“Feel the Rain”

I worked in the Information Technology field for twenty years, but I didn’t climb up the corporate ladder-- it was a jungle gym!

I worked for my last company for over twelve years, holding five different positions in four different departments. I had a broad portfolio of experience on both the technical and business side. The details of my positions really don’t matter, but I essentially managed a lot of large-scale, high-risk, global technology projects internally and for our customers regardless of the position I held.

And THEN I got a big promotion to a management position in a newly created department!

The position was not in IT but on the business side, so I had to learn aspects of the business to which I hadn’t been exposed before. This department was created due to a re-org so I had to help decide how the department would function, what people’s new titles would be, and what their new roles would entail. I had over a dozen direct reports, and I needed to learn what they each did as well as keep their morale up while I broke the news to them that we were changing how they’d worked for years.

I was new to the department. They didn’t know me. I didn’t know them. It was my job to turn their world upside down in the name of improved efficiency while keeping them happy enough not to quit.

That was how 2020 started. We all know what happened next.

I won’t get into detail except to say I survived the April layoff, which reorganized the department again, so had to start from scratch with a new team after I was just getting to know my first one. But it didn’t really matter since the August layoff came after managers like me.

I’d only been in that position for 9 months. I guess that made me an easy cut.

The chaos, stress and sleepless nights in the months before the layoff were hard on me. I’d known a layoff was coming in August already, but my boss started treating me differently in June. By the beginning of July, I knew I wasn’t going to make the cut.

My husband said I was paranoid. Anyway, I made sure I had nothing personal on my work laptop. I enrolled in Graphic Design courses. The stress of what I’d been through in the previous months was so high, I knew I needed to do SOMETHING different if and when I was axed.

One day, it was so stinking hot outside. We didn’t have the AC on. The heat was going to be short-lived… A storm was coming!

I looked outside and saw clouds rolling in, so I decided to grab a drink and sit on the steps to watch the approach. Dark clouds rolled in against a bright sky—it was awesome! Then, the sky burst open!

I stood up and let the rain come down on me. It felt so good in the heat. It felt so good just to BE! As I got drenched, I saw the neighbors looking out the windows. I laughed and laughed! Let them watch! They probably thought I was drunk out there with my drink—let them! I felt so FREE!

I felt so ME!

I had been so stressed and weighed down for so long, I don’t know when I changed. When I’d become so serious. But this was who I once had been! This was who I was deep down inside! This was who I wanted to be again! I hadn’t felt so much like MYSELF for so long! This was ME!

And I remembered the saying that Bob Marley is often credited for, “Some people feel the rain, others just get wet.”

And that was when I decided: if I get laid off, I’m going to become an artist. My business name will be Feel the Rain Studio.

I went into the house, opened my laptop, and drew a rough sketch of what I thought I could make into my logo.

Quite a rough sketch, but cute enough!

Two weeks later to the day, my boss scheduled a last-minute meeting at 9:30AM on a Monday the week she was supposed to be on vacation. I told my husband, “I’m getting laid off today. This might be my only chance. If I get laid off, I want to give being an artist a real try.”

He said, “I don’t think you’re getting laid off but if you do, then go for it! I support you!”

At 10AM, after my suspicions were confirmed, I made myself a Mai Tai to celebrate. I’d told my boss and the HR woman, “You don’t have to worry about me. Whatever I do now, it’s going to be amazing.” They both cried. I didn’t.

So I climbed to the next bar of the jungle gym of my career. It’s really high, it’s really risky, it’s really scary. But this is my chance of living my dream. Of being me. Of really feeling the rain.

A much better logo designed by April Minech.