Whether there is truth to this or not really makes no difference. The fact is that the office that I have personally worked out of for over 10 years now, was announced as being closed after a 12 year run. I have been a part of this community at my office for the majority of my IT career, minus a couple of years out of college at Microsoft. I call it a community because that is truly what it came to be to me after all these years....definitely much more than a workplace. Out of the staff that was here, the majority of people were let go as a result of this action. I don't know any details but from what I have heard everyone was treated incredibly well, which is great to hear.
For me personally, I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to be able to move to a team around three years ago now, which is remote home office. Although I did still maintain a desk at the office, it also means that I maintained a lot of the relationships that I had prior to moving. I get to move home, and have the shortest commute ever 15 feet from my bed. Seeing all of this happen in front of me was by far one of the hardest things I have gone through in my career. I honestly think that for myself I have a case of survivors guilt as a result, however the initial shock is gone and I was finally able to get a full nights sleep last night. I am sure I will be in need of human interaction sooner rather than later.
I know that there have been way to many inspirational quotes posted at least to my feeds, so I won't preach. What I will say is that any time I have seen an event like this that although it is painful at the time it ends up working out. Take some time to let it sink in, recharge, and use the amazing amount of knowledge that you gained from the experiences to go forward.
To everyone from the office, I will miss everything from the numerous charity events we did together as a community - Big Bike being one of our favourite:
To things such as winning Diane the Dragon as a team at our last Christmas party:
I definitely will miss it all. I am sure that we will remain friends long after this week...I learned so much from some of you which has lead to myself growing personally and technically. I wish everyone the best...and never stop growing!
So I guess I will end this post by saying ... "So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish!"
