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Steve McQueen's character in The Great Escape looked a lot like i felt, Monday morning. in my mind's eye, i recall the scene when he's released from "the Cooler", for transgressions against The Man (in this case, his Nazi jailers): eyes squinting against the assault of light, beard-stubbled face as prickly as a cactus, appearing that he might just stink enough to kill canaries. no, i don't seem to have weathered solitary confinement well, at all. it all seems a bit silly, now that i'm on the other side of it... mostly. being chained to the house, simply to keep the kerosene heater topped up and the pipes from freezing in near-zero temperatures, and thanks to snow-and-ice on the highway wasn't entirely self-inflicted, but just seems that way, now. this all makes it more difficult to understand how Yoko can withstand near total seclusion on a daily basis. true, i've always gotten along with animals lots better than people, especially when i was much younger. but, lack of human contact... it brings out the worst in me, not the least having to suffer dickheads and the self-important when the bars are thrown back. my, that describes work pretty handily. when i read Less Than Zero, many moons ago, the phrase "veal fattening pen" stuck in my brain... a fairly succinct description of working in a cubicle. since the no-smoking ban went into effect, the sentence has been commuted into a stay-in-one-place-for-twelve-hours hell on earth. low-level grumbling, constantly... and not just from the nicotine-challenged. employees heading, one-by-one, for the doors. desktop computing people pressed into working on the shop floor to make up for the exodus of those unwilling to deal with stormTrooper mid-management for minimum wage. jezus, i should have left this paradise, years ago. i have truly stayed too long at the fair. this, of all days... where i hit another annual milestone, a big one this time, where the Abyss looms, not so far away. and still, i prefer it to being at home. time to grab the baseball and weathered glove, and listen for the beep-and-click of the security door, behind me. i better start tunneling, FAST. |
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