9/11/2008

Class-clown messianics at the office

I.
In the end we did terrific time for a first-time drill, as per what the Fire Department said, with 1,000 people having evacuated the building in 8 minutes flat.
“What the heck have you gotten yourself into this time around?,” asked my mother on the phone a few days later.

Working with Business C*ntinuity, on what was supposed to be a part-time basis, means I get to tackle the craziest things. For instance, media training for executives. How to proceed if the company receives a bomb threat. Building-wide fire evacuation drills. And so on.
So you can probably picture me in day-glo orange safety harness and blue construction hat, with a Batman logo pasted to the side and my name to the back. I was actually considering writing “Maverick” instead but assumed few people would get the joke, and decided against it anyhow.
But I digress.

Fire evacuation occurs via the fireproofed stairwell, after the alarm’s rung and all the offices have been emptied into the halls, and once the four floors we rent out in the building were clear and the premises all inspected, I was good to follow suit and leave the building alongside everyone else.

Only, I didn’t.

See, there I was, looking up past the thronging crowds climbing down the fireproofed stairwell, my tasks all done, the remaining of the building’s companies to go, like, 10-plus floors or something - - and I could go down with the flow if I wanted to- - only that mischievous voice in the back of my head just wouldn’t stop singing this Echo & the Bunnymen song, in fact chanting it like a mantra; it goes like, “Say we can / Say we will / Not just another drop in the ocean” and I started recalling their concert like a couple of months back where Ian McCulloch looked so cool at the mike, like some goddamn drunken messiah in sunglasses, and like I told you there I was in day-glo orange safety harness and blue construction hat, with a Batman logo pasted to the side and my name to the back, and I don’t know if was the that song in the back of my head, or all the caffeine in my blood, but regardless of anything I decided against looking like a total doofus, and made the call as to do it like a rockstar instead.

It´s fairly simple if you think about it:
This year... this wondrous, wonderful 2008... is no longer about money, no longer about power, not about love, not even about either freedom or sheer fun, and entirely beside & beyond all pleasure as well. It is, simply put, about denting the memetics of the mundane with a half-smile more confident than god´s own.
It´s about doing everything I can, just because I think I can, regardless of the outcome.

...So up the stairs and against the crowd I went, herding the crowd in an orderly manner down step by step, waving my hands and barking out orders left and right, all the way up to the very last floor, then going down again past everyone else, guiding them through the way until the meeting spot in the park by the building outside.

“You know, you are nuts. You´re crazy. You´re entirely out of your mind, pulling a stunt like that,” said my Director (boss to my own boss, jesus-made-flesh himself) afterwards. “But that was amazing! I loved it! Thank you so much for going above and beyond the call!”
Not really expecting that reaction (in fact I was quite ready to have my behind kicked by then), I became speechless for this one single golden instant and just beamed a large smile back at his own. But then upon turning my back to head back to the office that little impish voice inside my head kicked in once again: Why not? asked the trickster god in me.
So I turned back to that whitest among the white collars and let it out in a deep, rasping mock-Batman voice: “You´ll never have to thank me.”

Just like that, you know, just like in the movie, and just because I can, not just another drop in the ocean...


II.
There´s this...
I mean, every morning there´s this thought that flashes across my mind either during breakfast or brushing my teeth or whenever.
It´s this one single, simple question I often get to ask myself:

What are you gonna do for the REST of your life?

And every morning, upon realizing I´ll never get to find a proper answer to that dime-store half-riddle, half-Zen Koan, makes me close my eyes and bite my lower lip just lightly, then smile that secret smile to no one but myself as Creation unfolds back onto itself like a Lotus flower withering backwards into its own bud.