No Love for Ex-Bosses

Several months had passed since I was laid off from my job as an administrative assistant. A former co-worker who was still employed at the company asked if I kept in contact with my ex-boss, Martin (not his real name). “No,” I said, before changing the subject. Why would I bother to keep ties with a man who obviously didn’t give a damn about how I was going to survive after his actions?

They say that big decisions should not be made too soon after the death of a loved one. My youngest sister had succumbed to cancer while I was a secretary at a law school. Four months later, I had agreed to work as an administrative assistant for an established, but not well-known, social service agency. My salary went up a few thousand dollars, and for the first time, I would have my own office which was a major plus. Unfortunately, I learned the hard way that I should have let more time pass after my sister’s death before making such a leap. The job was no better than the previous lackluster office jobs I’d held. Yet I stuck it out for six long years while dealing with nitpicking Martin’s mercurial moods.

The agency was always experiencing some sort of financial trouble. Cutbacks of resources and programs and lack of supplies were common. Upper management people had to take reduced salaries one year when finances had taken a hit. The rest of us just didn’t get raises but were expected to work with less. I guess Martin didn’t see anything good coming down the line after a while so he decided to cut his losses. But when Martin put in his resignation, my job evaporated. In a company that had few office support people to begin with, there was nowhere to put me.

By that time, I had taken some more of life’s blows. My father died two years after I had begun working at the agency, and a favorite uncle of mine passed on not long after Dad. A co-worker whom I was buddies with had died a few months before I received a pink slip. I was diagnosed with health conditions that required maintenance medications and had major impacts on my quality of life. I was struggling with debts. My boss apparently thought that taking me to lunch at a suburban Italian restaurant would help ease things. Maybe it helped ease what little guilt, if any, Martin may have had about my situation. I was in no mood for a lunch, yet I went because I was raised with manners. But I didn’t eat much.

Martin talked of wanting to explore new career paths then settling down into retirement in a few years. Those in the office would joke about Martin’s cheapness with money and remark that they had no doubt he was set for his golden years because of it. He had options. I was in my late 40’s facing few job prospects not only because of advancing technology, but because the typing jobs I had effectively covered up the college degree on my resume. I had become disenchanted with my job some time ago, but I was angry that I had not had the option to have some control over my employment situation. Once again, I found myself behind the eight ball, like most office support staff are, at the mercy of someone else’s decisions. Martin had been generously given an entire month to close up things at the office. I had only been given two weeks.

It was much later when I learned that Martin found another position that was basically the same as the one he resigned from. He probably received the same six-figure income he was making before plus a little more. All that talk about doing something new was an excuse to exit a sinking ship. Meanwhile, the economic meltdown of 2008 that took place a few months after the lay-off pushed me further to the back of the line. Then I began to experience age discrimination which further eroded my options. Martin had the nerve to tell me before my last day of work that I needed to think about my future. He had one. My future was not bright.