Rant #3,426: Money Honey

I hope you had a great Labor Day, a holiday where we celebrate workers' contributions to our society.

And being that as it is, that celebration evidently does not extend to me, or many other remote workers.

With the advent of COVID just about four years ago, many companies were pretty much forced to go the remote route for at least some of their employees, if for no other reason than to keep themselves solvent.

The scourge was at its height, so many people had it, there was no vaccine to at least mitigate it, and people confined themselves to their homes so as not to spread the disease.

This created something of a new facet of our workforce, those who used modern technology to keep their jobs and get work done.

Although the scourge has kind of faded--we have a vaccine and many of us have been innoculated--the need for remote workers might have lessened, but it remains a valued part of the workforce.

Me, I won't go into, for the 100th time, the whys and wherefores of why I found myself as a remote worker, but I have found that it has good and bad points, with pretty much the good canceling out the bad and the bad canceling out the good.

So it's a wash, at least for me.

But the fact remains that remote workers simply do not get treated as other workers do.

Let me count the ways ...

I am still waiting for my August work pay. This is not the first time this has happened to me, and based on past history, it will not be the last.

I know it was holiday weekend, but I sent in my invoice early Friday morning. It should have been processed, since I am supposed to be paid the first of every month.

Rent is due on the first of the month. Happily, I can cover that with my finances at hand, but not being paid on time makes things more difficult.

I have brought this fact up to my employer in the past, but evidently to no avail.

Hopefully, I will get my money today, but having to remind them of this transgression on their point is embarrassing, and I should not have to go through this--ever.

Add to this nonsense is that not even a half hour ago, the president of the c9mpany I work for asked me if I coukd cover a conference on Thursday.

I don't think he knows that I haven't been paid yet, but I replied to his request as follows:

"I can cover it, but i have to get paid for my work in August before I commit to anything.

I don't know any nicer way to say it."

And I don't.

(I have also not had a raise in four years, but that is another story for another time.)

I am going to repeat something I have said here about 1,000 times, and I might say it 1,000 times more.

What I have been going through since I lost my job nearly five years ago cannot possibly be what retirement is all about.

Although I am officially considered to be retired by the federal government, I have never actually retired--

And I probably never will.

What I have gone through the past several years cannot possibly be what retirement is all about.

I have been a guest at a couple of retirement parties in recent times, and those people will have real retirements, where they made their own decision to retire, and can slow down a bit and take it all in after decades of hard work.

They deserve it!

Me, I got "bubkis" after decades of hard work, and unlike Superman, I cannot make coal into diamonds.

My "retirement" has been completely non-existent, and will continue in that direction, certainly for the foreseeable future.

And this latest transgression on the part of my employer simply makes the total, complete negative that I have been through even more toxic.

This simply cannot be what retirement is all about.

I don't know what retirement is, and at this point, I may never know.