Monday, January 12, 2004

Passion and Purpose.
This is foremost upon my mind at regular intervals of the day. I work with people full of both. The enthusiasm with which they discuss the most inconsequential minutia of work place trivial staggers my mind. I cannot help being envious. They have found the grail we all seek.
Life if anything is unreasonable1. Two words prove this point. Paediatric Oncology. Yet, we as living creatures still attempt to divine or impose reason and purpose to an existence which clearly has no interest in colouring within the lines. I have tried to find purpose. I sought it in religion, but once you look behind the curtain, the wizard of God is not so frightening and all powerful. Like some of my co-workers, others find it in their vocation. I think they have it right. If you know the universe doesn’t give bonus points for being something we humans hold in esteem (i.e. world leader, holy man, celebrity, or sports star), then why shouldn’t mail clerk be a trade worthy of single-minded devotion. Why is pretending you are a discontented office worker on TV more interesting than being a discontented office worker in an office? Why is the perfected placement of a staple upon a page less worthy of a gallery wall than the conceptual art which usually pollutes those spaces? There is still a part of me that can’t buy it. I can’t see the work I do as anything more than moving this bit of paper from one tray to another. Even if I ignored society’s valuations, I would still rank my work quite low. Street sweepers and zamboni drivers would definitely gain some ranking. Those things are cool.
Again I have scrawled questions which rattle around my head but never seem to answer themselves. Maybe, today I will force passion and purpose into my daily work. We shall see.


1 This is the second time I have used 'life is'. I will try to refrain from this in the future. This is also the second time I have used a footnote. I will not refrain from this. They are fun.

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