Rewards From Work

I'm starting a new job.  It's not one that's going to require what my previous job did, but that's OK.  Sometimes it's not about the work you do, but the income you have that will allow you to continue to maintain a few luxuries, like eating, living indoors, and staying sane.  

My previous position was seated, which is yes, a joke.  I've had some jobs that involved sitting some of the time.  When in IT, I learned very early on that when I was supporting other people, it was my job to be visible.  Not just walking past someone's cube, but doing it slowly, stopping by, and, if their work permits, say Hi.  Not just because I'm that outgoing, which I'm not, but because I learned that there are quite a few people like me who might deal with a small annoying problem with a work-around they've figured out, but there may be an easier solution.

One person whom I would regularly pass by and pass the time of day eventually mentioned an annoyance.  When she opened up a new document in her word processor, she had to set all of these things to our corporate standard, because she did a lot of work that went out to others outside our organization.  Because I happened to be passing by her desk one moment when she was doing this, she said something.  I sat down in the chair next to her desk and walked her through changing the defaults in her word processor.  Any new document she opened from that day onward would get those defaults.  

Often, people had issues that they didn't want to "bother me with".  And sometimes it turned out they were a bit embarrassed because they didn't know how to do it.  It was my job to know how, and the unstated part of the job description I had was to also make them feel good about asking, good about learning, and give them the confidence to ask again, next time, sooner.  I was good at that part.

But after twenty years getting two or three years working for an organization before some business-driven change required much larger changes wore pretty thin.  The signs became pretty obvious as I got through more of these sorts of layoff/shutdown situations.  They would start with an announcement that additional resources were required, but because of the current business/economic climate, we'd be looking for outside resources to assist, something that these days is known as outsourcing.  There would be many more messages from upper management encouraging us, letting us know things were fine.  Then there might be some small "Reductions-In-Force", or RIFs, with certain departures not being replaced, certain workloads being stretched, or further duties assigned.  

It happens.  To many organizations.  Some of those I worked for were absorbed into other, larger organizations.  Some just disappeared.  

My most recent employer was exceptional in how they approached the difficulties they encountered.  They tried to keep going.  And in the end, they decided it just wasn't working.  Some of my previous departures have included severance packages.  Most have not.  But they treated us well, and I would happily go back to work for them.

It's not just because of the pay.  There were some rewards that weren't just in that way.  Back in 1996, I learned HTML in a crash course.  I'd been playing with composing web pages, and had fiddled a bit, when, in November of that year, my wife and I were expecting our second child.  On a day where my wife's car was in the shop for minor repairs, she took mine to her work, and then came to pick me up before we picked up our daughter from her daycare.  We got home, a frozen pizza went into the oven, and then, three weeks before her actual due date, her water broke.  Our daughter, who had been two weeks overdue before she chose to make an appearance, gave us some false sense of security.

I will not forget the tone of my wife's voice when she called my name from our bathroom, in our bedroom.  I ran in - and she told me our evening plans were going to change.  "Hospital, now.  It's coming."  I turned the oven off, removed the pizza, grabbed a nutri-grain bar and juice box for my daughter, and we went down to the apartment garage, then off to the hospital.  The weather, which had been weird that day, had turned to freezing rain.  I was left trying to contact anyone who might be able to take care of my daughter while I spent the evening with my wife.  

Our option one was unavailable, didn't answer the phone.  Option two was 90 minutes away, and due to the freezing rain, was likely out.  Option 3, our daughter's regular daycare, was willing, but I didn't want to burden her.  Then another friend returned my panicked call and came down to pick her up and take my daughter to her home.  The next day was pretty brutal.  Almost exactly 22 hours from when her water broke, my son was delivered by C-section, just like his older sister.  He was taken to the maternity ward, my wife was closed up, taken to her room.  Our friend brought my daughter to the hospital to see her mom and meet her baby brother.  We went to the maternity ward, and discovered my son was not there.  A new doctor from our pediatrician's office was in their back room with my son, who at three weeks premature, was having breathing problems.  Bprn at 5:30 pm, he was loaded into an ambulance and taken to Minneapolis Children's at 11 pm that evening, in another round of freezing rain.  I followed, at a rather great distance, and was able to find the NICU and my baby boy.  After two hours, the doctors at Children's assured me that he was in other ways healthy and normal, was responding to treatment, and he'd be there for a few days to insure he was all right.  

