When Life Throws You a Curve
by Larry Jameson
Shortly after 8:00 a.m. on April 10, 2008, my wife, Beth, was standing at the office coffeepot discussing the recent layoffs with a co-worker when an employee from Human Resources stopped in and asked her to join her for a moment. Sure, you know what comes next. Beth became the latest victim of corporate restructuring.
I could hear the fear and disappointment in her voice when she called a few minutes later and simply said, "I’ve been laid off." Life had thrown a big, round-house curve. Unexpected? You bet. Beth was a few months away from her twenty-fifth anniversary in that department. Twenty-five years!
April 10, 2008 will be known in our house as the day of the big Pity Party, because we certainly had one. Woe is me. What do we do now? Et cetera. Then came an email from our youngest son at 2:47 that afternoon, just hours into our new life of misery and despair.
"I was just browsing Monster. Tell Mom I’m putting her in contact with a girl I know up in Fayetteville who works for a company that designs and creates resumes catered to that person and what they are seeking. She can have her resume looking good. I will give Mom her number. This is just the first step. Remember the ongoing message of your book. ‘Never Give Up!’ This is nothing but an opportunity." Then came April 11. Not only were we more inclined to pay attention to that email, our son came took us out for dinner and told us about a book he’d recently read entitled, Who Moved My Cheese? by Spencer Johnson. Now, we’ve both read it, and every person facing change in their life needs to know the story. Telling it will not lessen the value of the book because it’s the type of book you need to have with you at all times.
It’s a wonderful little story about accepting change. Four characters, two mice and two little people, were in a dark, scary maze searching for cheese. They found a huge supply of it.
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