Paint it Pink

In the first hours of arriving at Menasco in January I was taken down a peg or three by Larry Abram who instructed me to move some boxes, the Stress Office was relocating and I was tasked to move some stuff.

I objected, saying "I'm not here to move boxes" which was quickly shot down by the seasoned man.

"You're here to do what you're f##king told!! - you get paid the same rate for moving f##king boxes!"

A lot of what Larry would say was like that, usually the f-word was used for maximum impact.

So, my apprenticeship started and during that first year, I learnt that if someone said "Paint it Pink" and it really didn't make any sense to paint it pink, for a quiet life it was best to paint it pink.

This I realized, was one of the fundamental differences between what I was and what I became.

The career man, someone who wishes to ascend the corporate ladder, would associate pride with the decision making process, a trust from management who bestowed (endless) responsibility on their subordinates and the career man, proud that his responsibilities were growing (even if his salary was not growing).

Yet, it became apparent that the only long term goal of the jobshopper was to earn more money and it really did not matter how that was accomplished, the one thing that was important was that responsibility was the responsibility of the masters, the salaried staff.

And if their decision was to paint it pink, then pink it would be.

If subsequently their decision was to paint it grey, then of course that could also be done.

Whatever color they wanted because as we all knew, if they had the hours...

...we could fix anything.