Part Two - "The Pecking Order"
One of the great ironies of work is that, being under the employ of another man, we must take orders from one who, under God, is no more than my equal. What of it, if some old codger orders me around, letting me know at which time I am permitted to arrive and depart, who I am able to talk to, and in what manner, or to make demands of how many agreements I am to geo-locate in a day's work? What does that indignity amount to, weighted, I mean, in the scales of the New Testament? Do you think the archangel Gabriel thinks anything the less of me, because I promptly and respectfully obey that old codger in that particular instance? Who ain't a slave? Tell me that. Well, then, however the old sea-captains may order me about -- however they may thump and punch me about, I have the satisfaction of knowing that it is all right; that everybody else is in one way or other served in much the same way -- either in a physical or metaphysical point of view, that is; and so the universal thump is passed around, and all hands should rub each other's shoulder blades and be content.
The other great irony is that the captain believes it truly is he who is guiding the rudder. As our ship cuts across the open seas, it is the deck hands who take to the fore while our exalted captain remains comfortably seated in the aft. For in the world of sailing, head winds are far more prevalent than winds from astern (that is, if you never violate the Pythagorean maxim), so for the most part the Commodore on the quarter-deck gets his atmosphere at a second hand from the sailors on the forecastle. He thinks he breathes it first, but not so. In much the same way do the common men lead their leaders in many other things, at the same time that the leaders little suspect it.
As according to Newton's laws of motion: for every force exists an equal and opposite force, so as the puppet master manipulates the strings, or so he thinks, the articulated joints of the marionette pull back with equal pressure. Tell me, then, who really runs the show? For without the common worker, what foundation would the leader then be able to build his empire; and for what reason, then, would he be able conceive of himself as any more of a man than the rest of us? This is why I am able to remain content as a worker, because it is truly the masses that wield the power. Without the common worker, the foundations of our society would crumble like a Jenga tower.
Yet, there is no greater tool to the boss man than one who aspires to, himself, become the boss; and likewise there is no man with less authority over his own destiny than one who holds the ambition to take command -- nor is there a greater enemy to his fellow man. For when we elect to serve under a particular leader, we do so because we are sentient of how to manipulate them to do our bidding. This is what separates the common man from the truly ambitious, for those who aspire to lead for themselves are unaware of the double-edged sword of power dynamics and are very easily tempted by the gravitational pull of corruption and greed that accompany self-elected authority. With such a tool, the boss can clear his own desk of work, vacating a space for him to prop his feet up and relax back in his over-sized, double-padded captain's chair while his peon enforces his bidding. The ambitious man may refer to his actions "taking initiative," but the boss man simply calls it "living the dream," or by our standards "getting paid vast sums of silver to sit on ass."
The ambitious man attains no more silver than his peers for taking on a larger volume of the workload. So what truly makes his peers resentful and keeps them in a state of unrest is the acquisition of a disproportionate chunk of a very important piece of real-estate: the boss man's ear. The ambitious man will freely volunteer information regarding his peers in his desperate grasp for more power or more coin, if only he can make himself look good in light of them and possibly divvy up their share of the spoils one less way -- by sending one off the plank to swim amongst the sharks.
Captain Ahab was such an ambitious man. Perhaps it has already become apparent to whomever may have stumbled this message in a bottle -- and whom is currently reading this memoir -- but the title of Captain is not an official rank bestowed upon Ahab, though rather an endearing term of resentment given to him by his fellow ship mates aboard the Pequod: the jolly band of scalleywags whom affectionately call themselves the Airlite 9.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
Moby Dickhead - Part One
Foreward: This is part one of an epic saga describing the Airlite as the doomed ship, the Pequod led by the obsessive nature of our own Captain Ahab to shatter the daily agreement record while, in the course of fulfilling his destiny, subsequently sending all of our lives sinking to the murky depths of unemployment. Without further adieu, I bring you the story of the white whale:
Part One - "Loomings"
Call me Ishmael. Some months ago -- never mind how long precisely -- having little or no money in my wallet and nothing in particular to interest me in Iowa City with regards to employment opportunity, I thought I would venture back home to Omaha and explore the world of possibility offered by the Railroad. In spite of our deepest desires to sit around the house all day, when faced with the grim reality of boredom that comes with lack of money and an excess of free time, oft do men such as I find ourselves invariably drawn to work. The urbane activity with which a man receives money is really marvelous, considering that we so earnestly believe money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no account can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! How cheerfully we consign ourselves to perdition!
