This is one widget I wish I didn't have to put on my blog. But,when you write about business/careers/worklife this is the Big Story. 1.9 million people have lost their jobs in 2008 - with one million of those losing their jobs since September.

At 56 years old, Amanda* has no illusions about her future career as an attorney in the U.S. She knows her career is about to come to screeching halt. It could be this week. It could be January. She doesn't know when, but she knows it's coming.When I called her this morning she was at the shoe repair shop. She said there is no work for her at the office. This from a woman who just several months ago regularly woke up at 4:00 am to be in the office at 6:00am and who didn't return home until 10 o'clock at night.

A few months ago I had lunch with some of my old colleagues from my most recent corporate job that I left 9 months ago. As they were busy stressing about having taken a lunch break (my boss will kill me!), shuffling papers for work (I just need to get this one thing done!), and generally apologizing for their human need for oh say food and connection, I could see much more clearly with the eyes of having been removed from that environment.

In the summer of 1968, nestled in the weeks following Robert Kennedy's assassination and the August debacle that came to be known as the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, I was a 17-- year old spending my afternoons reading novels for a summer school class on government. The class requirement: read two novels a week. In 1968,summer school at DouglasSouthall Freeman High School in Richmond, Virginia, was not so much a punishment but an opportunity to take a class that you might not be able to fit in your regular schedule. And besides, my mom believed in keeping me busy.