Just Like That . . .

Lose: To bring to ruin or destruction.

SuperK lost her job yesterday.

Actually, she got fired. It's not like she couldn't find her job anymore. She didn't come home and say: "I don't know what happened to my job. I went to where it normally is and it wasn't there any more." Maybe she should call Lost and Found. Maybe it wandered off like a lost child instead of being accidentally misplaced, like a wayward set of keys.

We try to soft pedal everything these days. We give it the old soft shoe. Fired sounds like a violent action. Fired out of a gun, a cannon, a missile silo; fired off a quick retort or witty comeback; fired up the bong; fired up the troops so they could rush off, yelling, to sack and pillage.

Personally, I prefer "down-sized." If I ever get down-sized, I'm going to object.
"No, you're mistaken. I'm the same size I was before you fired me."

"Letting go" is not bad, either. It makes it sound like they're really doing you a big favor.
"We know you really, really want to be here but we're not going to detain you any longer. You can toodle off now."

While technically I wouldn't consider this good news, it wasn't a total surprise. Things used to sneak up on me all the time when I was drinking. I would behave poorly and suffer some unpleasant circumstances that I would be unprepared for. Now I drive too fast and get a ticket and think: "Huh. I deserved that."

And it's not like we have to behave badly to suffer some consequence. Sometimes we get ground up under the massive leather jackboot of life. Mostly I stay out of grinding range but sometimes I'm asleep at the wheel and get crushed. Sometimes that jackboot just moves faster than I do. It's surprisingly nimble despite the weight of all that leather.

What can you do? People lose their jobs.