Panic - One Less Dog In The Hunt

With the focus on COVID-19, and the currently over 220,000 deaths, it’s easy to get lost in what is happening around us. Death is something that gets people worked up, especially when we feel it is unnecessary, could be prevented, or that someone died before their time. Birth and Death are two things that every human being on this planet have in common. No matter what our differences, where we live, how rich or how poor, our ethnicity, our social status, religion, sexual orientation, or gender — we are all born and we all will die. When we talk about death, it is almost natural for emotion to rule the conversation. But sometimes it is important to develop a perspective, to look at reality, and to recognize the facts.

According to the Population Reference Bureau (PBR), the United States, average annual death rates climbed by 400,000 between 2009 and 2018; from 2.4 million to 2.8 million. Factors could include aging population or growing underlying health issues such as heart disease, cancer, or other illness. The three top causes of death in 2018 were heart disease, cancer, and accidents.

So, I got the boot. I think I walked out of that building (escorted of course) in a tunnel. I had a feeling it was coming. We’d been warned there was some corporate restructuring that would impact those in my position. Crazy thing is, they warned us a week before they told us; let us dangle at the end of the hook so to speak. Simple courtesy or even humane treatment would have been to tell us what was happening and then tell us who got the axe. One swift cut, but no, bro.

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Anyway, my point isn’t to debate the heartlessness of corporate decision making. I mean to set up the feeling of walking out of a building where I had invested over half my life with no clear understanding of where I was headed. Of course, I had bills, a wife, a kid in college, and I was still at least ten years away from retirement. I was going to need some income, but I had no desire to enter into something I would be wanting out of in six months.

In that week where I dangled, I researched. The number one thing I found was encouragement to stay calm. Don’t Panic. Keep a perspective. Don’t rush into the first job you stumble upon. Therefore, on the trip from the building to my car, with the lump in my throat growing with each step, I forced myself to take deep breaths. I opened the door and dropped my few personal items from my desk into the passenger seat, and I sat… taking deep breaths. I was empty. I was stunned. I was lost. I was questioning, but I wasn’t panicking.

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