Collective Trauma: The Fallout 17

It's all going too fast, Gentle Reader. Even a simple but unasked for computer tutorial yesterday from my supervisor sent me into a panic. We are expected in this mad dance of death to perform and perform and perform better, more efficiently and to save our employers tons of money because saving money, cutting costs, the bottom line, and profits seem to be all that matter. Oh yes, they do say they want services delivered in a timely and appropriate manner, but only if it looks good on their balance sheet. Which explains their excuse for keeping peer support workers, like me at an inadequate low wage of just a little more than one dollar above the minimum. It's like this everywhere. We freeze up, we panic, we go comatose, or drug and drink or eat ourselves to oblivion or go out and harm ourselves or others, because no one can really cope with this kind of frenzied pressure. Or we turn into shopaholics, which our corporate bosses love, since it fattens the economy god, but we end up throwing ourselves into debt, and all because we cannot cope anymore. Not in the long run. I retire in something like 934 days, or just over two and a half years. I can't wait. For a while I entertained the nonsense of continuing to work part time after I turn sixty-five, but I think that's just part of the corporate propaganda that persuades us that we cannot have a life without a paycheque for doing work that keeps us busy, makes us feel useful and keeps us distracted from ourselves, our lives and our own empty souls. We are so conditioned to go through life as dark little voids with no interior substance or ballast that we simply consume and occupy ourselves from one distraction to another. Work becomes our absolute refuge from ourselves, our selves whom we don't know, whom we fear, hate and are always trying to flee from. I understand that a lot of people, men especially, when they retire, their lives implode. All their sense of value and usefulness has centred around their dear little day job, no matter how trivial or useless the work or business, and it's often for one very important reason. They have devoted so much of their time, energy, their very lives to their thankless occupations that, outside of the workplace, they are nothing. They have no friends, no meaningful connections, no meaningful ways of occupying themselves, no lives, and all because they were brainwashed into accepting their profession, trade, occupation as the be all and end all of their sad little existence. And surprise, surprise, guess where all their friends are? At work, of course. Well, let me tell you something, Gentle Reader. I hate my job. And I have friends, good solid relationships with people outside of the work place and in spite of the soul-sucking centrifugal stress of my occupation I have maintained and nurtured my friendships and am still building my social network. And I have interests, occupations, vocations and passions that are not confined to the workplace. When I retire, I still might work up to ten hours a week, to supplement my pension, of course, and to keep interacting with clients, because the one, single thing that rewards me about my profession is seeing disadvantaged and disempowered persons do well with their lives, and lead better more fulfilling and more gratifying lives. I can also do this outside of my job, because I am one for staying in touch with people and cultivating healthy relationships, and I could easily continue doing this in any number of volunteer capacities. But my job is not going to determine the rest of my life. I have already put in my time, and now the soft winds of freedom are already blowing my way.