A tool can outlive the task it was designed for and wait decades for someone to recognize it.

Objects can survive their purpose. A tool whose job disappeared decades ago sits there fully functional and unrecognized, waiting for somebody who knows what it was for, and its usefulness is intact while the knowledge that would unlock it is gone. Value can be dormant rather than absent.

The same applies to skills. Something you learned for a job that no longer exists may be exactly what a new situation requires, once someone recognizes the fit. Rather than discarding what seems obsolete about your experience, describe what it actually consists of, and look for where that shape is needed now.