I wake to rain knowing that today will not be my day. My alarm does not go off when it should, so I am late to work. I rush out the door just to get stuck in traffic. Traffic that I would have missed if only my alarm worked.
I suppose it’s just life: everything not working the way you think it should. I sit here now in a cubicle surrounded by many other cubicles. My job is a meaningless job: I’m not really sure what the point of my job is though I do not question it in fear of losing my job. I hate my job but what else can you do: quit?
The coffee tastes like lukewarm water with bits of black floating on the surface. The dark water has no taste and the effects of the caffeine no longer do anything for me. I drink it because it’s part of my routine. Like brushing my teeth and parking in the same parking spot at work my routine is fixed. I go through each day knowing that there is comfort in the mundane.
I input numbers into a computer. Numbers that are not real numbers. They represent something but the numbers themselves have no function. The need for the numbers ended years ago. Now, I have a job because no one has the nerve to question the numbers.
I go home each day to an apartment. I read from one of the books on the shelves in my home office. In the corner of my office is the typewriter that I once typed what I dreamt would become the next great, American, novel. The first page is still in the machine: blank.
All of this changed one day. I sat in the laundry room of my apartments waiting for the buzzer of the machine to announce that my clothes were done. I Was stressed over a new memo. A memo that announced the end to my department. They were no longer interested in the numbers.
When the machine finally announced that I could remove the wet contents, transplant them to a dryer I stood, yawned, and opened the lid. At first I was unaware of the change. The color was not as apparent to me in my state of shock. Pink. Not just one thing, but everything. My clothes, all of my clothes had turned pink. Would people consider this a bold statement about sexuality or masculinity?
The next day I showed up at work to receive my pink slip wearing my pink clothes. A statement about the work force? Shall pink be the new color of rebellion?