With this, I had some experience with the health insurance environment.  We had good insurance, but there were things to learn.  I learned more over the years.  My wife's father, a Korean War veteran, had multiple strokes before I met him, so meaningful conversation with him was short.  I did sit with him on one visit and told him I found his daughter captivating and wonderful, and asked him if he would be pleased if I married her?  He looked at me strangely, and I told him "she already said she would marry me, but I'd like you to be on board."  "OK" was his response, with a wide grin.  

He had been dealing with a disease called Faebry's, which affects internal organs, is carried by the women who pass it to their male and female children.  The men are affected by the disease, which was for very long known as an "orphan disease" in that very little research or treatment was being done.  

While working at my previous employer, one of the pharmacies I worked with for infusion patients was in Texas.  I saw many young children with a wide range of health challenges, and we were able to help them.  I also saw a few patients who were receiving a specialty medication called "Fabrizyme" which treated Faebry's.  So I was able to help folks who were in situations I remembered well.  My father-in-law lived about six weeks after our wedding.  It was devastating when he passed, but it was also something of a relief, for him.  We made at least four quick trips to Iowa while we were dating because there was a downturn in his health they did not think he would recover from, or a limb which seemed to require amputation.  In the end, no amputations were performed, he died from liver failure.  He did, finally, have the same peaceful look on his face I first saw when he approved my request to marry his daughter.  She was her own woman, and still is, I felt it necessary to ask her father if he would approve of me.

My previous job gave me a deep sense of pride in what my employer was able to do.  I was part of the team that insured that our patients didn't get nasty surprises after we provided treatment, because their insurance companies provided us with authorization.  I learned, back when my son was born, that was a critical piece.

On the Wednesday, nearly a week after he was born, Minneapolis Children's was ready to let him spend a few more days back in our local hospital for monitoring, but he was doing well, and didn't require their specialty care.  During another snowstorm (the third of his life already at that date), the nurses and other staff at Children's asked our insurer for their approval for the ambulance ride from Minneapolis back to Burnsville.  They started around midday, and it took several hours before the approval was obtained.  By then, circumstances had changed.  What was a light snow had turned into a pretty steady, heavy one, and we had nine inches where there had been only two, with a bit of ice over it, on the ground - but thankfully not on the roads.

We headed home around 3 pm to get my wife off her feet.  It wasn't until 11 pm that my son arrived at the local hospital. The delay, due to the snowstorm and the inevitable early-season snowfall driving issues, pushed his transfer from a normal "daytime" rate to a much higher "emergency/evening" rate.  Some months after my son had come home, we received a bill for the ambulance ride.  The 34 minute transfer ride was going to cost us over $1800 due to the delay.  And our insurance wasn't going to cover it because it had been done at a different time.  I was both shocked and pretty upset.

Fortunately, back then, I had some resources most people do not have.  One of my cousins is married to an attorney who is recognized as an insurance expert.  I won't drop his name here, as I expect he has retired by now.  However, back in 1996, he was recognized, not by the average person, because he wasn't the sort to run late-night ads, but because he had participated in large insurance cases that involved many people, large properties, and large catastrophes.  Insurance companies were very well acquainted with him, and he knew most insurance company attorneys.  When I spoke to my father about the problem we had with our insurance, he called my cousin.  My cousin made one phone call.  That one phone call produced a letter to us from our insurance company which apologized for the miscommunication, and told us that our co-pay had covered our portion of the ambulance ride.  

I like to think that I paid my cousin back in several ways.  I provided him a few heart-felt, hand-made items, and pictures from key events in my son's life.  And I was also able to insure that patients who came to my previous employer for service got it, and didn't get the bills like we did.  So there's that. 

This new job isn't going to have that level of job satisfaction - but it will be a job.  It will keep me busy, moving, and earning.  And with so many people looking for work, I'm fortunate to have it.  And I will give it my all, because that's who I am.