Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Despite my best efforts, Monday’s discussion did not, in fact, warrant a hallowed spot in Reader’s Digest, although Google did affirm the exclusivity of the quote. More importantly, however, I was afforded an evening of not posting. I know, I know. Devious.

What is the perfect job? Certainly there are shitty jobs and better jobs, but in any sector you’ll always gripe and hear the griping. Everybody does it. It’s an institution, as necessary as it is there, and implicit in each complaint is the possible existence of occupational paradise. How you would find this paradise, I’m not exactly sure. I imagine somewhere, somehow, there’s a job wherein you sail along golden shores, rescuing whales while a chorus of orphans swells in the background, praising your benevolence because you saved the orphanage by doing an awesome cost-benefit analysis.

A dolphin, whom you also saved, leaps out of the sparkling waters, handing you a fat paycheck with one fin and wiping your ass with the other. It waves goodbye–with its good fin–before plunging back to the depths.

A few weeks ago, as I was driving home, it occurred to me I’m content with my industry. Oh, don’t get me wrong. There are plenty of brutal days. It still seems like a sensory overload to coast through e-mail after e-mail in Outlook. There aren’t as many layers of bureaucracy to buffer and comfort. The online sphere runs in real-time, which means falling asleep at the wheel will beget bitchslappings of real-time proportions. But there is also a belief in the medium itself, and the same speed that stresses also thrills at times.