyone he meets to"smile with your teeth" is wearing thin), he continues to show growth in all aspects of his socialization process. Every morning, as he bounds out of the car at school, he will greet any adult or classmate he sees. At a Cub Scouts meeting, he interacted with everyone he knew and enjoyed himself so much that we are participating in the "Pinewood Derby" for toy wooden cars this weekend. On the mornings I can't take him to school, he happily catches a ride with our neighbor Doug and his daughter, apparently yakking it up the entire way there.

But to me, the real show of progress was his request (actually, insistence) that two children he played with on New Year's Eve come over to his house for a playdate. A former co-worker of Sarah's who has a boy about a year younger than Elijah (and a little girl less than 2 years old) invited us over on New Year's Eve. Elijah, who had gotten to know Quinn during the past few summers at the local park pool, was very excited about going over to the house and counted off the days until the big event. When we got there, an added surprise, a little girl cousin named Zoey, was also there. After a little bit of getting-to-know-each-other time, the three played all evening long, which allowed the adults (there were eight of us) to relax and enjoy each other's company.

The next day I asked Elijah if he enjoyed playing with Quinn and Zoey, and not only did he reply in the affirmative, he asked if they could come over to our house to play. I could count one hand, with fingers to spare, how many times that has ever happened. Needless to say, I was overjoyed and insisted that Sarah start the process to get this done. When arrangements were finalized we put the date on Elijah's calendar and, as the date neared, he eagerly counted down the days.

Unfortunately, it appeared as if Mother Nature would put a crimp in our plans. Seven inches of snow had fallen a few days earlier, and now the weather forecast was calling for another four to five inches the day our guests were due to come over. Thankfully, the local weather people were as accurate as they always are, and all we got was a little dusting in the morning. Elijah was so excited he climbed up on a chair to move the clock hands, as if that would really make them come any earlier. (He mistakenly turned the hands back rather than forward, so it appeared to Sarah that the batteries had gone dead, and she insisted I change them.) When the young guests finally arrived, it was almost three straight hours of jumping, laughing, playing musical instruments, sledding (our backyard has a hill) and finally, cookie eating. It was a complete success!

These pictures may seem to be nothing but some kids playing together in the snow, but that's what makes them so wonderful to us. That Elijah not only asked for Quinn and Zoey to come over, but actually played and laughed with them, is an incredible milestone, one which I'm sure we'll be repeating soon. Yes, it's going to be a great year!

Dinners of the damned

You hear a lot these days about layoffs and what they are doing to workplaces. Low morale, heavier workload on those left behind, survivor's guilt.

I can relate to the lowered morale and the heavier workload, but survivor's guilt? Sorry, can't go there. I've worked past midnight and every weekend and pretty much every holiday for too many years and am simply too exhausted by my schedule (and the fact that I haven't had a week off in nearly a year) to feel survivor's guilt.

Don't get me wrong -- I am very grateful to have a job at all in this economy, and I intend to do my best at that job as long as it is there for me. I have no choice -- our household depends on two incomes. But reading all these articles about post-layoff workplace issues has me wondering if those who write them have any clue what they're talking about.

Take the office refrigerator. Please.

No one ever seems to write about this, which is why I'm convinced that the layoff stories I read in newspapers are written by free-lancers who never actually set foot in a newsroom.

I've never been unfortunate enough to actually be at the office as co-workers are being told that their services will no longer be needed (one of the few good things about working nights is avoiding these scenes, which generally happen during "regular" hours). So I don't know exactly what people do in those minutes between the time they are informed of their layoff and the time they leave the building.

But I can tell you what they DON'T do -- they don't take their food out of the refrigerator.

The results are predictable, and when I read a Chicago Tribune article a couple of weeks ago about an office refrigerator whose fumes actually resulted in several people being hospitalized, it didn't take much for me to imagine how the situation had developed.

It's been more than two months since the last round of layoffs at my workplace -- and it was a huge round. So you know where this is going.

