First Monday (of the rest of my life)

Today is the first Monday in 25 years I didn't have a full-time job to go to. And it feels weird.

But as my friend Craig, who owns his own restaurant in New Orleans, said today, "Embrace it."

The positive comments have been streaming in all weekend, both on Facebook and in the real world. Friends have been very supportive of my decision Thursday to take a voluntary layoff from a decent-paying job with Florida Today, one of 31 top-earning papers at Gannett Co. Inc.

The last four days have been nothing short of an emotional roller coaster ride. I have been riding alternating currents of relief, anxiety, joy, fright, elation and depression pretty much around the clock. The worst part is when panic sets in and I feel I need to "do something," like jump into this freelancing gig for Hellometro.com for a piddling $40 per 500-word story. Hell, it isn't about the money. It's about getting a foot into the door of online content providing, which is where the bulk of freelance gigs are at these days.

The best moments are when I realize I don't have to do anything, that I am still financially secure for at least the next three months, and even after that I have a "crisis account" to dip into if need be. I could sublet my place and trek around the globe if I wanted, but my driving nature won't allow that. Not entirely. I feel that I've got to work. I've got to "have-something-to-do."

So much of my identity for the last 25 years having been wrapped up in journalism, writing stories daily and weekly, investigating political campaign funds, ethical lapses, and government spending of public dollars. Now I'm writing 500-word business profiles and collecting  unemployment and transitional pay that equals what I was earning prior to my unemployment.

So the self-evaluation continues, a never-ending cycle of critique and deconstruction of my actions, my reasoning and motive for taking the layoff option, and reminding myself why I quit in the first place. And each time I run into a friend for the first time since my separation from work I hear myself repeating the sequence of events, the reasons why I did what I did and the internal editor revises, polishes, rechecks the tone and intent of the narrative to make sure it's on track, to search for missing information or illogical constructions. And each telling is a little more polished, a little more sophisticated, a little more self-assured and authoritative.

For instance, the same afternoon I got laid of, I ran into Jared and Lisa at the "Purple Publix" in West Melbourne. She was like, "So, what happened?" And I was like, Oh, yeah, you don't know. So I told her and I conveyed my anxiety. She said, "You know, I'm a smart person, and I read your stories and know you're a smart person, too. And so I know that whatever decision you made was the right one, and you obviously gave it a lot of thought. Do you trust your own judgment? Have you ever made a bad decision?"

It blew me away. I hugged her for saying that and then Jared delivered the coup de grace: "Use your anxiety in your favor." Very Jedi knight of you, Jared.

The next day, at Friday Fest, I run into Bastard and his Old Lady at Matt's Casbah. They think it's awesome that I left the paper, and that I'm going to be traveling west in a few days. Their friend Toni shows up with her friend Regina, and they're very cool about what I'm doing. So I'm beginning to feel like it's going to be OK, that I am not a pariah or leper just because I'm without a job.

And on Saturday, I went through another iteration of the events of that Thursday with yet another group of friends wondering what the hell happened. And again on Sunday at a going away party for the friend I'm going to help move out west. So I'm getting good at telling this story of mine.

I am beginning to think of my situation as more like being between gigs or waiting on the next assignment. Like a samurai wandering from village to village, Toshiro Mifune with a laptop. Have laptop, will travel.