Whether this choice was governed by an act fate or free will, I found myself consigned to a small warehouse in the near North side of the city dubbed, "The Airlite Plastics Facility," though my fellow cartographers and I have since affectionately christened our sinking ship as the Pequod. The Monday I first arrived was a very dubious-looking, nay, a very dark and dismal February morning, bitingly cold and cheerless. I knew no one in the place. With anxious grapnels, I had sounded my pocket, and only brought up a few pieces of silver, -- So, thankfully, I said to myself, I need not plug a parking meter, as I stood in the middle of a dreary trash-lined street and comparing the gloomy prospects of my place of employ towards the north with the darkness and boredom towards my home in the south. On this day, I continued to tell myself, wherever in your wisdom you may conclude to dine, my dear Ishmael, be sure to inquire the price, and don't be too particular. Come Friday, however, and each Friday thereafter, my pockets would be lined with silver, and I would need not worry about such frivolous things, in stark contrast to the unemployed and shelterless frame of a man lying on the steps of the church opposite the Pequod. Never did there exist a more startling allegory of polar opposition with regard to my decision to return to work. Though I was aware beforehand of the short-term nature of my contract, I had to be grateful that I would be able to provide food and shelter for myself at least through the remainder of the cold season.
Looming just over the horizon, and across the street, were two very different prospects: for one, I was lured by the promise of full-time employment should I perform my duties to the best of my extent and to the complete satisfaction of my employer; the other prospect involved a similar future to that of my companion laying on the steps. One prospect was based on a hollow promise yet to be fulfilled, and the other was based on a near certainty, but at the time I preferred to remain optimistic about my future and thus gambled on the possibility that I would continue to be the one safely aboard the Pequod looking down upon the drifters amongst the flotsam of the church steps and not the other way around. Had I the foresight to witness which circumstances I am currently surrounded by, I would have at least requested that my seat cushion double as a flotation device.
Moving on, I at last settled into my chair inside the hull of the Pequod, holding the rank of FNG. In my exploits as a fledgling young cartographer, I was shown the ropes by a legendary old salt by the name of Bryce. He told of a time long ago when boxes were as bountiful as the sea is vast, and the agreements were ripe as cherries waiting to be hand picked. In the early days before the expansive sea of agreements was exhausted by over harvesting, a record was once set. To some folks, the number was simply a fishing tale -- ramblings of a man gone crazy as the combined result of several years spent geo-locating legal agreements and living in a bleak land known as "Kansas," but Bryce claimed to have set the record himself and experienced firsthand the simultaneous feelings of grandeur and horror that accompanied the sight of the white whale of record. It was, indeed, an attainable number according to Bryce, but we were forewarned about setting out to witness it for ourselves, and that rather we should aspire only to geo-locate just enough to sustain a comfortable living so as to make sure we could hold tightly to our shelter and provide food for our families for years to come. Though it was often preached not to over exert ourselves, Bryce would routinely set out with the same goal in mind, haunted by his past efforts and forever doomed to repeat them.