Yes, the food is still there, festering. No one wants to touch what one of my fellow night-shift workers refers to as the "Dinners of the Damned." And who can blame them? I'm certainly not volunteering for the task. And whoever was disgusted enough to post the aforementioned Chicago Tribune article in the kitchen area of our newsroom apparently didn't volunteer, either.

I haven't given a lot of thought to what I would do if I were laid off. It's unlikely I'd have what it takes to launch into one of those philosophical speeches that movies are made of, or to make a dramatic exit that is forever enshrined in newsroom lore.

I admire those who do make a memorable exit, though. Like one former co-worker who, on layoff day, got "the call" to please come up to the publisher's office. Sure, she said, I'll be right up. Rumor has it that she immediately headed there, where her supervisor and other bureaucratic types were waiting. But instead of taking a left and going up the stairs at the end of the hall, she took a right -- straight down the stairs, out to the parking lot and off into the sunset. (On behalf of beleaguered worker bees everywhere, here's to you, G.B.!)

I hope the layoff scenes are over. But if I should get the ax, you can bet I won't take long to pack my stuff. I won't scream, cry, throw a fit or launch into a soapbox rant about the disintegrating morals of corporate America. I'll probably just quietly fade away.

And I'll take my dinner with me.

Here comes Trouble

Whew. What a week it's been.

I still have a job, which is more than many of my (now-former) co-workers can say. Monday's payroll blood-letting was brutal -- we're now down to approximately half the staff we had a little over a year ago -- and confusing. I thought I had lost my capacity to be stunned, but I was wrong. Some of the most versatile (and therefore valuable) employees were cut, as were some part-time (and therefore cheap) employees. So again, there appears to be no rhyme or reason to the decisions.

But I survived, and my schedule henceforth will look something like this:
4 p.m. to midnight Mondays.
Off Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
5:30 p.m. or so until whenever we're finished on Thursdays. Hopefully before midnight.
Off Fridays.
4 p.m. to midnight Saturdays
4 p.m. to midnight Sundays

It's starting to feel less and less like a part-time schedule, and more and more exhausting. Until now I've gotten a three-day block of time off every week, which sort of feels like a mini-vacation, and so I haven't really minded the fact that I get no paid days off and therefore can't take any time off other than those three days each week. (Haven't done so since going part-time in August).

I think the thing that will finally get to me is the fact that for the foreseeable future, Jeff and I will have NO days off together, ever. Up until now I've had Mondays off, which means that whenever one of those Monday holidays rolls around, we can all spend the day together as a family. I'm pretty zonked from having worked the three previous nights until midnight, but still, it's nice to go to the park, or the zoo, or wherever and not have to worry about making it to the office by 4. Granted, there are only four of these family days in an entire calendar year -- Martin Luther King Day, President's Day, Memorial Day and Labor Day -- but oh, how I looked forward to them. So much for that.

I'll stop complaining now, because at least I do still have a job. It's going to be far more stressful because we are each taking on so many added responsibilities, but there will be enough money coming in to pay the mortgage and all the routine bills. At this point in the recession, that's enough.

So on to our other news: Elijah is just completing his first week ever of being away from home all day! He's at something called Spring Break Adventure Camp at our fitness center, which as far as I can tell consists of a group of teenagers and 20-somethings leading a bunch of 5- through 12-year-olds through a day of games, swimming, rock-wall climbing and arts and crafts while trying to maintain their own sanity. (I couldn't do it.)

At first I was really hesitant about sending him, because he's so different from other kids and I feared that he would be teased and bullied and scared and lonely -- all the things most moms worry about, but which I amplify through the magnifying glass that is autism.

It appears my worries were, for the most part, unfounded. Although he has mostly stayed to himself (OK, yes, I've checked in on him each day!), he doesn't at all mind sitting and coloring while other kids play basketball and field hockey and whatnot.

He even has a little hanger-on who rarely seems to leave his side. That would be Will, a precocious little guy who actually looks much younger than 5, which is the cutoff age for this camp. Elijah had told me one evening, after my usual round of questioning in an attempt to get even one word out of him about his day, that one of the other kids at camp was named "Will." This was the only name he could come up with, and I was skeptical.

