Life Cubed

"We don't have a lot of time on this earth. We weren't meant to spend it this way. Human beings were not meant to sit in little cubicles staring at computer screens all day, filling out useless forms and listening to eight different bosses drone on about mission statements".

Peter Gibbons


So true! I have spent more time than I care to admit residing in my dinky cubicle doing exactly that. I admit that I don't have 8 bosses, but only two. Cubicles are to offices as mobile homes are to housing. Managers get their own BIG cubicle to work in, maybe even a window. So lucky they are. The corporate life matches the decor. Don't get me wrong, I am thankful to be working these days but I wonder for how long? How long before my company is sold, bought out or bankrupted?

I work for a large telecom firm that has been tightening it's belt for quite some time now, at least for the time I've been here. It's painfully obvious they could do things so much better, yet they won't listen to any suggestions seriously, and the only advice they do attempt to listen to is making staff fill out those idiotic corporate surveys which get talked about and forgotten within a few months. My fellow co-workers and I proposed a work from home plan, that would actually save money. Unfortunately, it was poo-pooed as being "too expensive". Corporate ran a "Going Green" campaign, which spefiically mentions work from home. I responded in kind. The reply? "The final decision is up to your local management". Pure fucking GENIUS!!!

The building I work in is for sale. Plans are in place to then lease space back for our cubicles. We were shuffled off the 26th floor, down to the 5th floor. Doesn't sound like much, until you look out the window. Before there were stunning views of downtown Seattle, and Elliot Bay to at least help you cope with cubicle life. I got to watch some killer fireworks from the Space Needle, reflected upon Lake Union. Now it's Gordon Biersch and alot of concrete walls, if you can see through the thick layers of crud on the windows that hasn't been cleaned since we've moved, a year and a half ago. Due do the shakey economy, it has not sold, with one agreement falling through. So, here we sit, not too unlike turds in a big ol toilet bowl, waiting to be flushed at some point down the line.

Now I know what Milton felt like being shipped down to the basement and assigned rodent control duties.

I find it rather humorous, if not aggravating that I have a 50 mile round trip commute that at times is fraught with nasty weather and usually includes shitty traffic on the clearest sunny day to do a job that is done 100% remotely, off premise. All I need is a high speed connection, computer and phone and I am good to go. Pretty much what I have right now in my teeny tiny cubicle. I don't need to be sitting on a beach like commercials show their customers doing. Working in a home office seems to make more sense to me. I NEVER see my customers or their equipment, rarely do I see any of the field techs that I dispatch. Funny, I can say nearly the same thing about my boss, who has a nice big cubicle with a corner window just down the hall from me!

So, as I try and wade through all of this be ready for more writings from the cube. As I look for work elsewhere, to escape the rat race. Call 'em modern day cave drawings. Call it therapy.

More to follow....