CAREER, INTERRUPTED

Sometimes, life just isn't fair.

You did everything right.

Maybe starting off with being born into a family who had the means and the dough to put out for an ivy league diploma, and the connections to help groom you for your future role as a player in whatever high stakes profession would be au courant after 'B' school.

Either that, or you looked around at a very young age, and decided you were not going to play for the team that headed straight to the minimum wage line, and an early marriage to an ardent beau who turned out to be the world's champion beer chugger, so you got a grip on your life and soldiered your way through a state school while working seven part time jobs.

Whichever path you traveled, you made it all the way to just under the fabled glass ceiling.

You know. That place near the top, within panting distance from the CEO, or COO or CFO perch you had been salivating about since you elbowed your way past the first casualty on your carefully thought out corporate ladder hit list.

And, darn. Here you are, on the way to being a high stakes corporate player, a real master of the universe in a pant suit, a pedigreed spear carrier.....and you've just been canned.

Somebody hit the 'delete' button on your path to the other side of that glass ceiling

Not only that, you're no, er, spring chicken anymore.

You are "A woman of a certain age," who hit the snooze button on your biological clock a decade ago when you started looking around for cougar bait, instead of somebody your own age at the speed dating events.

And despite the trim body and flawless complexion and rigid diet,your health might not be so good anymore, due to the overuse of prescription drugs you had to use to calm those twitches, and/or the alcohol or drug habit you may have developed to cope while blazing that career path.

Which is a real drag because you lost your insurance benefits along with the job.

And you spent so much time and cash on projecting the right image to your networking buddies and your slave masters you forgot to save any real money.

Then the disastrous economic slapstick hijinks a few years ago -oops there went the 401k, and your stock options....or whatever other high falutin' crap shoot savings schemes you were smooth talked into, and you, silly thing....you forgot to get a contract with a 'golden parachute'.

And the Blackberry, or whatever techno gizmo you used to stay in touch with and on top of your world? The one filled with the names and numbers of all of those other 'golden' people?

Fagaddaboudit. You are the last person they want to hear from these days.

Oh, yeah. You've come a long way, baby.

All the way to Homeless Nation.

Welcome to the world of ratty hair cuts, cheap hair dye jobs, cheaper shoes, ill fitting clothing and taco bell for lunch.

It's still hard to believe it really happened. But it did.

And that's the point. It happened.

Whether it was an abrupt departure from your illusion of a secure and upwardly mobile life by overextending yourself to the point where you really didn't have enough cash around to last more than two pay checks....or a slow, steady descent, into the indignity of selling everything you owned right down to the last pumice stone. It happened.

And you need to get over it.

Because you're not going to get anywhere in Homeless Nation...or, find the way out, unless you grasp the concept: You're homeless.

You're homeless, and you have no money, and no status.

People look at you, well....like you maybe used to look at people who weren't dressed quite right, and lacked the polish and finesse of the well turned out career woman.

You need to get with the program.

There are plenty of those around in Homeless Nation.

And they all involve a women's shelter. Living in one, not visiting each Christmas with a few of your used Chanel sweaters for the donation bin.

Yeah, it's a whole new world.

Noisy, and badly ventilated, chilly in winter, hot in the summer. Locked down at six pm. Food you know is nutritious, but, Lord, didn't these people ever hear of Bernaise sauce?

And then there are the "Others." This is not a shelter in St. Barts, Madame. This is a shelter, most likely in a part of town where you are situated away from people who don't like to look you in the eye, or who just don't want you around.

And there's a reason for that. Some of the roomies you are going to be living with, are not exactly flavor of the month, and you will have to learn a whole new set of coping skills to interact with people you used to look down on, or actually sneer at.

And then, there's the job hunt.

You will be out there, trying to talk somebody into hiring you for a minimum wage position who is looking at your resume and wondering how you could possibly fit into a job answering calls all day from irate customers. In short, your experience, and education and life in general have made you overqualified.

Yeah, you're in for the ride of your life.

It will take every bit of smart and cunning and resilience and spirit you have to get through this one.

And take heart, there are more and more of you drifting into Homeless Nation. Soon, you will have lots of company, and then you will be the wise and experienced and savvy street puppy giving the what for and where's it at to the newbies.

And in the meantime, if any of those people on your Blackberry, the one somebody stole from you the first night in the women's shelter, anyway, if any of those people ever run into you out there in the other nation, and ask what you've been doing....just tell them you've been in the Mistress Protection Program.