Laid Off

I got laid off today.

Our architect came by my cube and said he wanted to talk to me. Nothing unusual about that, I figured he wanted to ask some technical questions or my opinion about something. We went into the conference room across the aisle from me, nothing unusual about that, it has a white board. I followed him in and noticed the HR lady sitting at the table. Mmm, what's she doing here?
We sat down and the architect quickly said something like "days like this are difficult. Your position is being eliminated." I thought, ok, so what's my new position? We had been having slow sales, our revenue this year was so far very poor, we had shuffled some executive level people, we had just hired a new director of technology, a re-organization was in the works, so they are probably finally rolling out the new organization and they are going to tell me what I will be working on now.
"Today is your last day." That kind of hit me hard. It was like I wanted to pause time immediately so I could think a little. Then I wanted to rewind, this couldn't be true. I was one of the best software people they had. I was smart, hard-working, innovative. Just yesterday I had been talking with my manager about what project I would be working on next. I was the most versatile guy they had here, I had 27 years experience in software development, I had 14 years in this industry, I was a mentor to the less experienced.
The HR lady took over and told me about the severance package and about insurance, etc. I'm not the type to freak out, so I asked pertinent questions about the situation, what about the open job requisitions, are those closed? Most were closed, but I was welcome to apply for any open positions. The whole thing seemed surreal. I didn't ask about who was going to finish up what I was working on. I did ask how many are affected by this.
"11% of the workforce, from all areas of the company."
They told me I can pack up, or they can pack up for me. I said I would pack up. I stepped out and saw my cube neighbor, a member of my team. He had a box and was packing up. "You got hit too?" I didn't feel very gregarious at that point and just went and got a box. By the time I came back there were more people who were packing up.
I didn't have a whole lot to pack. I grabbed a DVD and copied all my personal stuff from my computer. I put in my yoga mat, my various packaged food that I nibbled on during the day, my model of Dr. Zauis, my mug, some pens. I had some paintings my wife had done. It all easily fit in the box. My previous manager came over and gave me his card.
I left and went across the street to the hotel where the outplacement people were set up. I talked with a nice counselor who made sure that I was emotionally all right. Sure, I'm fine, I just dread going home to tell my wife.
"Will she be supportive?" she asked with grave concern.
"Oh yeah, I just mean it's going to be hard to tell her."
The whole thing is still surreal. I have about two months of severance. They'll pay for insurance for three months. They actually were pretty decent about it. And I understand the logic, third quarter results come out tomorrow, they're probably pretty bad, so this move will reassure the stockholders that the executives are on top of things. Sure, they could be bold and say our people are our best resource, and developers are an investment. They probably don't care that they've put the company in a downward spiral, all the people left are going to be nervous, they're going to be overworked, they're going to start looking for new jobs, the best ones are going to get new jobs.
The whole thing sucks for everyone.