But he turned out to be right. When I checked in on him the next day, sitting off to the side of the gym coloring with another little boy sitting beside him, I walked up and asked Elijah how he was doing.

"He's fine," chirped the little boy.

"Hi!" I said. "What's your name?"

"I'm Will," was the reply. "I like to color."

"Do you know Elijah?" I asked.

"I know he's TROUBLE!!!" Will exclaimed.

I was a bit taken aback, and was beginning to wonder when Elijah was going to look up and at least acknowledge that he had just been defamed, when Will launched into his explanation of "trouble."

"He goes over THERE," (pointing to one corner of the gym), "when we are supposed to go HERE!" (pointing to another corner). His eyes grew big with excitement as he related this tale of anarchy. "He's TROUBLE!"

I tried not to laugh, but it was hard. Yes, Elijah does tend to zig when other children zag. Usually it's not a problem, as long as there are enough adults around to redirect him. Or to put his swim trunks back on when he decides he's had enough of the pool and strips butt-naked right there in front of everyone (that would be Tuesday's version of Trouble). I would think THAT would have made more of an impression on young Will, but no. It was the going-to-the-wrong-corner episode that really marked Elijah as Trouble.

Today is the final day of camp, which will be a relief, no doubt, to the wonderfully patient staffers who have led Elijah from one activity to another all week long, with Will never far away. It marks a big milestone for Elijah, who never seemed interested in coming home early even though his worried mom made the offer nearly every day. It also marks a big milestone for me, because I've finally been able to let him be with strangers in a child-care setting all day long.

Next stop, kindergarten! It's just 5 months away. Perhaps I should warn the teachers now to watch out, because Trouble is coming.

Woe is not me -- yet

OK, so it's been awhile. I haven't subjected any of you to my ramblings lately because, well, I can't think of anything new to ramble about. Which is good, because I have finally reached the age where the phrase "no news is good news" actually makes sense.

But the thing is, there's always news. This week's news is that I have started taking what is likely to be a long list of classes to upgrade my skills in preparation for a new career. I'll admit that I put this off for a long time, not because I didn't want to go back to school, but because I hate having only one night a week at home. (Elijah doesn't mind it at all, given that any night Mom's gone means he gets to eat dinner in the den with Dad and make all sorts of disgusting bodily noises. Mom tends to take all the fun out of things with her insistence on sitting at the table and not belching. Or worse.)

So now I'm taking an HTML/XHTML/CSS class on Monday and Tuesday nights, then working Thursday nights through Sunday nights. With any luck, I'll develop enough skills in Web site architecture that I can go into the underlying code for this blog and make some changes to the template, such as getting the title to be in proper uppercase and lowercase letters (those trendy all-lowercase things drive me insane.).

More importantly, of course, is the fact that I'm in the job market, which, as you may have heard, is not a real great place to be right now. I technically still have a job, although it could evaporate this week or next. (Yes, it's layoff time again -- the fifth round of layoffs/buyouts at my company in the past 14 months.)

Got a fork? Stick it in some newspapers. They're done.

So I'm trying to keep in mind the GOOD things about a likely job loss. For me, it means eight hours of sleep a night. No more getting home from a commute downtown at 12:30 or 1 a.m. No more going to work on Friday nights, Saturday nights, Sunday nights, holidays, 52 weeks a year. No more snapping at Elijah because I'm exhausted. Mondays are especially bad, which doesn't bode well for learning computer code from 6 til 9:30 on Monday nights.

If you happen to be someone I work with -- or one of my bosses (yeah, I know I sent you an e-mail from home and forgot to delete the link to this blog in the tagline), please keep in mind that I do not WANT to be laid off. If given the option, I'd probably stay til the ship goes down, simply because I'm a stay-til-the-ship-goes-down kind of gal. (Plus, so far I haven't been able to find another job.)

