Reprieve, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Uncertainty

Okay, my post title lies: I can't love the uncertainty.

The meeting at which the laid off one was to officially be axed happened today. I can tell you finally that it is Bruce who is affected by this, not me. What I can't tell you, though, is anything about the details of the impending separation.

Against all odds and expectations, it appears- preliminarily- that the Hail Mary I referenced a couple of times may have worked. The office head actually appears to be interested in helping Bruce find a new department, now that his industry has collapsed, rather than just firing him.

It's not a done deal yet; they are set to meet again on Friday to confirm the details. But it looks like the firm doesn't want to lay Bruce off. Like they may be actively looking for some way to keep him employed. At the meeting today, nothing was spoken about severance, or a soft landing, or anything like that.

If I sound amazed, it is because I am. I admit, I had very little faith that the firm cared anything at all about working with Bruce. And I still don't think that the firm does care, in the sense of concern for Bruce personally, but the fact that the management has enough foresight to try to find a fit for him, rather than simply cutting the "dead wood" and moving on, is simply befuddling to me at this point. This is not how law firm management typically works. Maybe it is not just propaganda that this firm is different.

Anyway, after the weeks of buildup, I have no idea what to think about all this. I had gotten myself into certain patterns of thinking, about the ways our life was going to change, about some things we need to do to make it work, and now those patterns maybe aren't terribly relevant and there is nothing to take their place, since we don't have complete assurance that Bruce still has a job and on what terms. After weeks and weeks of stress, it almost feels like a reprieve, but I'm not sure we can go back exactly the way we were. We've been giving a lot of thought to our future, and where we want to go and what we want to do with ourselves from here, and some of the changes in our thinking will be permanent, I think.

And still hovering over us is the uncertainty. The new group could decide not to take him on, and that will leave us in the same spot. Almost certainly a pay cut is in the works (though don't think I am complaining: any lesser cut is better than the 100% pay cut he was facing). He could still be out of a job in a few months, if the new group doesn't find work or if somehow politics comes into play in a way that we can't foresee right now.

What if, what if, what if. My head is spinning and it doesn't help that I didn't sleep well last night. Bruce says he is relieved. I'm not; I'm just confused and not counting our chickens before they hatch.

I think the tentative plan, if Bruce remains employed by the firm, is to still let the nanny go and put Caetlin in day care. That is a more than $2,000 per month savings, just on child care, and we have been thinking that day care would be good for her. But it will allow us to help her land a bit more softly, give her a longer notice and a larger severance. We want to pack away the savings and hammer at Bruce's student loans, which we can pay off within a year. We could pay mine off a year after that. And we must sell the Charlotte house. Once we sell that house, we can go anywhere we want, and just about do anything we want.

We need that kind of freedom, right now.

Anyway, reprieve! Kind of.