The Deathly Halls of Bureaucracy

And a special Birthday note

My days are filled with chores.

Endless chores invoking the death of an empire, circa 1878. It’s Grand Brittania on the world stage retreating down long corridors of bureaucratic nightmares. An endless sweep of head counts and “Good day to you, Sir” congeniality.

I gather a well-worn form and place the width of paper in the crock of my elbow. I am the official representative of the Governance Department. A behemoth of unknown missions and devalued grey suits. My role today is to escort a small group of protestors up and down the corridors and the halls and the drab-grey rooms, and up and down the grand staircases of empire. We will land in a back room to thrash out a deal that will bring them somewhere close to a resolution.

We bluster along.

Pass the hung drawn men of stature. The ones with handlebar mustaches and fast-backward fashion of bowler hats and lumpen ties in one shade of satin blue. Pass the soon-to-be housewives who would make a man happy with unbridled loyalty. Pass the Inspectors of Papers coddled in a dark corner awaiting the retirement of the Elder-in-Chief.

We swoop from one office to the next.

With every entrance, a glaring middle manager turns us away. The pointed finger beams a slip of direction into the vast depths of this organizational nightmare. We follow. We knock. We move on.

And on.

And on.

An endless crusade to find an answer for somebody to take responsibility.

The eventual outcome is square one. The root of our quest. The Office of Governance filled with joyless people who refuse to wave on boats. The joy-suckers who make nothing happen.

And here the rabble asks us to consider one last plea. To make an executive decision. To bypass the regulatory paperwork, the huffed and puffed madness of the controlling department. They implore. They beg. They solicit.

“Please. Please. Our petition is important. Our appeal is worthy. Our children are in danger. Please. Please. Take a moment. Hear what we have to say. Please.”

It has taken me more than a decade to reach this point. To stand in front of a beseeching mob, poker-faced, calm, and serene. A decade of stonewalling and obfuscation. Ten years of futility encompassed within. Ten years of experience stalling, misdirecting, and delaying. This is my job. A government ally. A friend within. I offer false hope which the desperate and despairing are only too willing to accept.

“Of course. Let me see what I can do. I have your number.”

And with that, my day is done. The mob decanter. The halls briefly fall to silence as the paperwork is filed.

Tomorrow the dance will begin again.

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Birthday Dance

50 was tough.

On a scale of life-events-that-will-fuck-you-up, this year was a richter busting 10. Dealing with redundancy, becoming a full-time student, a solo Dad for the best part of the year, and then cancer…

It’s been challenging.

Today is my birthday. I hit 51 with the numbers becoming ever more meaningless until retirement age. Laying on the Linear Accelerator, a fancy name for a spinning machine that blasts radiation directly into your skull, my mind wanders. No point thinking about the heavy doses of radiation penetrating my jaw. Or the teeth rotting from within. Or the skin blistering with every blast. Nope…I like to think about the future.

There are 14 more years to go before I can officially retire and collect a pension. A single aging thought with the power to turn your hair grey overnight.

I can’t wait.

I’m done with the treadmill of working hustle. Of buttering up obsequious co-workers. Keeping deadlines. Acting your age. Of being amicable in the staff room. Applauding another middle-management decision served with morning tea to calm the locals. The stress of earning a living wage.

Training to become a primary school teacher isn’t easy.

There must be an easier way to coast to retirement. I could do the same-old, same-old, and go out in a subdued pilot light, barely flickering with life. Fourteen more years of dull repetition, knowing I will never change the world or influence any sort of paradigm shift in my industry.

More like a prison sentence.

So my last (official) 14 years in the workforce will be redefining who I am. Challenging myself. Making a difference. Influencing young minds. Shaping the future. Real purpose instead of boardroom marketing bollocks and fighting the suits to let my creative juices flow.

My job was slowly becoming redundant.

AI is soon to replace the old-school magic-marking graphic designer with a slicker model for everyman’s purpose. Nobody wants skilled labor when there’s a budget to keep and a couple of prompts to create generic artwork. Why waste my last years growing bitter at the onrushing leaps in technology?

14 more years to make a difference.

I like to think this year will be better. The cancer will be in remission. I’ll be a qualified teacher about to teach at my first school. We’ll slip in a vacation at some point to celebrate our life and the endless days in the Deathly Halls of Bureaucracy will be a distant memory.

It’s best to dwell on the positives.

Happy Birthday to me.