The last five days have been a roller-coaster ride. I was laid off from a job I loved in the middle of the week, and although what I heard was, “it’s not your fault,” and “there’s nothing you did wrong.” I still have to go through the grieving process, and have spent more time analyzing what could have been, should have been, and would have been.
Thus, the jumping-off point.
When I was in journalism school, we called it an hourglass style, because the inverted pyramid hit a low point, then there was a turn. The turn – or turning point could even be in a narrative where the irony or twist happens. I liken it to reading the irony of someone like Flannery O’Connor, in whose work the antagonist at first seems harmless but then there’s the ironic twist, and he/she turns out to be a murderer. This is not to say that I will become a villain in this story – I just want to get to the pivot or turn.
As a news feature, the story might go something like this:
Two people were pink-slipped at one local radio station on Wednesday, as the ax fell across broadcast outlets nationwide. Of the nearly 170 stations coast to coast, program cuts left newsrooms, rock stations, country, and alternative stations running on already tight budgets, with few than two people in house at any one time.
Denyse… was one of those furloughed. Carrying her bag of belongings, and a coffee pot to her car, she wiped away tears as she bid farewell to her co-workers, and heard the business manager reiterate, “it’s not your fault.”
“I’ll land on my feet,” she said. “I always land on my feet.” (here is the turn).
What comes after leads to either a predictable end, a surprise, or an irony. I have yet to write what comes next and I hesitate to reveal that here, but I may as I go through this process as a way to bolster someone else in the same situation.
I’m still floating and waiting for an inkling of the as-yet unknown. I am ready to jump off the roller coaster whether it is from the top – where the emotions run highest and the fear wants to wreck me, or at the bottom, where I’m confidently filing one application after another and waiting for the phone to ring. Somewhere in between the rise and fall of the coaster car, there is a balance – a resting point where I find peace. For now, I’ve gotten to the turn in the story and know there will be more to come.
Aurealia Writes 