Monday, December 20, 2004

First, read this.
Then, read this.
Now, we are ready to begin.

"What do you want to be when you grow up?"

I would have to say that these are the 10 most evil words in the english language. From the moment you are able to speak, the adults pounce on you with this question, hoping for the cute stock answer of Policeman, Fireman, or Spiderman. It doesn't stop there though. The question is brought up regularly during your formative years, and your answer will likely change once you realize that Policemen get shot at, Firemen get burned, and Spiderman has to live in New York.

In high school, you are teased with the notion of fantasy jobs that are made possible only through post-secondary education, and the seed of evil has sprouted in your mind. This is what all those long days of lectures and boring nights of homework have been leading up to. This is what it's all about. This is the final goal.

Of course, of the millions of children who are told that post-secondary education is the key to their dreams, only a fraction of them actually do attend, fewer of them actually staying the course. It's all the same though. In the end, we've all just worked hard, to earn a job were we can work hard. Afterwards, death!

So, the line is drawn between the box-lifters and rocket scientists, the blue and white collars, the rich and the poor. It actually works out kind of nicely, because if everybody was a rocket scientist, who would lift all those damn boxes? A janatorial job is not one that is given out of pity, but neccesitty. Because how many rocket would get scientized if the scientist had to clean his own toilet? Not as many, that's for sure.

Of course, this all raises the question: Why are we bred to see our job as the final goal? Why are we expected to live our lives for our job? After all, isn't a job just a means to an end? I think that we may be getting somewhere now. Stay tuned for part 2!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home