Sitting at the bottom of the stairs drinking the day’s first brew waiting for the time to tick around. It is nearly 05:30 or 5:30am in the old parlance. It is time for a new day. My first workday of the week, after a three-day weekend. Although I work five days a week, I only get one-in-four Saturdays off accompanied by the following Monday.
The car is already taking a second or two longer to start. The mornings are getting colder but I’m still just in a gilet. Soon I will be surprised one morning to find the car with a frozen windscreen.
Red lights, roundabouts, BMW and motorcycle and me in convoy and progress is made. Go, go, go. The IGS are playing, swinging the sweetness of nothing in my ears. They always make life feel good. A harmony of voices bringing powerful chords to my discordant being. Two early to sing along I let the bliss soak into me like particles that don’t even see I am there.
Life is rich with opportunity. This darkness is the beginning of a new day. A new week. Anything can happen. There is laughter to be had. Joy to be conjured in this corporate world. The moody and the mardy will lighten as the day progresses and the shenanigans and banter heat up the workplace.
It is at the bottom that you understand these opportunities. For these are not made by money. These are not the pursuit of profit. These are the opportunities to seek life. We are classed as semi-skilled, but we all know we are the bottom of the pyramid. We are the backs that make the revenue, the ones without value. The ones so easily replaced by any employed in jobs like ours. Or those jobless.
Bing AI image created by author
Today we applauded a worker on ten years with the company. When I reached ten years, I got a plaque. (Picture left) The worker today got a card and a QR code that, when scanned, showed him a vid meme with balloons saying well done for ten years. That is the value the company now places in its base workers.
That is what Donald Trump, and his ilk does not understand. Life isn’t about being the best. Life is not defeating the competition or screaming at the authorities.
Life is love.
Life is laughter.
Life is listening.
Life is sharing joy and comforting pain.
Life is once.
This was first posted 03/10/23 on Medium.com
Nigel Hare 
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