The Disposable Employee

Dear Delyara, I watched them fire a man today who had been with the company for twenty years. He carried his life out in a cardboard box, looking like he’d been hit by a truck. No one said anything. We all just looked at our screens and typed faster, as if the sound of our keyboards could protect us. It hit me then that I am just a number in a ledger. If I disappeared tomorrow, they’d have my job ad posted before my funeral was over. I’ve given five years of my life to this building, and I have nothing to show for it but a bad back and a coffee mug with the company logo on it. I feel used, and I feel small.