The Whine

My friend Dragonfly-cr wrote recently a post about her workplace, and expressed a view I can't but absolutely agree and totally share: the annoyance of having a job where you have nothing to do. This is something a lot of people don't get, because they love being paid to do nothing. Some, while love having nothing to do, also love to complain about how they have nothing to do. These cases are spotted quite easily, because the moment you give them something to do, they have an excuse  to avoid doing it, or endorse it to someone else.

At the office there's a lot of people who are not here because they like it, but because they want the money. People with no calling for the job their are doing, or any sort of affinity with the company. They want the status, they want the paycheck but they want nothing else to do with the job. Some people also have dreams of grandeur, dreams outside their regular activities, dreams of movie-like fates, and spend every available and non-available second to tell others about these. Annoyed listening to their ramblings, you wonder either when will they wake up or why don't they go and do exactly that.

There's this guy, Whiner, who fits this type. He has a good job, truth to be told, a good income too. He, however, finds it unsatisfying to be here, and believing himself a genius in the area of business and such, he has some sort of side business I don't quite get. Allegedly he has a car dealing business, though when I wanted to buy a car, he went to the very online site were I also searched at first. Anyway, he has a business. Why at the office, he spends his day doing not much, or eventually dealing with this database, that database, going to meetings, making calculations and so on. But he also manages his business from here. Well, I'm not the boss, so whatever he does or doesn't do isn't really my problem.

Recently he interrupted my most delicious state of absolute concentration - music on, shut of the outer world and it was only the computer and I - to whine about how he isn't meant to work in an office. To explain this a bit more graphically, I was really out of the real world and submerged in my own thoughts revolving about this work I was doing, when he waved his hand before my eyes, so that he could whine. He waited for me to react and extrincate myself from the earphones, so I assumed it would be something important. Go figure.

He passingly mentioned how he envied people who got retired, just to take on the topic as a jumping board, to dig into his favorite topic: he's so awesome, he's such an incredibly gifted manager, has such a nose for business, he has so much money and blah, blah, blah... and he would really like to work on his own, be his own boss, travel around... because "he isn't meant to work in an office". Compared to myself and my natural reaction, I was really polite. I told him that wasn't my case, I loved working in an office, having a stable job, not to mention I was beyond satisfied with my current job. Oh no, no, no, he's so grateful for having this job... Yeah.

So, let me get this: he wants to work for himself and already has a business on the side where he does exactly that -  and he's such a successful business man and all that -  so why in the freaking hell is he interrupting my work&me time to bitch about the job - because I basically qualify that as bitching - when he could take his sorry ass, quite the job and be happy doing the crap he wants to do? I mean, if I have this super-awesome business and I'm doing so freaking good, but I still work at an office... it's because I like it, right? Not in his case. I can't vouch for how he conducts his private business - though based on the interaction with my buying the car, he really can't close a good deal, unless he can find a gullible client - but based on what one can see around him, he's working because he really needs the money.

God has blessed me with no husband and no children, therefore I don't have to endure the hardships and sacrifices that come from supporting a family, thus perhaps it's a priviledge only people like me can enjoy, to work for calling, because we love what we do, and not to bow into servitude into a job, and work for a fee. sure, I have dreams outside the office. I'd like to get published, would like to teach economics, do some consulting in my older years... in topics related with economics and telecommunications.

Yes, I can imagine working for a paycheck to support your family, but when you are settled, shouldn't you look to move towards what you like? Isn't then like whoring out to keep on a job you don't like - though you could do what you like - only to live at an unreasonable level of luxury?