How I Got Myself Fired From a Job I Loved.

Warning: In order for this tragic story to make sense, it’s required that you have already read my previous story, “Struggling With a new Policy”. If you have not read it, please click here and do so. If you have read it, you have my permission to continue on. This time, friends: I have really done it.

I had just completed a nine-stop mostly-Pittsburgh trip and I was happy to be heading home, even though I wouldn’t be making it back until the next morning. Just making it back from Pittsburgh is acceptable enough, but not having any symptoms of post-traumatic Pittsburgh stress syndrome left me feeling downright happy.

Like most days on the road, there is always some strange story to tell. Today was no different; I thought about the morning’s incident on Route 376 heading into the evil empire of Pittsburgh. I wanted to tell the story of how traffic was backed up for miles and no one seemed to know why. I wanted to tell the story of how I finally found out why the traffic was so nightmarish; how at the entrance of the tunnel on the road stood a man who was stopping traffic and talking to each truck driver in front of me. I wanted to write about when it was my turn he asked me if I “had been through here before” and when I answered yes he ordered me to dump my airbags (without explaining why). Dumping the airbags lowers the rear of my tractor slightly and in turn, lowers the front of the trailer. I wanted to write about my concerns on why this was necessary- had the tunnel suddenly become less tall, was it in danger of immediate collapse? I wanted to share my anxieties of driving through the tunnel at 30 miles an hour with airbags dumped, four ways a-blazing. I would have told you that nothing happened on that journey through the suspicious tunnel and I still don’t know what all the fuss was about.

As I sat there parked at the end of the day, I also thought about another story, the one I wrote last. When it was finished, I sent it to my editor, who also happens to serve as my most wonderful Mother in the world. While she liked the story she sent it back with not only ten million small errors that needed correction, but also a few words of caution. “Maybe you should check with one of your favorite higher ups about this before you publish it, just in case.” I wrote back and quite simply said, “Thanks Mom, but no worries, I got this.” And I went along and published it but also sent a link of the story to one of my favorite higher ups, just in case she was right. Better for me to point it out to them in case they took offense instead of them finding out about it on their own. Still, I didn’t think there was anything horribly offensive within the story, but I never heard back from favorite higher up as of yet, which concerned me. I probably would not have been so happy, and slept so well that night, had I known what was about to transpire the very next morning.

I rolled into our Leesport headquarters at nine the next morning. I still hadn’t received my next trip information, which wasn’t totally unheard of and only aroused minor suspicion in my mind as to why that might be. I entered the building through our driver’s lounge and made my way back into the offices where I was surprised to see my favorite higher up in question sitting in one of the offices. “Wonderful,” I thought, “I didn’t even know he was in town! I can say hello face-to-face, ask him if he liked my story, and see if he is agreeable to my suggestions!”

As I passed by the office, en route to drop my trip envelope from my wonderful Pittsburgh adventure into its proper place, he spotted me and said (no, it was more like he barked), “Jason, come in here. I need to see you.” The way he said it seemed uncharacteristically unfriendly of him and I wondered if he was in a bad mood, lacked his morning coffee, or both.

Me, being my always-pleasant self offered up a cheery greeting of “Good morning! So nice to see you here!”

“Come in and shut the door!” I had not yet read the morning paper but the way he said this suggested that not all was right in our world. Besides that, he was smoking a cigar but oddly enough, the room lacked the aroma of a cigar. Instead, I was sure I could smell the fresh aroma of pure anger floating about the room. This is the moment when I became worried.

I complied with his orders; I shut the door and sat down in the chair in front of his desk. I’ll never forget the conversation we had. It was too terrible to ever forget.

“We’re letting you go. I’ll need your keys, your parking pass, and any other building credentials you may have.”

“Wh..What?” I was in so much shock I was having trouble speaking coherently. “You’re kidding right? This must be a joke! Come on, where are the cameras hidden?”

