dashboard before driving to the office.
That Monday, there was no dashboard to check.
No urgent messages.
No overnight corrections.
No plant manager asking whether a shift differential had been applied correctly.
I sat at my kitchen table and stared out the window at the maple tree in my backyard.
For the first time in years, I didn’t have to think about twelve thousand paychecks.
It should have felt wonderful.
Instead, I felt hollow.
I had built my professional identity around being dependable. If someone needed a complicated deduction corrected,
