Not Really Goofing....

I'm not really goofing off, at the moment. I am officially working; I have my pager on my hip (both on my hip and on, period); I have gone through emails and responded as needed, and I am using my work laptop to do it. I am Working.

It's also true that I am sitting at the kitchen table, listening to the birds, and looking out at a perfectly glorious day; I am barefoot, wearing shorts and a light blue Tshirt, and sipping coffee while I leaf through a book. So, I'm not really working. More like, I'm holding myself in readiness, should the need arise.

This is, in fact, exactly the condition that the people who reluctantly pay my salary (not just me; they're reluctant to pay anyone's salary, as if they could get away with never paying, then their P&L would be fabulous) were referring to when they balked. Am I working? No, truth is, I'm not. Am I avoiding work, delaying it, refusing or failing to do what I should be doing? No, not at all. Nothing is waiting for me.

I suppose that one way to look at this would be that if I have nothing to do, then I ought to be finding things to do. Because unless one works in valhalla, there are always things that could be done to improve the common weal, the working environment. Thats true. But I am not going to do them, because I have found, over the years, that it simply doesn't matter. Perhaps thats my failure, an inability to see how things could be grandly better, and to contribute my mite to efforts that could possibly lead to such improvement, knowing full well that by myself, I can't change them. And its true that at one time, I though that even if I couldn't change the totality or anything approaching totality of the environment, I could at least make an effort. But I don't think that way any more. I see a problem, I fix it. I see something I can make better in my small realm, I do so. But I don't try to change the world, the nation, the state, the city, the street. Just my little part.

But I'm not goofing off. Much.