Ringing Out the Old...

I'm not a big champagne person, but I do like a wee bit at weddings and on New Year's Eve just for tradition's sake more than anything else. I'm far from an expert. While I can tell the difference between a really crappy bottle of Freixenet (Sorority Bid day, 1993) and a really great Dom P (wedding day 2000), everything else in between is a big bubbly blur.

Last Christmas my boss sent me a lovely bottle of a really nice looking bottle of Charles Lafitte. I brought it to our New Year's Eve celebration with our best friends, but alas, in our first year as new parents, none of us made it to midnight. So the bottle was put on a shelf, to be saved for this New Year's Eve celebration.

The thing is -- in January of last year my boss decided to retire and gave us all 30 days to find a new job. It was a small family like company (12 people), the shortest timer among us 3 years in the office. I myself had been there for nearly 8 years -- a quarter of my life, and nearly all of my professional life. Anyway, I'll not rehash the details, as I'm not one to blog about work, but let's just say it was a sudden, un-anticipated, and very very cold closing up of shop.

I was extremely loyal to this company and to this boss. I felt mentored, taken care of, respected, and needed for all of my 8 years there. So the end of this job took a huge emotional toll.

Now all of us found great jobs elsewhere and a few of us are still working together in different places, so all's well that ends well. But even in our newfound successes everyone still feels so burned by our mass lay-off of 2005. This was compounded by the lack of any ceremony. No parting words, gifts, no goodbye parties, severence packages, or thanks were given by our boss. Not even to her VP. Instead we received unsolicited pessimism about our new jobs, and invoices for unpaid office expenses and travel receipts.

Yesterday while preparing for our New Year's celebration I found that dusty bottle of champagne and the only things that bubbled up in me were the old feelings of resentment and betrayal. I gave my in-laws permission to re-gift the bottle to their dinner companions last night, but they left it on the counter and there it was this morning staring me down again as I poured milk on my cereal. It's the saga of the champagne -- and the ill spirits -- that will not die.

Well, I'm going to drink that bottle at a party on Saturday night and I will try to raise my glass to remember the 7 and 3/4 good years I had at that company, and the things I can still appreciate about the BOSS:

*the on the job training in a field I knew nothing about.

*the ability to continue re-inventing myself as I moved up in the company.

*the extraordinary show of trust she gave when she allowed me to telecommute when we left the area so my husband could go to grad school.

*the amazing friends and co-workers I met because of her.

*the incredible professional network my job enabled me to develop.

*the phenomenal reputation of our company, which enabled all of us to find fantastic jobs in other companies without so much as an application.

Then I will use the rest to drown the resentment I'm still holding and christen 2006 and the new challenges it will bring.

Cheers, SB. Thanks for the ride.