His jaw clamped onto his cigar, he looked me right in the eye with a heavily furrowed brow and said, “You think I’m kidding? Why don’t you take a glance out the window?”

I rose slowly from my seat wondering what this was all about and looked through the window of the office door which afforded me a view straight out into our parking lot where I had parked my truck. To my utter horror, I saw our mechanic on a stepladder with a heat gun, peeling my name off the side of what used to be my truck. There was also some fellow who I had never seen before standing by the truck with a few bags by his feet. Presumably, he was there to take my truck away from me. My legs felt weak and I collapsed back into the chair. I looked at my formerly favorite higher up and could only manage to faintly whisper, “Why?”

“Because we can’t afford to have someone like you recklessly throwing around words, trying to make us look bad. You’re obviously a loose cannon and we’ve decided if we keep you on, we’re putting ourselves at risk for millions of lawsuits. Now get out of my office, clean out your truck and get off the property.”

I was so confused and full of disbelief that I didn’t even argue. I simply stood up and walked out to my truck and removed everything from inside it, which only took two hours. The new guy was annoyingly chatty, asking me things about my beloved truck that I had no real desire to answer. I felt no need to tell a complete stranger who was taking my mistress away, what she liked and how she behaved.

My car was stuffed with all my belongings, and I drove solemnly up to our guard shack. I was always friendly with those guys and I hoped to say a quick goodbye; but to my amazement, a guy appeared whom I had never seen before. He looked eerily similar to Tom Petty. As he opened the gate, he pointed his arm out towards the road and said, “Don’t come around here no more.” I left the property for the last time.

My next concern was what I was going to tell my Wife. There have been other times I showed up unannounced at home, with news that I’m there because I seemed to have accidentally lost my job, and she never really appeared to like it so much. I drove to the convenience store down the road, got a coffee and sat in my car imagining how the conversation might go:

“Hi Honey, I’m home!”

“What the %&(@ are you doing here?”

“Well, I seemed to have lost my job. Now I can stay home and write full time, isn’t that great?”

“And how do you think we’re going to be able to live while you write full time?”

“I’m not sure; I haven’t given that much thought. If things get bad enough, we can always start putting the kids up on E-Bay, one by one. We should start with the youngest ones first; they are much cuter than the big and ugly ones. They’ll probably get us the most bucks.”

“Get out.”

I let out a sigh as I wondered, “Why didn’t I just listen to my Mother?”

None of this would have ever happened if I did.

And none of it did.

Events similar to those could have happened had I not been fortunate enough to work at a company filled with such great people. The truth is, I never really told a story of pure fiction before - if you don’t count the occasional tale to the random teacher, policeman, or Wife. In those instances it was only to stay out of detention, jail, and to remain breathing, respectively. Otherwise, the only true things written above were the Pittsburgh trip (including the tunnel thing), my Mother’s words of caution, and the fact that I really did send a link to my now infamous story to one of my favorite higher ups. The rest was purely fabricated in my mind and to be honest, I quite liked the result. Maybe I’ll do it again some day. In case my Wife reads this I must say to her: “No story-telling to you Honey. With you it’s always the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so make me more food. Thank-you.”

Anyway, I did get a chance to talk with my favorite (yes, still) higher up at headquarters. On my very real recent Pittsburgh trip my phone rang on the way to my third to last stop. I answered it (with my hands free headset of course) and after a few pleasantries we turned our conversation to the article in question.

He expressed his thanks for sending the link but also gently let me know that maybe I should have sent it to him first. I blamed my Mother, told him the whole thing was her idea. (Kidding of course, Mother - I said I should have listened to you and he found this amusing.) He also took some time to explain his (and the company’s) position on the matter; why this policy was put in place. I sat shifting gears and every now and then letting out a “Huh…I never thought about that” followed by a few more lines of, “I never considered that!” He explained that while he thinks I do a very good job of thinking things through, I should try to make sure I think of all the possibilities, because that is an important part of “responsible journalism”. I would later wonder why he thought me a journalist when I always consider myself one who conjures up wild ideas, turns them into words and throws them out to the world - with no thought that I might be tossing caution to the wind. I reminded him that this is also why I said I was not born for management and he told me that, “thinking things through” is something he asks of people who report directly to him, leading me to believe maybe I could someday be a manager if I actually liked people.

