I stood there in the conference room. My crisp ironed dress shirt was tucked into my pleat-less ironed dress pants. Even though the company policy requires just a collared shirt, I’ve noticed the looks I get when I come in with my polo. So here I am in the best fabrics I could find out of my suitcase. Sometime I wonder why I bother. The few friends I have here at work really don’t care what I wear. In fact, they’d applaud if I came in to work with shorts. Everyone seems to be under this strange spell, the spell of corporate culture. Some unspoken rules on how to survive in this world. Some of the rules are obvious, some are subtle, but most are held by the people that run it. It’s no real surprise that a company’s culture is dictated by the guy up top. What is a real surprise to most is that people think the culture if determined by their direct supervisor. No, that’s not it, your direct supervisor dictates your happiness. It’s two different things.
Through the large glass window I can see all of Westwood Village down below. The streets intersecting at odd angles. People running around grabbing lunch in the time slot they’ve been given. It was a giant mouse maze boxed by the edges of this window. We all chose to be in this mouse maze. When we accepted that offer, we voluntarily entered the maze provided by our supervisor. Regardless of the position you’ve accepted, there’s no fooling that you’re in a maze. It’s an odd maze determined by whoever put you there. That person being in another maze above of you. I see some that are easy. One big box with no paths, just four walls. You at one corner and cheese at the other three corners. Simple right? Well, there are people that don’t perform too well in these situations. They still sit at their desk being as unproductive as you don’t want them to be. It’s kind of like the people down there looking for food. Westwood has a ton of places to eat, yet there are people just wandering around not knowing what to eat. Maybe that’s it. They don’t want cheese. But then again, it’s just metaphor. Maybe it’s just too easy. That brings us to the other case. An overly complex maze where you don’t know how long it’ll take you. This goes back to whoever put you there. They see the maze from above. Yet they still put you in this nightmare of a game. And if they’re really crazy, there wouldn’t be any cheese to be found. I don’t know what is worse. A maze that leads you down endless paths or a box with four walls and nowhere to go. One you’re doing something, but there’s just no end to it and the other is just complete acceptance of your role. Both are sick. Maybe that’s why the first case doesn’t work. You see the cheese at the other corners but you’ve surrendered to the fact that even though your got cheese, you’re still in a stupid box.
I stared out and panned over the horizon. The spots of green reminded me that all hasn’t been lost to the urban sprawl. Like Cancer for trees, concrete had spread over this once green land people called the West Side. Now, vegetation is allowed to grow in areas deemed reasonable. Trees must be kept under a certain length, trimmed if the grow out of control, and uprooted if they are considered a danger. A danger to man of course. Telephone posts are placed on every street like a warning to free growing trees. Standing in servitude to man, their lifeless bodies stripped of their green mane and left to hold the luxuries of man. An awful fate for something so grand. It almost seems as if we lived with more of these wise trees around, we’d be in more peace with ourselves. A feeling I remembered as I stared out.
I was there a few months ago. Out in the fields where people worked with nature to nourish each other. They took from the land as much as they gave back. Farmers, that’s all they really were, true farmers. They wake up, tend to the animals, tend to the land, and tend to the family. Cycle repeats over and over again. It’s been like that for centuries. Even more impressive was the tie to nature. When they give back to the land, they really give back. Feeding off the vegetation and animals their whole life, they believe they should do the same when their life ends. We look upon it as barbaric, but they look upon it as an honor to give their body back to the animals. It was a rite of passage for those who led a good life. When I had heard about it, I must admit, I was turned off. The ceremony sounded brutal, but after a young girl explained it to me, my view started to change. These were different values, different ways of looking at things. There were no mazes, no mice, just your own boundaries you place upon yourself. We in fact, create this whole race or game. I really wanted to stay. There was no real reason for me to leave. I had no ties back at home as far as U.S. society goes – no bills, no contracts, no loans, just family and friends. That was enough for me to decide to leave. This was one boundary I made for myself. It felt almost like an excuse. They would have wanted me to be happy and it wasn’t like we couldn’t visit each other. Yeah, it was an excuse. It was too scary of a step to take.
“Aren’t you glad to be back?” Jeff asked entering the conference room. His usual cynicism heard in his voice.
Others came in after him, all carrying their clipboards, all dressed within the company’s business casual attire. A few had brought laptops for the meeting. Someone was going to give a presentation on all the new features to be implemented. The rest were there to attend, whether they wanted to or not.
I stood staring out the window.
“I know you miss these meetings,” Jeff says smiling.
“Actually, I miss this view.” I say taking a deep breath.
“Nothing like Tibet I bet.”
“Nothing like it at all.”
“Hope you can apply some of what you saw over there with this new release we’re planning.”
I turned around and saw the familiar faces of the team. Product managers sat trying to connect the laptop to the projector. Even though they’ve done it many times, the projector always had a mind of its own on when it wanted to turn on. The quality assurance team always sat in the back. They smiled up at me and ave me the sign that they’ll be sleeping through the meeting. The developers always sat up front to see the specifications clearly. They usually drove the questions for the product managers. I was there to make sure people have a clear understanding on what is to be done. After the six months I had been away, it was hard not to think of how simple people made their lives out to be. So it was hard for me to answer Jeff.
All I could tell him was, “No. We’ll be doing the same old thing.”
Besides, I’m just a mouse who crawled back into the same maze. I had my window of opportunity. I didn’t take it. Now this is where I belong.
