(12-12-2019, 09:00 AM)Rico Wrote:

(12-11-2019, 09:19 PM)Caldrac Wrote: Wife's got our first one on the way. Due in April. My focus is just on getting the house ready for him. Support my wife. All that good stuff.

I am not really stressed. Its just frustrating if anything. I don't mind the work. I love the job. I love the grind. It's just the environment like Rico pointed out.

Feels like we're in limbo hell and it's a matter of hurry up and wait. There's a lot of great people there that are close to retirement or hanging on and I have been working with some of them since I was 19 years old.

It's been 12 years. Up's and down's like any place. But I take a lot of pride in where I work at. It's a legacy for me. Means a great deal being a 3rd generation railroad employee to me. I want to keep it that way.

Thankfully my house is affordable. Stole it before the market picked back up in favor of the bankers and lenders. If I get [BLEEP] canned I can at least breath knowing my mortgage is beyond affordable and I can work any job that I have to in order to get by.

I just miss having some free time is all. I miss fishing with my old man. Miss bull [BLEEP] with my two younger brothers. Miss mom's cookin" on Sunday's. Just hard to make time for them when you're working for a place that doesn't give a [BLEEP] about you. They don't want to get to know you.

I get it. It's a corportaion. We're just a "body' at the end of the day. But the tension is there. It's like working in a giant fish tank now. It's empty as hell. Lifeless. Bothers a lot of us. We're just all kind of waiting our turns to get [BLEEP] over like everyone else.

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I'm just trying to get by another 2.5 years.  Hopefully I don't go bonkers before then.  I really don't want to go looking for a new job at my age.  In all honesty, you're going to be dealing with a lot of this BS in any 'corporate' environment.  I think that's probably what I'm most tired of.  And it's just gotten worse over the lat 20-25 years.  I've seen enough of it over my 40-year career.  

I think another part of it was that I was a consultant for 17 years.  I never really got a chance to get tired of an environment.  I think the longest I was on any project was 2 years....and that was out of the norm.  Usually 6 months to a year...then onto something else.  Only problem with that was, lots of travel.  That's how I ended up here.  Just got tired of that grind.  Hell, they were about to make me start travelling to China when I started looking for a job, then ended up here.  Sorry...22 hours in airports/airplanes to get to work just wasn't happening for this guy.

The nice thing about my line of work is that I'm not tied to one industry.  IT is IT.  Show me the databases and files and I'll paint you a pretty picture.  Problem is, these guys are paying me so well that the salary is going to be tough to match.  Which is another large reason I'm trying to stick this out.  If they lay me off, it sure as hell isn't going to bother me too much.

I hope you make it man. I really do. 22 hours in airports and airplanes sounds like purgatory to me. The BS is tiresome. Just leave me be. Let me work. 40 years is a long run. I am just a flea on a dog's [BLEEP] in experience. LOL. But I can see for myself now that this is really something I don't want to keep doing for another 30 years. I don't think it's sustainable. Whether I want it to be or whether the corporate masters want it to be. 

I honestly wouldn't mind being a clerk over there again though. It's less political. You kind of work at your own pace. Don't really have to eat the BS like you have to do over here. This place is all I know really. I literally went from being a snot nosed kid slinging sandwiches as a little punk manager at 17, 18 years old for Subway to come right over here to the RR. Worked my way up the ladder. Thankful for where I am at now. 

It's just the lack of communication that bothers me at the moment. The uncertainty in the air. It's uncharted territory for me but I just know that no matter what happens I can't let it bog me down. My dad worked his [BLEEP] off and moved us around quite a bit. He didn't shy away from taking on new challenges. And I feel like I have that instilled in me as well. I'll be fine no matter what. 

Like you pointed out though. They're paying us pretty good. Granted, that all came from previous ownership. But at least they haven't tried going after us quite yet. If things start to look better going into 2020 I think I'll cut out some time if that's possible to get educated in a field or two if the company still grants funds for that. Put it off for way too long.

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