I read once that Americans change their careers more often than any other people in the world. Some would say this exemplifies the personal freedom we enjoy. Myself, I think it shows just how much your average job sucks. We all go around jumping from one to the other in the desperate and futile belief that somewhere there must be a job that doesn't make you want to go home and bathe in paint thinner while drinking cheap whiskey and playing with matches.
At any given moment 93.7% of Americans hate there job. That number would be higher but the other 6.3% are too busy looking for another job to take a survey. The number one reason people hate their job, of course, is their boss, those insipid little bastards that couldn't find their ass with both hands yet somehow manage to screw yours. By coincidence the number one reason bosses hate their job is the employees and, oddly enough, for the same reasons. As fucked up as the situation is, it's a wonder that every workday doesn't end in gun fire.
Still, sensible people get up every morning, grit their teeth, go into the office, keep their head down and thank their lucky stars they have shitty health insurance. A few, however, eventually descend into a type of madness known clinically as Delusional Self Employment Mania, or D.S.E.M., a condition characterized by waking dreams of freedom and independence, and a euphoric sense of personal manifest destiny. Less formally these individuals are referred to as 'crazy'.
I know firsthand the difficulties of living with D.S.E.M. having personally contracted the condition two years ago while sitting in a strategy meeting during which 47 minutes were spent debating whether we as a company should standardize on using the spelling 'e-mail' or 'email'. At the end of it a vote was taken and the spelling 'e-mail' chosen on the grounds that it would present us as being sophisticated and learned and thereby double our annual revenue. It was at that moment I experienced my first waking dream of self employment freedom and I have struggled with the affliction ever since.
It has been particularly difficult for me in the fact that I suffer from one of the most acute forms of D.E.M.S. While some people with the condition may see themselves as a freelance web designer, opening a restaurant, becoming a porn star or engaging in some other kind of respected and marketable career, in my delusion I see myself as a writer working on the great American novel or, worse, maintaining a blog on the Internet and making money off of banner ads and the sale of self-promoting merchandise.
For a time I was able to treat it with a monthly dosage of bill paying. A form of shock therapy, the jolt of making mortgage and car payments, and seeing the devastating effect the violent act had on my bank account was enough to keep me grounded in reality for days or even weeks at a time.
Eventually, though, the effects of even the most aggressive bill paying therapy would begin to wane and the voices in my head would return more insistent than before. "Who needs insurance!" "Food is overrated!" "If you bathe only twice a week, you could save enough money to make it work!"
Now, over the last few months, things had gotten to the point where nothing was abating the dreams and the lines between reality and fantasy had begun to blur. I found myself saying things like, "Jon, either you approve my departmental budget or I am not inviting you to the book signing!" The only positive was that people were inviting me to fewer and fewer meetings.
