Today marks the 9th anniversary of the best/worst day of my life.
About 10:30 in the morning my phone rang. It was my boss.
I knew why he was calling… everyone in the company knew.
I was about to be laid off.
600 people lost their jobs that day.
My boss told me I was the last one selected… I was #600.
What an honor!
“But you’ll be the first to be called back!” He said… but that never happened. Nor did I want it to.
I had been at Boeing for 32 years and I wanted out. I was tired. I was done.
I needed something new.
In my case, it was a great day (even tho I was gutted and scared to death).
In all fairness, I had already started something new in 2008 – it was a website about my hobby – photography and video — and it was doing fairly well. I was working my butt off on nights and weekends to grow the site and it was already one of the top in the industry.
Plus, they gave me a severance package of 6 months salary (thanks Boeing!)… and I also had the comfort of being able to take early retirement and to have a bit of income every month.
I told my wife, “we might not be able to eat, but at least the mortgage is paid!”
I’m not sure that was a lot of comfort tho LOL.
Long story short tho… I was indeed able to make planet5D support my family for many years.
I got to travel and to meet people in the film/TV industry and to be on Hollywood sets and to watch people craft amazing stories.
If you had asked me when I worked at Boeing if I thought I’d ever be able to be on a set while famous people worked and to make my own short film, I would have told you “that’ll never happen! I’m a computer programmer and I sit behind a computer all day.”
But it did!
And I’ve been struggling, grinding, writing, learning, and so much more in the last 9 years… but it has been so much fun and so much of a challenge.
It has been great!
So I always say a big thank you to Boeing for my career and my layoff… it was the best/worst day of my life.
What’s your best worst day of your life? I’d love to know.