Sorry for the cliche (the kind of thing I get paid to take OUT of other people's writing), but the ship is indeed going down -- you know it as well as I do.

I thought about posting a bunch of links here to various articles and blogs about my industry's demise, but those of you who care probably have already read all you can stand to read about it. I'm just hoping I hear about any layoff involving me BEFORE my name gets posted on one of them. That's a lousy way to learn about your job loss, although only slightly lousier than getting the news in an e-mail, which seems to be a growing trend.

I will say that I understand why no one wants to read newspapers anymore. Nobody sums the reasons better than Will Bunch on the Huffington Post site. Click on that, read it and watch the Jon Stewart video. It's a scream.

And sometimes, screaming is all you can do.

Death by a thousand cuts

Anybody need a copy editor?

You're probably shaking your head right now, thinking, What exactly is a copy editor, and why would I need one? I have spellcheck!

Well, if you're one of the countless people who, as you are placing the order for your Christmas cards this year, find yourself merrily typing an apostrophe in your surname, as in "Happy Holidays from the Smith's," then you indeed need a copy editor. I'm not even going to get into the geeky grammatical explanation of why that apostrophe is Just. Plain. Wrong. You'll have to trust me on this one.

The reason I'm wondering whether anyone needs a copy editor is simple: Today is yet another Layoff Day at my newspaper. (Layoff days, in my world, are sort of like wars. Once they become a recurring event, they get uppercase, proper noun treatment.)

So here I sit, wondering whether I have dodged the ax yet again. (This would be the fourth time this year, for those of you keeping track at home.) I'm cautiously optimistic, based on the fact that the e-mail announcing this round of bloodshed was sent at 12:32 p.m. and stated that nearly all affected employees already had been informed. It is now 3:50 p.m. -- no one has called, and an e-mail exchange with my immediate supervisor (who may or may not actually know) seems to indicate that I am safe once again.

As usual, the best source of information is the blogosphere (now THERE'S a sentence I never thought I'd write!). Local media gossip blogs, which have been amazingly accurate through round after round of these layoffs, have posted a list of those who have been let go. Some of the names were expected, some are stunning, some are sad (Would YOU lay off an employee who had worked nights, weekends and holidays for you for several decades and whose wife has recently been diagnosed with cancer? Well, then, you are not cut out for management!).

So here I sit, waiting and wondering and possibly sealing my eventual fate with sentences like those at the end of the paragraph above. If you're one of my bosses, trust me when I say that I'm NOT talking about you personally. I'm talking about the whole corporate machinery that builds up people and products and services, then cannibalizes itself in a desperate attempt to undo the damage wrought by macroeconomic forces and its own bad decisions.

Then gives its top executives multimillion-dollar golden parachutes.

You and I are both victims. But at least for now (4 p.m. Central, and the phone is still silent!), my name is not on the list. I hope yours isn't, either.

Buyout blues

Things are fairly grim around the office these days. As you may recall, my company is in the process of significant downsizing -- again. Our departmental meeting last week consisted of exactly what we knew it would (which is good, considering that about half of us could barely hear the proceedings because our ears were still ringing from the Springsteen show the night before).

According to the official announcement, the "majority of" employees are being offered buyouts. Apparently "majority of" means every full-time employee who has been with the company for at least one year. Given our very low turnover rate, that's a hell of a majority. Somewhere upward of 90 percent, according to the office grapevine (which, by the way, has a pretty impressive record of accuracy. We're journalists, after all!)

The hope, we are told, is that enough people will participate in the "voluntary separation program" that there will be no need for an "involuntary separation program." And we all know how ludicrous THAT hope is.

As luck would have it, this announcement, along with the accompanying stacks and stacks of ominous-looking manila envelopes, each bearing the name of an "eligible" employee, landed with a thud on the very day that my status shifted to part-time.

That means there is no decision for me to make. Now that I'm part-time, I'm not being offered a voluntary separation. And I have no control over the possibility of an involuntary one.

