This Economy Sucks

I consider myself pretty lucky with everything that's been going on. I am years from retirement so I can wait out the stock market disaster. I have a regular mortgage with no balloon payments. And I'm a nurse which means I have no fear of layoffs or salary cuts. In fact, in the next few weeks I will hear what my pay raise will be next January. So far I have been lucky.

Well that sort of changed yesterday. My mom told me that my dad found out that this Friday his company will just shut down. He found out by accident, but the company's plan was just to act normal until Friday and then tell people 'bye'. How crappy is that? Well my dad has been grandfathered into his position which means his experience has gotten him to where he is, and he doesn't have the education necessary to move to another company and keep the same position or salary. My parents have gone from living well - 2 homes, 3 cars, boats, semi annual trips to Mexico - to now not knowing how they will make it. My dad brought home a six figure salary and now the positions he is looking at is less then half that. To make it worse, the only positions he is able to find are far from here. So when and if my dad gets a job, my parents will most likely be moving out of state.

This is difficult for me in many ways. I moved here to be close to my family. Since then all my siblings have moved away and now it looks like my parents will too. I don't depend on my family much, maybe every few months for something but it makes me wonder what I will do in the future. The biggest help my parents were was during the holidays. Since I work in a hospital I have to work days like Christmas...well who watches other peoples kids on Christmas??

I'm sure I will be fine. I will work something out. But I also feel for my kids. I grew up in Canada while my grandparents lived in Florida. I never really had a close relationship with them and now I guess my kids will experience the same thing. But to be honest, my parents now live just a little over an hour away and we only see them now every few months, so I guess things really won't change that much.