Every time I turn on the radio today there is more really bad news about the economy. About how the stock market is at its lowest level since 1997 after insurer American International Group posted a staggering $61.7 billion in quarterly losses.Abut how even more bailout money is required.About a small town in Ohio, where almost half of the population is unemployed as the main business just shut down. People are standing in lines to get donations of food, the very same people who used to be giving to these very same charities. Many are in a state of stunned disbelief that a job they’d held for 25 years has ended. People are asking: How can this be happening to us? Here in America?
YIKES.
Through all this I have been watching Spike Lee’s When the Levees Broke, watching these inconceivable images of the drowning population of New Orleans.Sometimes it feels like what we saw in New Orleans after Katrina was a microcosm of what we are seeing right now, as we hang on metaphorically to the roof of our houses and to our loved ones, hold on to edge from which we so easily could slip off into those torrential waters that are rising and swirling around us.
And some days the greatest strain in all of this is the pressure it places upon my marriage. As March arrives it has been a full three months since J has been without a job. Job loss is up there with life’s greatest stresses, the sense of powerlessness and the loss of the sense of identity that work brings. Because I have vowed to keep writing every day until J finds work again, I must be truthful about all this. If I’m not telling it like its happening to us what is the use of writing at all?
I am reminded of an article from the NYT (February 5, 2009) “As Layoffs Surge, Women May Pass Men in the Job Force.” Catherine Rampell writes: The proportion of women who are working has changed very little since the recession started. But a full 82 percent of the job losses have befallen men…
So here it is. The statistics that are probably telling many stories that are very similar to mine. I am not in a support group with those working wives, but I suspect there are times that there marriages are getting as battered as ours by this storm of job loss and economic crisis. Yes. The truth is, we are having some really tough times together.
When it’s bad it seems no matter what I say it is the wrong thing, and some undercurrent of resentment comes through in my voice. Usually it is something along the lines of “ You are not taking good enough care of ME.” with the subtext of (“ because you do not have a job, and I am super stressed about having to keep everything afloat!”) “You need to do more around the house. You need to home after the class you are taking at night so I can get enough sleep because I am the one who has to get up in the morning and go to work. “
I remember reading that money problems are in fact the number one reason for divorce. In our worst moments of discord we imagine this possibility although it really is not something either of us would invite to shatter our economic partnership that really is still primarily based in love.
And most of all, hard as it is for me to believe this, we are also having some of the best times we’ve ever had (just like I heard from some of the folks in New Orleans). These are the times when I stop worrying about the loss of income and retirement savings and I actually enjoy our simpler life. The way we are making food, going out less, the way we really connecting with our friends, getting our priorities straight. I like that he is there in the morning when I leave for work, that he isn’t as tired from commuting. That he’s getting to take walks with me at the end of the day. That he can really learn new things, and explore his own projects.
So today, driving home from work listening to the bad news, thinking about the stresses of our weekend, I suddenly am flooded with a sense of acceptance of the way things are, that maybe it’s going to be like this for the very long tim . And maybe this is just the impetus I need for myself, so that I will write every day, something that I've always said I wanted to do.
But then, when I get home J tells me the news on his front. It’s not bad news. Rather, it seems he has not just one but two job prospects. No face-to-face interviews yet but real interest in him and his skills. A good match. Maybe a job. Just when I was accepting the way things are, more change may be ahead. And more waves.
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