So I just proceed as normal, while all around me, talk turns to the merits of the various buyout options and the mysteries of job-hunting in the year 2008, such as as: Do people still actually use paper resumes? Or resumes at all? Do online applications ever really get reviewed? Do employers prefer to see a full-blown Web site detailing every accomplishment you've had, as well as links to any reference to you anywhere on the Web, not to mention all your favorite blogs and other sites? Let's hope not, because if the dreaded "involuntary separation" comes my way, the closest thing I have to a Web site is this. Heaven help us all if my career options are shaped by what's written here!

In any case, it's an interesting time. When you're in the situation we're in, all the normal rules of professional caution pretty much go out the window. I've seen people engaged in heated arguments with people who are several levels above them in the hierarchy. No one seems audit their own conversations regarding plans to leave, and everyone who is looking for work feels pretty free to let the boss know about it. Unless, of course, you have reason to believe that your boss is closing in on an interview for the same job you're angling for.

But there IS a bright side: I have finally reached the point where I can get up and walk out at the end of my shift without the slightest bit of guilt for things left undone (a very handy approach, considering that I now work one short shift a week in which I leave four hours before everyone around me does). After all, my reason for switching to part-time was to get more sleep and to stop sacrificing my health. There's simply no point anymore in giving up so much of myself to an industry that has nothing to give back.

For those of you who really couldn't care less about my professional tribulations, I apologize for going on for so long. (But why are you still reading, anyway?) And for those of you who really are just interested in how Elijah's doing (Hi, grandparents!), he's doing just fine. And he's turning into quite an impressive little artist. Jeff has scanned some of his drawings into the computer, so I'll be posting them within the next couple of days.

Right now, I think we're off to the park. We're fortunate to live in a city that has a great number of free outdoor performances of the symphony, ballet, etc., in the summer and early fall. It's part of an outreach effort to introduce the arts to the great unwashed masses (like us). And as a mom, it is my duty to make sure Elijah experiences such things. (Jeff and I long ago worked out a list of parenting responsibilities in which he is in charge of sports and rock-n-roll, and I am in charge of classical music and the performing arts.)

So it's time to stop thinking about work, stop thinking about resumes and stop thinking about all the things on my to-do list. We're off to Ballet in the Park, where we'll be in a beautiful rose garden surrounded by elegant fountains and enormous trees. A good break for the soul.

Thanks for checking in!

The plot thickens

Once again, my job situation is precarious.

Those of you keeping score at home may recall that my company, which has been hemorrhaging red ink in much the same way all other companies in my industry are (when's the last time YOU sat down to savor a newspaper in print form?), had a round of layoffs a mere eight weeks ago.

Round Two (or is it Round 3? I've lost track.) is upon us, and my job category is widely suspected to be squarely in the middle of the chopping block -- just as I had finally arranged for hours that would keep me sane, give me sleep and keep at least a small paycheck coming in.

We received notice this morning that we are to meet with our executive editor at 5 p.m. Monday. Needless to say, this will make it somewhat challenging to devote our usual diligence to our jobs throughout the weekend. So I'm damn glad I'm going to the Springsteen concert Sunday night, rather than doing my usual Sunday night gig of presiding over the production of a newspaper whose staff morale is sinking fast and could hit bottom on Monday at about, oh, 5:03 p.m.

So, Bruce, I'm counting on you. Bring out all those angsty songs that you churned out with such fervor in the 1970s, before you made your first gazillion dollars, when your audience could still believe you knew what it was like to be in that darkness on the edge of town.

It's official

I switch to part-time hours on Aug. 25. I'm giving up benefits. I'm giving up paid vacation. And I'm also giving up perpetual exhaustion and the sense that I'm not giving Elijah what he needs most from me at this point in his development -- a mom who is working with him and interacting with him in a meaningful way rather than trying desperately to catch up on sleep every afternoon before heading downtown for a work shift that doesn't end until at least midnight.

