GOD-SPIT
Cannot a man be a god over his own damn dog? In that book, ya know, the Bible; God gives manna, then demands. For chrissakes, he feeds then practically says "fetch". Every damn God does that, throws you a bone then tells you to do something.
So why the hell wasn't old Caulfield listening? Damn dog won't do anything for anybody. I swear to God, you could be burning alive and he wouldn't get up. Those sad grey-blue eyes just looked up at me from the spot where he parked himself on the damn sofa. I wanted to kick him. God, right then I really wanted to land a good solid kick on him. Ya know? One that would lift his lazy ass right off my damn sofa. Damn dog. I feed the damned thing and what's he do? Ignores me. Bloody hell ignores me.
It wasn't like I was asking for him to do a handstand, or anything like that, just say good-bye before I trudged off to the office. I know he's old; I'm not sure how old though. I rescued old Caulfield off the street, miserable thing. Saved it, fed it, raised it, and all. Damn dog wasn't getting off the sofa anytime soon, so I just left.
This time I remembered to lock my apartment, not trip down the stairs, and not drop my briefcase. Of course, what I did forget was that wretched God be damned umbrella. And it was raining something terrible. You'd think God was spittn' on you. Yeah, I know every hack and his brother calls the rain tears, but personally I think it's God-spit. That's what rain is, not tears. Why tears? What's to be sad about if you're immortal? Nope. It's spit all right.
I hailed a taxi, I don't own a car, and I wouldn't have room for it anyways. I never have any elbow room, never. Everywhere you go there's always somebody right there. I mean they're practically on top of you they're in such a God damn rush. And their in a rush because they're always late, which makes them angry, which sparks road rage and speeding. This whole planet is polluted with people, people here, people there, God damn people everywhere. Pop'n' out of the ground like weeds in God-spit.
One of these days I'm gonna leave this city. I'm gonna find somewhere that isn't full of people. I'm gonna get some elbow room finally. I'll even bring old Caulfield. As much as he's a pain in the ass I still enjoy that damn mutt. I'd find a nice place, far from people and concrete, away from the traffic and noise. An escape, ya know?
Finally a taxi pulls up, took 'em long enough. I'd been waiting such a damn long time that I was soaked. Now I'd be late. I'm always so damn late. Well, I hopped on into the taxi, after getting soaked to the bone. The Pakistani driver almost leers at me as he asks in his thick accent where I'm going. I want to say "somewhere, anywhere where there are no people, no traffic, no sky scrapers, and no God-spit". But I don't. I tell him where the office is. He smells like smoke and doesn't talk to me, not the friendliest guy in the world. He turns up the volume on the radio on some station that I can't understand. Its all goddamned gibberish to me. But the rides not long, and he's not a terrible guy, just not the friendliest. So who cares?
I pay the guy and hop out at the office. Go in through the big spinning doors, and sopping wet make my way through the giant lobby. What I don't get is that we can afford this God damn huge lobby, and stuff like that, but kids in Africa or some other God be damned place are starving. It's kind of ironic really. They starve with no money, and we waste money on this enormous lobby that serves no purpose but to impress people into buying our products thus giving us more money. Probably if we get enough they'll build another lobby. People are like that. I mean they've got something that's perfectly fine and nice and they throw it out and get something fancier and newer just to show off that they have enough money that they can afford that top-off-the-line-expensive thing.
In the elevator I push the button a dozen times. One part is I know I'm late and even though I know that it won't make it go any faster I still do it, another is I'm claustrophobic as hell. I already told you about crowds and elbow room right? So I push the button a million times egging it and prodding it to go faster, which it won't, and I know it won't, but I still do it anyway.
The doors finally open and I dash out, not too quick like though. I try to look normal as I escape the metal jaws. Isn't that what everybody does? Tries to look normal and blend in even as they writhe to escape? I suppose that helps with organization, but I wish it wasn't so. I'm not asking for mass havoc and chaos or something like that, just a little difference in the world. Someone to speak up and say, "I'm running from the tiny metal death trap that is that elevator."
Anyways, I find my cubicle and sit down. Life's terrible in a cubicle. First off they're tiny, second they're usually blindingly white. Nobody grows up saying that they want to work in a fabric covered box. They put you in this white maze of cubicles like some rat, and the cheese is somewhere else; the experiment is seeing if you can get it though. Most people, as it turns out, can't.
I can hear this guy, Davis typing in his cubicle. Tick click tick tick. Annoying. Anyway, Davis is an asshole. He's that guy that you send an e-mail to asking for project information, or telling him when form 75-A is due and he'll ignore it. Then later trouble comes because of this and he blames you. Saying you never got it to him when you know sure as Hell that he's a lying bastard. If someone tells you to fill out form 75-A then you'd better damned well fill it out. That kind of stuff drives me crazy. So that conniving bastard Davis isn't good looking, most of us aren't though. He's short and always trying to compensate for it with "wit" and "humor". Two words more opposite of Davis were never imagined, but that's how he looks at himself, as the funny go-to guy that everybody loves. It's odd how one's perception of reality is totally different from another's. We all live in our own realities, they merely collide when we talk or see each other. I think of that as I'm driving down the expressways. About al those realities brushing against each other, and for that split second in time, all our realities are the same. Then we pass and we each continue on deeper into our own realities. So Davis has his cubicle on the right of mine, and I'm trapped between him and Jameston.
Jameston, this other guy, has his on my left. Jameston is that nosy fellow who every once in a while you'll see him lean back and "casually" see what you're doing. He'll walk over during break. Now when I go on break I want to be alone and enjoy my God damn break. So the bastard will walk over and talk to you, but he really doesn't care about you. Only about what you're doing, what projects you're on, and what kind of money you're making. That kind of stuff pisses me off. He acts all interested in you only to weasel information out of you, mainly money things. Ya know? It's all about what you make, not about you. You're a number. You don't have a face, or a name. They take that from you; strip you of your humanity. Well that really gets me going, ya know? Sometimes he'll walk over and start to talk, but you know he's not talking to you, but at you. In the mean time while he's talking at you he snoops around your cubicle. Casually glances at your papers, your desk, your God damned sticky notes. He analyzes you. He fucking analyzes you. Drives me crazy.