The Blaring Message

I think it was June, sometime in the late 1970s.  I was employed as Human Resource (HR) Manager for an Orthodontic manufacturing company.  This was in Denver, Colorado and it was my first diversion from HR within the banking industry.  The department was small.  It was staffed with a VP of Operations/HR, my position, a benefits/compensation person and two administrative support staff.  The financial health of the company of course, was directly linked to sales and the ability of operations to meet and deliver the demand for our orthodontic products.

Waking up one morning, thinking about the routine of getting up and getting ready for work, I found myself totally engaged in mulling over the words, “for whom the bell tolls.”  Where was this thought coming from?  Why was it in my mind?  I surmised it had something to do with my dreams but I simply had no clue, no conscious connection to it.

Later at work that morning, I started conversations and shared with a few co-workers the message and my puzzlement over it.  It had grabbed my attention and wasn’t letting go.  As the day progressed, I finally had a chance to talk to Ray, my supervisor and to ask him the question which had been on my mind for a few days now. 

I knew things were slow and the company was going to be laying off some people.  Senior management had decided the previous week to soon lay off at least one person from each department.  Part of my job, after the announcement was made, would be to place ads in local papers announcing the layoff and to list specific job skills of some of our departing workers.  I would also be contacting nearby manufacturing companies who employed welders or used other trained factory skills. This would be an effort to try and create out placement opportunities.

Being occupied with making preparations for the layoff, I’d forgotten about the Human Resource Department.  However, burrowing itself at first, quietly and deeply hidden from my daily awareness, the question had begun in the last two days to loudly and repetitiously present itself to my awake mind.

So I asked it aloud this day.  “Ray, who in HR is going to be laid off?”   He replied, “you.”  I said, “You must be kidding.”  No, he responded, I’m not. 

Of course, of course.  I don’t know why it wasn’t obvious from the blaring message.  “Ask not for whom the bell tolls.” It tolls for thee!!

Before sunrise this day, thought, bubbling up from the stream of all knowledge, had already clearly addressed and correctly answered the unspoken question.  "We are divinely connected at all times." jrt