Others had come within sight of the great white whale, or so they claimed, but my mentor was the only one who had ventured to such a depth of numbers and survived to tell about it without first going mad with boredom and loneliness. Nonetheless, the experience left a scarred impression stained upon his countenance, and he seemed to lack any personality that he once may have had, now at times falling into pits of rage and despair for seemingly no apparent reason. Alas, the old curmudgeon passed on before the Pequod took wind to its sheets on my maiden voyage of cartographic experience. Some say he packed up and set sail to finally seek vengeance upon the whale that had since destroyed his life, but his sudden departure still remains an unsolved mystery, and the idea of Bryce has since faded into such relative obscurity that he himself is thought by many to be nothing more than a figment of the legend of which I speak. The few of the remaining crewmen of the Pequod that served with Bryce, myself included, continued to keep his lore alive, not knowing that it would one day spur one ambitious cartographer by the name of Ahab to embark upon a voyage in an attempt to bring in the legendary white whale and avenge Bryce's consequential loss of identity.
One really can't blame Ahab for trying, for it was seemingly a noble cause, but in his youth and inexperience, Ahab didn't fully understand the consequences of what was to be our collective fate via the actions of one. It is understood of most seekers of the holy grail that they initially set out on their arduous journey with the full intention of benefiting all of humanity, but in the end, the quest consumes them to the point that they succeed merely in deceiving their own selves into believing that their cause truly is one of nobility. The prize is built up to be more than that which they first set out to attain, and the promise of the unattainable inevitably steers them off course. Beneath their facade of righteousness and benevolence lies a more sinister emotion fueled by greed and self-entitlement, thus leading to the their own tragic downfall. Such is the story of Captain Ahab and the Pequod, which is a story intimately interwoven with my own, and that of my fellow crew, by the strands of fate and consequence that binds our crew together...
Part One - "Loomings"
Call me Ishmael. Some months ago -- never mind how long precisely -- having little or no money in my wallet and nothing in particular to interest me in Iowa City with regards to employment opportunity, I thought I would venture back home to Omaha and explore the world of possibility offered by the Railroad. In spite of our deepest desires to sit around the house all day, when faced with the grim reality of boredom that comes with lack of money and an excess of free time, oft do men such as I find ourselves invariably drawn to work. The urbane activity with which a man receives money is really marvelous, considering that we so earnestly believe money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no account can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! How cheerfully we consign ourselves to perdition!
Whether this choice was governed by an act fate or free will, I found myself consigned to a small warehouse in the near North side of the city dubbed, "The Airlite Plastics Facility," though my fellow cartographers and I have since affectionately christened our sinking ship as the Pequod. The Monday I first arrived was a very dubious-looking, nay, a very dark and dismal February morning, bitingly cold and cheerless. I knew no one in the place. With anxious grapnels, I had sounded my pocket, and only brought up a few pieces of silver, -- So, thankfully, I said to myself, I need not plug a parking meter, as I stood in the middle of a dreary trash-lined street and comparing the gloomy prospects of my place of employ towards the north with the darkness and boredom towards my home in the south. On this day, I continued to tell myself, wherever in your wisdom you may conclude to dine, my dear Ishmael, be sure to inquire the price, and don't be too particular. Come Friday, however, and each Friday thereafter, my pockets would be lined with silver, and I would need not worry about such frivolous things, in stark contrast to the unemployed and shelterless frame of a man lying on the steps of the church opposite the Pequod. Never did there exist a more startling allegory of polar opposition with regard to my decision to return to work. Though I was aware beforehand of the short-term nature of my contract, I had to be grateful that I would be able to provide food and shelter for myself at least through the remainder of the cold season.
Looming just over the horizon, and across the street, were two very different prospects: for one, I was lured by the promise of full-time employment should I perform my duties to the best of my extent and to the complete satisfaction of my employer; the other prospect involved a similar future to that of my companion laying on the steps. One prospect was based on a hollow promise yet to be fulfilled, and the other was based on a near certainty, but at the time I preferred to remain optimistic about my future and thus gambled on the possibility that I would continue to be the one safely aboard the Pequod looking down upon the drifters amongst the flotsam of the church steps and not the other way around. Had I the foresight to witness which circumstances I am currently surrounded by, I would have at least requested that my seat cushion double as a flotation device.
