Diary of a Laid-Off Dad: Episode 12
It’s the New Year.
With it comes:
New ideas, new hopes, new opportunities . . .
And the same me?
For the past three months, along with my job search, I’ve been doing some soul-searching. This introspective practice has led me to make a number of attempts to improve my life: I started journaling again, I took up a strength-training class at my local Y, and reached out to some long-lost friends. I cooked more, read more, and wrote more. On paper, it seems like I’ve improved. But . . .
I can’t help and feel the old me is still there.
And by the old me I mean the one who took his layoff personally. The one who beat himself up after every job application rejection. And yes, the one who has scrutinized every interview after the fact, wondering why his performance didn’t result in a job offer.
Yep, that guy. Guilt, insecurities, imposter syndrome and all.
I couldn’t help but be that same version of myself when I reconnected with friends and family over the holidays. It was a family vacation with a side of guilt: partly because it involved spending money (though most of it was paid for before my layoff and cancellation fees would have eaten most of our payments to date) and partly because I hadn’t secured employment by the time of our trip. All my loved ones knew of my layoff and sympathized with my plight, with a few having experienced such joblessness themselves. Such camaraderie lessened the sting of talking about my layoff, but it was an impromptu meeting with a friend that really gave me food for thought.
More than five years had passed since I saw this particular friend. My rigorous work schedule until late hadn’t helped, nor had Covid. So I was thrilled at the chance of seeing him again, due in part to him being a great conversationalist. We met for coffee and a bite to eat, and like the past several years hadn’t happened, picked up our friendship like we had saw each other yesterday. My unemployment naturally came up . . .
At first, I wasn’t sure if he’d relate. This friend had enjoyed much more steady employment than I have, and had done well for himself. Yet I was pleasantly surprised when he lent his ear and offered support. His sympathy came not necessarily from his related struggles per se; he approached my predicament on a more existential level. At one point, he became pensive, noting, “We all wake up and can only hope to be a little bit better than the day before. We’ll never look in the mirror and see a completely different person. Just someone trying to do their best.”
His sentiment stuck with me through the rest of our family trip. I considered his words on the flight home, as well as my boys’ return to school a few days later, and of course, now.
The old me. The new me. They crossover. They meld together. Sometimes the new outshines the old. At others, the old has lessons for the new. No matter whether antiquity or novelty win, there is one constant: me.
So I take that advice to heart. I’ll wake up tomorrow, look in the mirror, and see the same person staring back at me, one perhaps slightly different than the day before. A man who is a husband, son, brother, friend, and father. All trying to learn something new, blending their old selves with the new. All trying to do their best. All of them me.
