Friday, May 19, 2006

I feel like a junkie

I work in Corporate America. In opting to veer away from the frequent travel required from life as a consultant, I took a position as a relative peon. And peons don't get to do things like have three martini lunches.

But I did. Well, not quite. I think our culture as a whole has veered away from that, which has its pros and cons. But I had a glass of wine at lunch. And was very annoyed with myself for feeling guilty and fearing getting caught afterwards. I'm a thirty-something, responsible adult. What the hell is wrong with taking a nip when I lunch with friends and coming back to the office? Smokers don't catch the same sort of flak for taking their fix, and on company grounds no less.

And why have we become such a goddamn goody-two-shoes society? Health nuts? Republicans in congress? Why is it so difficult to accept our freakin' humanity? It's unreasonable to expect to be a fat-free, Disney-watching, kink-abhorring, teetotalling, clean-mouthed infallible....robot. And we set ourselves up for disappointment in aspiring to such things. Better to accept our flaws and warts, even take the good that can arise from them.

2 comments:

James said...

You shouldn't feel like a junky. You should feel like an alcoholic. Haha

Kidding.

You have a point though. To be human is to be imperfect. To live in this world is to be subject to its hostility.

Although I have to say, though, equating the three-martini lunch with smoke breaks isn't very fair. Smokers can still operate heavy machinery afterwards. And if it wasn't for the goody-two shoes health nuts, we'd still be able to smoke inside.

Smokers are people too. ;)

Slave to the dogs said...

Didn't mean to equate the two, exactly....but in white-collar corporate America, there's not the same stigma workwise with copping your buzz in short increments throughout the day as opposed to a drink or two at lunch. Sure, as a smoker you're still made a pariah otherwise by being cast out to the limits of company grounds and have nonsmokers turn their nose up at you as you walk by...although even there....if a smoker were standing with someone who was drinking a beer, the smoker would still be considered more acceptable.

OK, now you look stoned in your pic. Heavy, man....