American Fez

You Can't Win

Many years ago, I was a gung-ho type of guy. "Geronimo!" I would eagerly leap forward to grasp the nettle at all hours of the day or night. Perhaps even a "Banzai!" escaped my lips every now and again when in an especially uncompromising mood. Then one day I landed awkwardly and hurt my knee. It was the demanding specter middle-age suggesting Tarzan relinquish his jungle vine forthwith; that the Kamikaze should surrender his headband. 

So I took the specter's advice and became a take a step back sort of person. Well, if I'm being honest, really a two or three steps back after grumpily waving his cane at whatever is in front of him sort of person. I call it curmudgeonly caution. Never send to know about whom the cranky old man is muttering; he mutters about thee. 

I don't recall my former gung-ho approach to life getting me into trouble. Mine has always been a curious nature and even in my most impulsively hotheaded moments I was disinclined to shoot first and ask questions later, preferring a prior interrogation before the commencement of gun firing. Sure, my questions were considered peremptory and I usually would still shoot after asking them, but at least I took the opportunity to get to know, however briefly, the target I was shooting at.

I still enjoy asking questions. Alas, taking a step back when asking questions means it's harder for my respondent to hear me because I'm further away. And if I decide to shoot when I've finished my debriefing I'm undoubtedly going to miss because the target is harder to see. My eyesight isn't as good as it was, in addition to those other aforementioned physical frailties that confound my aim. Oh, how I wish I taken a step back before listening to that damn demanding specter of middle-age. But I was too gung-ho back then.

Status Bar

These days, old enough to often find myself forced to follow instructions from clients young enough to be my children, I sometimes think I'm suffering from the workplace equivalent of clinical senility.

Behold the youthful movers and shakers of business dressed in sneakers, skinny jeans and superhero t-shirts. Visiting their open-plan glass-fronted offices in my gray flannel suit and old fashioned power tie, I feel as though I might just as well be wandering aimlessly around a sanatorium corridor in my dressing-gown and slippers.

In meetings, they reserve a rocking chair for me. An executive assistant drapes a blanket over my knees as I demand the Powerpoint volume be increased. On video conference calls, my young colleagues wear Bluetooth enabled earbuds while I wave my ear trumpet in the air, squinting at the screen. Here I am, an old man in a fourth-quarter, being lectured to by a boy, waiting for budget updates. Did T. S. Eliot feel so obsolete when he was aging in his bank?

Back in my grey cubicle, this ancient wheezing desktop computer chugs along in imitation of the little engine that could, dragging a spreadsheet installation over a mountain of processing hardware. Then it stops. Just taking a breather or did I forget to replenish the printer paper? The only thing around here with less memory than my computer is me.

Meanwhile, the youngsters have all decamped to Starbucks with those new-fangled lightweight laptops, working from their home away from home. I clock off at five when they are relocating to that trendy bar across the street, there to finish assignments between martinis and restructure modules after ordering appetizers, still working into the wee hours.

Get a life, I want to tell them, and enjoy it while you still can. Alas, nobody listens to someone old enough to remember when people worked to live instead of living to work. Perhaps that's why I'm always passed over for promotion. "When will he retire?" I can hear them mutter when they think I am asleep.