We spoke for about ten minutes and I repeatedly said; “I think I learned something today.” I wouldn’t have said that if it weren’t true. I really do learn something every day, but I never considered that the article I wrote would have caused me to learn things that in turn made me consider that maybe I should have never written it. The best thing about our conversation was the way my favorite higher up went about the conversation: he used a soft tone and walked me through it with pure patience; this brought me comfort because it reminded me of the way my Father would do it. I could say things, and if he agreed he would say so, and if my opinion clashed with his, he would explain his view without demanding I agree. I don’t know if my favorite higher up has children (let alone if he smokes cigars) but if he does, I would consider them lucky. We said our goodbyes and I was left thinking it was a pleasant conversation to have and I’m grateful we had a chance to talk about it, even if I now thought the entire article in question was a waste of my time because my views had already changed.

As I slid my headset on to the dashboard I thought about my article and the conversation I just had. Then I let out an audible “whoops.”

I pondered for a bit, and considered whether or not I should remove the story from my blog; perhaps pretend it never happened. There were a few problems I found with that logic: first, I consider writing an art form and I thought about my artist friend who paints, and ironically enough, happens to live in Pittsburgh. While I can’t pretend to understand how a visual artist’s mind works, I could never imagine him tearing up a finished piece of art because he thought it was no longer right. I can’t either. Second, lots of people told me they liked what I wrote. I became concerned that if I don’t share the lesson I learned from publishing that story, they might fall in danger of similar things happening in their lives. So I wrote this instead, with hopes of saving mankind from making the same mistakes I have made. I’ve alerted the authorities at the Post Office to immediately begin gathering some huge burlap sacks to deliver all the cards of thanks that are surely heading in my direction, from all corners of the world.

That’s all I have to say this time around.

Oh wait! What did my higher up say to me with regard to what really caused this new policy to be put into place? Do I now agree with the policy? Am I going to follow it? Do I wear boxers or briefs?

I think that the new policy as it applies to me is still not necessary but as it applies to certain others makes complete sense. I’ve learned that the environment in our company yard has elements that we can control (compared to the dangers of the open road) and it makes sense when I consider that fact. Am I going to follow the policy I once vowed to ignore? To paraphrase one of my political friends: “You Betcha!”

As I stated in my original writing, I have full confidence in my company’s leadership; the fact that they take the time to explain to me why something is the way it is only reinforces my belief that they know what they are doing. It’s also my belief that had I been the one holding the reins and making the decisions, our company name would have been a faded memory now, because I would have likely run it into the ground long ago. Instead, a more qualified and capable bunch of folks moves us forward to new levels of success. For that, I am thankful.

Let me share one more thing I learned from the whole experience: sometimes it’s better to admit you made a mistake, set the record straight as best you can, and move on. Even though the tale I told in the beginning of this writing was all made-up, I considered the possibility that it could have really taken place - had I worked at a different company with less understanding people. I’ve learned that while it’s probably okay for me to write about some of the things from the road and what I think about them, it’s likely not the best idea to take issue with company ideas and then share them with the entire world, no matter what company I work for. I also think my company’s reasoning behind the policy in question is best kept to myself. Everything in this paragraph (actually, this entire writing) are my own ideas, and I’d like to believe my favorite higher up would be proud of me for thinking that through as best I could.

I’ve also learned the value of listening to our Mothers should never be undervalued. Finally, I’ve learned that sometimes you have to exit stage right as gracefully as you can, and that’s what I am trying to do. Bye for now!