madge, i'm soaking in it, OR "not that i condone any isms; in my opinion isms are bad"

Okay, so i'm washing dishes this morning and i'm thinking to myself...darn why are my hands not getting pruned up? Wouldn't you know the scrubbing bits in the nondescript smart and final washing up liquid has Palmolive in it. I guess i was soaking in it.



I'm often asked why i don't care about doing a mound of dishes and i think i finally know why, one, it gives me a feeling of completing something. A task, something unsightly gets cleaned up, the kitchen and sink are once again anew. The stacks of dishes are back in the cabinet and a slight bit of order has been restored. Two, my mind starts to drift while i'm working, but it drifts in a structured way. Once the order and organization of the dishes to be washed has been established my mind keeps working on problems. Sometimes it is shelving in the garage, sometimes it is cash flow for my company, and sometimes it is trying to wrap my head around the state of in between in quantum computing. F, 1s and 0s, you now have a 1 and a 0 at the same time to play with.

I've been told that the positive ions released from the flow of water near you is what helps clear your head, mellow you out, and make you think. I guess a similarly semi-scientific explanation for why we get good ideas in the shower. Interesting, or not really, but maybe there is something to it.

So there I am washing dishes.

I started thinking about work. Why do some situations work while others completely fail? I think i must have been thinking about a nootsmaak post about body count and hammers. My thinking went something like this:

Companies fail because the people inside become more and more worried about their own skin and what they themselves are getting out of the situation as they move up in the company. I saw this as i got a glimpse at being promoted, at first it felt good, then it didn't, then it was scary, then i wished i could go back to being a cog. Really the entire time i was a cog, i didn't realize that until i left. While i was there, i ACTUALLY started to care less about what we were REALLY doing and i cared more about protecting the things that i was supposedly given. Examples: where i sat, who worked for me, and whether or not they were talking to me or going around me, my budget, my portfolio, my visibility to those around me and those above me. I also worried about what that group over there was getting that i wasn't. Why do they get to make a decision and I don't. Why can't i be a part of that, why can't we work on that together, but i don't want you to waste too much of my time...because I have all of this other crap to worry about.

Meanwhile someone is showing up to their doctor's office and the damn doctor needs to wait 30 minutes to verify that you can have a boil lanced or some such thing. That feels like failure to me.

It happens in small companies as well. Three partners sitting in a room, a challenge comes up about one's value over the others. "I'm just looking out for the business, and for me." Yeah, sure, better to have yourself taken care of while the other people languish, and again, let us not forget the work dynamic, the skills set and value that those original partners saw when they went into business together. Nothing like eliminating one third of your work force and expecting the work (but also the profits) to be split between two people. Hmmm, someone want to do the hours calculation on that one? I wonder how much my hourly rate really could have been then? Infinite hours into finite dollars seems like an increasingly small number...but then again what is my time really worth. (See previous entry about time slipping away. It was nice discovering Fiona Apple 7 years later. I can overplay her albums now.)

So i have been snapped back to my dishes thinking about those two situations, but what brought me back to the sink was the fact that I was now thinking about the quickest way to process these dishes so i could leave the house as quickly as possible to go to a banana republic and buy jackets. Meanwhile the sig other is still passed out likely in some sick, or at least still feeling sick.

Now i'm zoning out on the suds and the crazy guy across the street, i don't trust, fixing the car of the incredibly rude woman who lives around the corner, another neighbor i don't trust. Hmm, maybe some of the problem is that we don't think favorably about the other humans around us and as stated in both work situations, can cause us to think about only ourselves and not about the people around us, the people we work for (clients, or end users, etc.). Can we broaden our thinking enough to remember why we do what we do. It isn't because we want a more attractive website, it is because we actually want someone to be able to access their health care, or that research paper. Without them, we don't get paid, we don't have a business. So screw your portfolio, it won't matter when we can't come to work. Last thing, is the problem of trust.

First a disclaimer: i am not a socialist, a communist, and i certainly wouldn't call myself sensitive to the human condition, and while not a baller or an actor, or a politician...i'll certainly own a little of i've got to get mine syndrome. Though my Benz doesn't role on 22's...it's still a Benz, and the other cars aren't much less fancy. It's also not like i don't burn more than my share of carbon, cash, caffine, etc. I guess I am just saying, is there something just a little bit moderate?

And wait for it...

The big discovery of the morning dish washing: human beings are incredibly selfish. They worry about themselves first, and their 'needs' are what they solve for first. I think i have fought my entire life to be less self absorbed. Holy crap we are fighting the core of our existance. Something that massive seems a little hard to deal with. Certainly not going to get solved here, because i am down to martini classes and swizzle sticks in the sink.

Oh crap one more disclaimer: trust is earned. I recognize that, i truly believe that, but bottom line, when that trust has been earned, trust those around you...unless you start seeing the corporate card come back with charges to the intercontinental and they are the only one who doesn't travel for business...or in this case live 5 minutes from the expensive hotel. That is another topic all together.

And a break, have to go get some toast for the sick sig, other. The groaning is breaking my concentration, wasn't i trying to get to a banana republic to buy a jacket. crap.

Okay, non readers this is lengthy, and I am getting to a point somewhere here, but i really do have to leave the computer...to be continued after some toast and some consumerism.

Next chapter: I can't believe it's not butter, and we weren't trusted to do our jobs. Will i actually be able to pull my own head out and care about the person i share a house with? Who knows, and does anyone care?