Marxian Musings

As a sort of post script to my comments about the weekend, I should add that spending a whole weekend doing things I enjoy and find meaningful with people I love brings back to the surface my thoughts and feelings of resentment toward my job. I know how blessed I am to have such a well-providing job (in terms of money and health benefits), but I just don't like what I have to do here sometimes. I mean, would you like to write a short paper about recent developments in the Federal regulations of the appropriate uses of restraint and seclusion on psychiatric patients?

I think Karl Marx was onto something with his idea of alienation. True, my writing a paper about a boring subject is not the same thing as would be my total disconnection from the piece of trousers I made in the factory. However, there is something to be said for the need to find your work meaningful and fulfilling at least on some level (regardless of literal physical connection). Solomon made this point thousands of years ago in the book of Ecclesiastes and people make jokes about office work all the time (and movies and TV shows), so neither Karl nor I are saying anything terribly original on that score. (The communist revolution, I grant you was probably a little more original, though utopias in general are not...I digress.)

I said I would do this for a year while I figured out what to do next, but on days like today I don't know whether I can make it that long. Does Starbucks have another opening??

I know, I know I have a case of the Mondays.