Moving on, I at last settled into my chair inside the hull of the Pequod, holding the rank of FNG. In my exploits as a fledgling young cartographer, I was shown the ropes by a legendary old salt by the name of Bryce. He told of a time long ago when boxes were as bountiful as the sea is vast, and the agreements were ripe as cherries waiting to be hand picked. In the early days before the expansive sea of agreements was exhausted by over harvesting, a record was once set. To some folks, the number was simply a fishing tale -- ramblings of a man gone crazy as the combined result of several years spent geo-locating legal agreements and living in a bleak land known as "Kansas," but Bryce claimed to have set the record himself and experienced firsthand the simultaneous feelings of grandeur and horror that accompanied the sight of the white whale of record. It was, indeed, an attainable number according to Bryce, but we were forewarned about setting out to witness it for ourselves, and that rather we should aspire only to geo-locate just enough to sustain a comfortable living so as to make sure we could hold tightly to our shelter and provide food for our families for years to come. Though it was often preached not to over exert ourselves, Bryce would routinely set out with the same goal in mind, haunted by his past efforts and forever doomed to repeat them.
Others had come within sight of the great white whale, or so they claimed, but my mentor was the only one who had ventured to such a depth of numbers and survived to tell about it without first going mad with boredom and loneliness. Nonetheless, the experience left a scarred impression stained upon his countenance, and he seemed to lack any personality that he once may have had, now at times falling into pits of rage and despair for seemingly no apparent reason. Alas, the old curmudgeon passed on before the Pequod took wind to its sheets on my maiden voyage of cartographic experience. Some say he packed up and set sail to finally seek vengeance upon the whale that had since destroyed his life, but his sudden departure still remains an unsolved mystery, and the idea of Bryce has since faded into such relative obscurity that he himself is thought by many to be nothing more than a figment of the legend of which I speak. The few of the remaining crewmen of the Pequod that served with Bryce, myself included, continued to keep his lore alive, not knowing that it would one day spur one ambitious cartographer by the name of Ahab to embark upon a voyage in an attempt to bring in the legendary white whale and avenge Bryce's consequential loss of identity.
One really can't blame Ahab for trying, for it was seemingly a noble cause, but in his youth and inexperience, Ahab didn't fully understand the consequences of what was to be our collective fate via the actions of one. It is understood of most seekers of the holy grail that they initially set out on their arduous journey with the full intention of benefiting all of humanity, but in the end, the quest consumes them to the point that they succeed merely in deceiving their own selves into believing that their cause truly is one of nobility. The prize is built up to be more than that which they first set out to attain, and the promise of the unattainable inevitably steers them off course. Beneath their facade of righteousness and benevolence lies a more sinister emotion fueled by greed and self-entitlement, thus leading to the their own tragic downfall. Such is the story of Captain Ahab and the Pequod, which is a story intimately interwoven with my own, and that of my fellow crew, by the strands of fate and consequence that binds our crew together...
Friday, November 7, 2008
Breakdown...
Entropy -- en·tro·py (ěn'trə-pē)
1. A theory that suggests that all matter and all systems in nature undergo an inevitable and constant state of deterioration.
2. A law of thermodynamics describing the tendency for all matter and energy in the universe to evolve toward a state of inert uniformity.
----
Two very different definitions, both eerily relevant to our situation... which will it be? Will the Airlite 9 deteriorate with the rest of society, or will we all be able to agree upon a happy medium and keep our jobs at least until December?
1. A theory that suggests that all matter and all systems in nature undergo an inevitable and constant state of deterioration.
2. A law of thermodynamics describing the tendency for all matter and energy in the universe to evolve toward a state of inert uniformity.
----
Two very different definitions, both eerily relevant to our situation... which will it be? Will the Airlite 9 deteriorate with the rest of society, or will we all be able to agree upon a happy medium and keep our jobs at least until December?
A Certain Douchebag Cartographer...
Whether or not you realize it, the ship is sinking, bro. Chill the fuck out.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
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