I'm not certain yet, but I think I'll be working my regular 4 til slightly-after-midnight shifts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, plus a shortened shift (5:30 til 9:30) on Thursdays. Yes, those are some mighty crappy hours, but it's fewer mighty crappy hours than I have been working for many years now! Once I make the shift to part-time, working these hours completely eliminates the need for us to pay for any child care for Elijah, which is good since saving money will obviously become a priority for us at this point. (Note to immediate family: Don't expect Christmas/Hanukkah gifts this year. Probably not even those calendars plastered with pictures of Elijah that you've all graciously displayed in prominent places in your kitchens, at least when we are visiting!)

Of everything I'm giving up, somehow the paid vacation is the hardest. It's not just that I will very rarely be able to take any time off at all or to travel anywhere. It's the fact that for so many years, I anticipated hitting my 10-year mark and therefore becoming eligible for the maximum number of paid vacation/sick days (it's now the same thing at most companies). The maximum number is 29, and this is the first year I've been eligible for all of them. AND NOW I'M NOT TAKING THEM! For those of you who work in more flexible industries, 29 days might not seem like much. After all, to a teacher, 29 days off is ...... July. But to a copy editor, it's nirvana, even though we still work on days most people wouldn't even consider working after age 21 or so -- Christmas, July 4, Thanksgiving, etc.

But with my new schedule, I'll have three entire days off each week, and I'll be able to get to bed by 10:30 four out of every seven nights. So until some lottery jackpot comes our way, that will have to be my own sad little version of nirvana.

Exit strategy

I didn't get laid off last week.

For most people, that would be reason to celebrate. And, given our financial situation, it is.

But only to a point.

I'm exhausted, you see. I go to work at 4 or 5 p.m. and arrive home long after midnight. I go to bed as quickly as possible after arriving home and, if I'm lucky, I can get a little more than five hours of sleep before the stirrings of a morning-oriented household, as well as my morning-oriented circadian rhythm, pull me back to consciousness. Then the daily schedule swings into action, and I'm staggering through another day on autopilot, snapping at Elijah for little things, zoning out at 65 mph on the interstate and feeling my health decline in ways big and small.

It's been this way for five years now, ever since I made a vow that the little bundle of joy and demands in my arms would never spend one second in institutional child care while in his infancy or toddlerhood. Hence, the need to work nights so I could be home with him during the day. Over these past five years, I've had several cardiac episodes that ended with an ER doctor, peering at my test results, asking me when I intended to start getting enough sleep and cutting down on the staggering amount of caffeine it takes to get me from 8 a.m. one day through 1 a.m. the next day.

I've even taken heat from a dermatologist when I had the nerve to ask why, after decades of relatively healthy skin, I'm suddenly getting precancerous lesions everywhere. (This is despite my dedicated use of sunscreens so powerful that until recently, they weren't even approved by the FDA -- thanks, online Canadian pharmacies, for your skin-protection assistance!) He looked at me carefully and said something along these lines: "I can tell you're not getting much sleep. Our immune systems are constantly fighting off cancer throughout our bodies, and sleep and exercise are the most important factors in healthy immune system functioning. And remember, not all early stage cancers are as easy to spot as skin cancer."

The lecture went on, but you get the idea.

That brings us to June 16, the day my employer laid off more than 1,400 people across the company, 120 of them at my workplace. Since another lovely facet of my job is that I work weekends, I was home on that dark Monday and thankfully missed a pretty grim scene. We lost some good people, some VERY good people, and those of us remaining are acutely aware of how fortunate we were to escape the ax. But given that our industry is sinking and sinking fast, we know our time is limited.

That's the day I decided to formulate my exit strategy. I must admit that it's not much of a strategy, but here it is: Get all debt except the mortgage paid off. Switch our family health insurance coverage to Jeff's employer. And pounce on the next buyout offer (expected late this year or early next year) with a vengeance.

In case you're wondering exactly what it is that I do, let me refer you to a fellow journalist (at another newspaper) whom I've always admired and who sums it up quite nicely here:
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/19/AR2008061902920.html

Is it too soon to write the obituary on newspapers? Maybe. But given my current state of exhaustion, I'm ready for my own chance to rest in peace.