Jason sat at his desk looking at the 17 memos in his in basket for the 17th time. The pile wasn’t getting any shorter. He tried to think of a time when he had been truly happy and kept coming up blank. He had been working for the Department of Weights and Measures in Canberra for over 23 years and he couldn’t recall a single day when he could honestly say he got pleasure from his job. He applied for the job because he was desperate at the time and it was only going to be until he could pay off his bills and get a little breathing space. Then he would go and work with Greenpeace and do what inspired him. But after the bills got paid he got this promotion which meant a bit more money and he bought a new car so hung on for another 6 months. And then he was put on this 18 month project that meant a bit more money and the 18 months became 4 years before the project was scrapped. And somehow another promotion came along and a bit more money and of course in there he got married and then 3 kids in 5 years and he couldn’t selfishly pursue his ideals and shirk his responsibilities. And here he sat, bored with life, bone weary at the age of 42 and just feeling trapped and unhappy.
He couldn’t honestly say that he was depressed any more. He had been about 7 years ago but he got through that. No, this was more like a chronic sense of sadness. Life wasn’t meant to turn out this way.
But today something else competed with the sadness for his attention. He was fidgety, jittery and his stomach kept churning like it did when he was 16 and wanted to ask Becky to the school dance. “No, it can’t be that”, he said to himself. He opened up his top drawer and took out the card that was there. And he read it for the 20th time.
Landmark Education
No way. In a moment of weakness, he had said yes to Bernie in the cubicle and had gone out to this guest event for something called the Landmark Forum. God, all these people going on about this course they did and how it changed their lives and what a good thing it was and would Jason like to do it? It reminded him so much of the time those Mormons came around and he foolishly started talking to them about Jesus. But try as he might, he couldn’t get the night out of his mind. And it was that one guy in particular who spoke about having just started a new job after being stuck in the same old rut for years. The guy beamed and seemed so authentically happy and kept raving about how all these possibilities opened up for him during the Forum. He didn’t seem weird or brainwashed. Just happy.
“This never gets any easier, does it?” he muttered to himself. And as he picked up his phone and dialed 9692-9011 he felt something way down in the pit of his belly stir.
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3 comments:
Although I’ve never worked for the Dept of Weights and Measures, I’m completely familiar with Jason. Jason is all of us. He’s stuck and unhappy in some area, and suddenly against his better judgement he sees a glimmer.
Your portrait of him is strongly created and completely empathetic (considering how I know you’d tend to feel about someone who spent 23 years in Canberra). His pain is our pain. He’s a wonderful character.
And I love the way you paint the process of the Landmark possibility, through the skin of one person.
It’s a beautiful story.
The depressing thing is that Jason is not alone, Rick, in being trapped for so long in an unfulfilling job. You have painted the picture of his slow demise, and his realisation that there is another way, very vividly.
Just as a point of readability - The way you've written Landmark Education makes it read like a heading. Perhaps it should be in quotes.
Kerry
Jenny says
The portrait of your protagonist is beautifully done, and the descent into resignation is so believably recreated - we can all identify to some extent!
The section about Landmark Education doesn't flow as well.
As a suggestion, you could try starting the piece with Jason dialling the first digit of the phone number, and ending the piece with someone at Landmark Education answering the phone, and then fit all the information in the piece into Jason's thoughts during those 30 seconds or so of time.
It's interesting that almost all of us chose to write about transformation!
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