Happy Birthday

I realized this morning that I have been blogging on my other site for over a year. June 26th was my first post there. Initially, I started that as an outlet for my creative writing. I took beach walks and wrote descriptive narratives. I was pleasantly surprised when people actually began to read them.
I also realized that I am hitting my 30th year employed by the same company. Pretty good for someone who was only looking for temporary employment. Yep - that was it. I had been accepted to a local Licenced Practical Nursing program. I was only working to kill time. But that paycheck - 128.50 a week - and 1976 that was BIG BUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!! - I couldn't stop. Time passed, I moved out on my own - and realized that I'd made the first REALLY BIG STUPID MISTAKE OF MY ADULT LIFE in not going through the LPN program. I've always been very comfortable and happy in a hospital environment. The corporate world was never where I should have spent my adult life - but - as I said, that was my first REALLY BIG stupid mistake. Being the single parent and complete support of two children - it is MUCH too late to go back. Or too early. Perhaps when they are grown and have fled the nest.
Although - my youngest insists that he will never leave me. And insists that we must stay where we are now.
But no - reality is that I will remain employed by this company as long as they allow me to. When they decide they have had enough of me - then I will leave. Not before. I'm not brave enough to take a risk. Nor - if the truth be told, do I wish to give up all the perks that 30 years has given me. Five weeks of vacation and 7 personal days for one thing. For another - the salary I make - I have no college degree. I could not go ANYWHERE else and make even CLOSE to what I make here.
The philosophy of big business HR - if you don't have a piece of sheepskin - you can't possibly know anything. Silly people. My years of experience have taught me more than any twenty college professors ever could. But some statistician somewhere (with 2 or 3 pieces of sheepskin, no doubt) said that this is so therefore it must be.
Another lovely fallacy that works against me - I have been employed by the same company for 30 years. Thats ALL BAD! I must, therefore, not be CAPABLE of working anywhere else. My experience is limited. The ability to be continuously employed by the same corporation and, in fact, hold several different jobs - all working slowly but surely up the corporate ladder is not good enough. My experience is not diverse enough despite the fact that the industry I am in has evolved significantly over the past 30 years.
And while I'm on a rant - let us discuss this "employment at will". A significant protection of the employers rights. This law of "at will employment" exists in over 40 of our 50 states. So, that leaves, in my humble opinion, less than 10 states that have some intelligence regarding their employment laws. For the rest, employees - please do not think that your years of service mean a thing. And do not be comfortable about your retirement package or benefits. If your corporation decides to cut your retirment benefits - not only can they do that (and you have NO recourse!) but they can file suit against you before they actually cut your benefits to ensure that you cannot claim them. Now you have a lawsuit to worry about IN ADDITION to your lost healthcare. And these corporations are perfectly within their legal rights to do so. For current employees - do not think the corporation cannot live without you. They can and will. They can let you go because they do not like the color of your hair or the fact that you don't manicure your toenails. And yes - they can fire you to make room for their friends. Its all legal.
We've come a long way - backwards.
We are, in my opinion, regressing to the days of the mining and mill towns - where one owed ones soul to the company store.
Sad.
Hmm..... started off this post on one foot and ended it on another.
Interesting where my brain takes me in the course of one rant.
Now - with all that said - you might think that I have forgotten what today is - or that perhaps I am not grateful to be living here in America.
Not true!
There is not, in my opinion, a better place TO live! You see, I just expressed my opinion. I said what I felt like saying. I expressed how the world looks to me. I can do that here. And anyone reading that is free to agree or disagree with me. Because we can.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!