Work and you.

This previously unfinished entry was started back in the beginning of March. I thought it still had some value so, I finally got around to getting the damn thing done...

So much to do so little time to do it all. The old saw applies today in the workplace more than anywhere else. A couple of long days on the job and I find myself looking at work through a jaundiced (if tired) eye. It’s not so bad, except for the long hours and at this point in life I find the body can only do so much before it rebels.

Speaking of which, something happened the other day which was quite interesting...

A co-worker, a friend if you will, has been toiling away with me on and off for the last few days.

I’m no longer gung ho about work anymore, not that I’m surly, I just won’t buy into the rah-rah stuff. I’d probably buy into it a bit more if any of the places that tried to foist it on me would have figured out you need to reward people for going those extra miles but, it’s been my experience the whole employer/employee relationship is often a one way street. You put in your hard work, toil and sweat and in return you should be thankful to have a job.

In previous generations people would spend their entire working careers with an employer. These days, it’s the exception, not the rule. The economy slows down and expenses have to be trimmed, so people must be cut, they don’t keep you on just because of years of good service. Hell, if you’ve managed to work your salary up to a respectable level, it may mean you are even more of a target because of it.

The result of this is a dysfuntionality in the whole work dynamic, people are understandably worried much of the time, job security for people today can be termed tenuous at best. This results in people doing things that just aren’t good for them.

Case in point, the aforementioned co-worker/friend. The person in question, has a tendency to put in way too many hours in working than is good for a person. Toiling away through a day shift and a night shift (consecutively), getting very little sleep, surviving on coffee and little else. The job is sedentary, there isn’t a true abundance of physical toil but, that doesn’t mean your body still doesn’t suffer the effects of all those long days.

People‘s body’s are funny in that you can only ignore the signals your body sends you for awhile before the body figures out a more dramatic way to get your attention.

This particular Monday had been a long day and round about 5am I just about had it. A long drive ahead of me, it being Monday (meaning I had been up a bit earlier than I normally would have bee), when 5am rolled around it REALLY felt like it was 5am. I don’t know about most of you but, I’m not really effective after about 9 hours of having my ass parked in front of a computer. After 9 hours or so my mind begins to wander, all I can think about is how the crappy office chair I’m sitting in is really uncomfortable, what it would be like to be in bed at the moment, how many bad life choices bought me to the point where I had to sit in a chair for nine hours, blah, blah, blah, blah - you get the drift.

5am rolled around the shift had dragged out to almost 12 hours and the last three or so hadn’t been all that pleasant. Besides tomorrow’s another day! I no longer buy into the work until everything is done mantra, not since it has become a way to cover a lack of proper staffing and leads to people rapidly burning themselves out.

I scooted out of the office at 5am and started to make my way back to the hinterlands just hitting the cusp of the morning rush hour. Even with the twelve hours I had put in, it was somewhat frowned upon when I announced my intention to leave but, so be it.

As fate would have it, I didn’t immediately jump onto the highway as I would normally. I proceeded to look for a mailbox to mail out a letter (got to pay those bills). I was on a quest, not realizing the corner mailbox is fast becoming a thing of the past. I didn’t realize it but, in Manhattan anyway, the terrorists have won in you can hardly find a mailbox on the street anymore! Something so relatively innocuous and convenient has now become the matrix for terrorist activity on the urban streets. So, I imagine in the name of safety, street mailboxes are vanishing faster than Bush supporters.

I made it up to around midtown when my phone started vibrating in my chest pocket. I couldn’t fish the thing out quickly enough but, when I looked at the number and saw it was work my heart immediately sunk. My first thought was, “Oh no! Only three weeks on the job and already we’ve broken down those barriers where work intrudes on life past work hours. Already we’re beginning the odyssey of the work emergency phone call.”

A lot of people know exactly what I’m talking about, immediately I was thrust onto the horns of a dilemma, to call back or not to call back? The Hamlet-like question of the morning, suffering the slings and arrows... well you get the drift. Finally, I succumbed and I called back only to wind up speaking with a very shaking up supervisor. The friend who had worked a day shift and night shift, still at work when I left, succumbed finally to exhaustion in the form of a seizure!

The guy had had seizures before. While I hadn’t been present when they happened, I was fairly nonplussed by the whole seizure thing having experienced myself a few decades back. Plainly put, it’s more embarrassing than anything else for the person having the seizure. You don’t feel so hot on the tail end of the thing but, the really off-putting moment is realizing how little control you have over your own body. Embarrassing to be sure but supremely terrifying to lose command of one’s own ship of self.

I had intended to speak to the supervisor in question about keeping my friend on a limited amount of hours to avoid exactly what had happened but seeing as how the guy was only on his second day I hadn’t had the opportunity to get around to having the conversation.

The upshot of everything was I wound up getting little sleep that day as I felt obligated just to go to the hospital and be there for the guy. How horrible is it for something to happen to someone and no one is there for you? I mean, I had to make sure the guy was alright.

In the meantime, the supervisor was absolutely, positively freaked out by the whole thing. I’m sure it was an unnerving experience but the guy was just totally shaken up. There had been a bit of a resultant mess from the incident which meant the supervisor had to toss his shirt, socks and shoes. I went back to work to get my friends possessions only to find the supervisor shaking, really out of sorts and unclad. I almost wish I had used my camera (which I did have that morning) and taken a picture to capture the moment for posterity but it probably would have bordered on bad taste.

It didn’t stop me from taunting the shaken and distraut man by observing how I thought he was a truly nice guy - what had he done to terrify my friend so? I would have to rethink my whole approach to him as a person! The next evening when I came in, of course this was the talk of the department. The event that had happened, everyone was curious to whether or not I had been there at the moment and I took the opportunity to equate the supervisor to the incredible Hulk having torn off his shirt and socks and shoes and running around like a madman.

I’m horrible, what can I say.

At the end of everything, I spent a bit of time at the hospital with my friend and explained all the necessary background information to the medical staff. After it became obvious he wasn’t going to get out in the next hour or so I left him with his possessions and a voucher so he could at least get a car home. Mind you, he was looking at his watch while he laid on a gurney in the emergency room of the hospital and when I asked him why he was looking at his watch he responded he was concerned how he might not be able to make it to work that day!

There’s dedication and then there’s something bordering on work insanity. The only thing I can say at the end of all this was, don’t let this happen to you.