Learning how to be dead so I can be alive

Almost six years ago, I was forced into retirement from a job that I despised. I should have seen it coming, and I should have been elated; I walked away with a great payout: a signing bonus after I'd agreed on the dotted line not to seek employment there again  The four of us who were still left standing when the rumblings of war had appeared in August of 2009 lucked out; in November the union and the board did some outrageous jerryrigging of the seniority language; we were told that by classification, the employees with the highest evaluation scores would be kept on, and those eligible were offered an early retirement package. Having had two successive bosses who marked me down on several points that should never have been on an evaluation, I heard the bell toll for me. To further explain, there was nothing on the form that allowed setting of goals and objectives, discussion of projects completed, and overall quality of work; the ratings were based on personality and ability to adapt to the strange new corporate atmosphere that had gradually spread throughout our organization since the Reagan and Bush years. My "creative" personality fell outside the required curve; others before me felt the plague early and bailed out it they could; this group consisted of people who were more like me. They believed that the mission of a public library was to serve everyone; the New Order's line was, "There are some groups that we just have to leave behind."

I won't go into the details. By now you know it was the library - it was the public library of our city. Currently the building is slated to be demolished because it was discovered that toxic materials from an old factory are leaking into the foundation. Maybe after the building is gone, I can let go. Because since the day I left, I have been plagued several times a week with dreams about continuing to show up for work every day and even perform my job, without pay, knowing I was retired but seemingly accepted as a volunteer. In essence--in those dreams, even though I realize I am retired, I am like a ghost who doesn't know she's dead.

I had the dream again last night, only this time it was different. I met a real ghost in that setting: a former boss who had died from AIDS in 1991. He gently took me aside, in my dream, and told me, "You cannot come here any more. You cannot come into the staff areas. Do you understand?" And then he gave me a train ticket to go to some unknown place, accompanied by his mother,(?) to learn how to accept retirement --- to learn how to be dead.

Postscript: I wrote this a month ago. I haven't had the dream since.

Blasts from the past: Culled from 2008 saved e-mails discovered tonight

1. From an e-mail to my sister Nancy:

Yes, the fear that the external world does not exist except in the imagination is a terrifying thought - akin to what hell would be. Jean-Paul Sartre, who was an existentialist, probably felt the other way - you remember No Exit - I read it in French (Huis Clos) His motto was: "Hell is other people."

They way my therapist and I got on the subject is that she was trying to get my spin on a new-age book called The Four Agreements. The author argues that you should never take anything personally, because it's all about the other person. I simply don't buy that. Some things I do and will and always shall take personally, because humans are a social species, and if we had been meant to exist alone, we would have given birth by parthenogenesis and lived in little holes in the ground, like moles. Toxic people can and do make others feel like shit. Period. That is why I avoid them if I can/ I haven't given them that power; it is not my doing. Vileness in another person is something I can't even take on; and yes, others victimize us and there are times when there isn't a thing we can do.

I remember well that crap in college about how "it's all within yourself" - all the pompous asses who took Philosophy 101 and liked to pontificate and patronize about how only WE can control our destiny.We don't have that kind of power: read the twelve steps of AA. I am not God.

I believe in free will. I don't believe in fate or/predestination, but yes-- I do believe in karma. I think that how we act toward others in the world has impact on everything. Ultimately what goes around, comes around. BUT--- on the other hand, I do NOT believe that when someone gets cancer, etc, that it is their punishment for something they did or didn't do. I could talk around this for hours.  That is such sanctimonious shit that I see red when I encounter it. I hate that kind of cruel thinking, - to say that someone brought unfair tragedy on themselves. In general, I get nauseated when people spew a lot of new age stuff at me - especially people who have had little to no contact with the real world. The true liberal is the person who encounters unwashed and underprivileged people every single day and can still go home and feel compassion. 

I will get off my soapbox now.  Before I go - do you know what weltschmerz is? It's defined as sort of a romantic "world-pain" - a sentimental sense of the tragedy of physical reality. But I think it goes deeper. Susan and I used to have a "swirling dream" that made us feel alienated - as if we didn't exist at all. And I have had dreams that are positively evil. The mind fascinates and terrifies me. The more we learn about the brain, the more we will be able to manipulate moods with drugs, and the less society will tolerate people with personality variations. I am already seeing this prejudice - people like me were accepted wholeheartedly, especially as library employees working in the 1970s and 80s, and now we are expected to be corporate clones. Susan says that even the school of library and information science at Dominican University weeds out the social misfits and won't admit them into the program, because even if they get good grades, their lack of social skills will prevent them from getting jobs. I think this is sad.

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2. Written at work:

( Sung to the tune of  If You're Happy and You Know it, Clap Your Hands—by EF /April 10, 2008)

I’m so cold and I’m so tired I could cry

My hands are cracked and bloody ‘cause it’s dry

I’m so cold and I’m so tired

Even though I might get fired

If I don’t depart this building, I will die.

I’m so scared of all the bosses that I shake

With each flogging not a whimper dare I make

I am spied on every hour

I’m a target with no power

If you see that I look happy, it is fake.

When I’m worried, there is no one I can tell

When I’m frightened, it’s as if my fear they smell

When I’m trembling, and it’s often

Or if I’m really feeling rotten

I keep quiet, or they’ll send me straight to hell.

When I’m home, all I can do is eat and sleep

When awake, I write my novel ‘til I weep

Eat and sleep when I’m not working

Write and weep where no one’s lurking

When I’m home, in all my files the bosses creep.

They record each freaking place I go online

They keep track of all the websites that I find

As they list all my infractions

After logging all my actions

They act cheery and assure me all is fine.

I am told how to behave and how to think

My tolerance for bullshit’s on the brink

If I slip and be myself

It will soon affect my health

So I’m spending half my paycheck on a shrink.

You ask me why on earth I don’t retire

Why I tolerate their vileness and their ire

I give you my assurance

That if not for the insurance

I’d be gone, replaced by someone cheap to hire.

Someday they’ll find my body on the floor

They will trip in haste to get me to the door

Then they’ll litigate in force

But you cannot sue a corpse

They’ll be glad that I don’t work there any more.

I’m so cold and I’m so tired I could cry

I want to go to bed and close my eyes

I’m so chilly I could weep

All I want to do is sleep

If it weren’t for daily Prozac, I would die!

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Also--very sad. I was also still drinking at that time. Sober now for two years and two days, and damned glad to have been out of that environment for five and a half years!
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