He had called and was ready to be picked up for the night. He asked how long it would be until I got there. It was cold and he didn't want to wait outside. I told him 12 1/2 minutes. He thought that was oddly specific. Obviously, he didn't believe me because he wasn't waiting outside when I arrived 12 1/2 minutes from the time he hung up. I had complained to him before that if I was giving him a ride home that he needed to be outside when I came to get him. That is the only part he ever heard. Me giving him a command and probably why he ignored it. The problem was that after the club he Dj'd at "kicked everyone out" at closing time, they locked the doors.
They only ever locked the doors. The people were all still in there and the music was still blaring so no one could hear me knocking on the door. Every time I tried to call, he couldn't hear his phone ring, that's if he could remember where he left it. I stood out side in the cold waiting for more than half an hour for him to be ready to go. What I had actually said to him was that I couldn't get to him if he wasn't outside waiting for me and that I didn't really care to stand in the cold either.
Long before we had this discussion, I had timed how long it took to get from my front door to the club to pick him up. He thought it was because I was obsessed with trying to catch him in a lie but it was because I worked in television I had this need to know how long it would take to get from one place to another so I could tell my assignment desk whether I would be able to meet their needs for a given story. Bricktown had it's own seedy reasons for me needing to know how long it takes to get there.
It wasn't just Bricktown that I knew, it took 7 1/2 minutes to get from the Broadway Extension overpass near 39th street to the office as long as traffic wasn't backed up. In rush hour that was 15 minutes by freeway or 13 by back road as soon as I could get to the road by the gas station.
In television, photojournalists live and die on stolen minutes and decisive action. If you were lucky your reporter knew how to tune in the microwave signal. If you weren't you were doing that while you were furiously editing with your other hand and talking to the producer about where you were in the show. Talk about multi-tasker. And dangerous too, one breaking news day one of our veteran photojournalists almost drove off with the mast still up in the air. That day was courtesy of the college football player who was caught using his "key" to fill up with gas at a gas station near his school which was allegedly one of the un-paid-for perks of recruitment to that school.
When I started working for the state I was told to slow down. As if I was going to run out of things to do if I worked too fast. When I went to work for the Feds, I was told to slow down even more. I couldn't believe it. I tried, I really did. Slow is not a pace I am comfortable working.
It is likely why I did so well balancing school, single-mom and full-time work. I am used to a pace that induces a cortisol response. I am also used to puzzle solving. Gathering information, timing, knowing strengths and weaknesses and forming and enacting a plan of action to deliver the product on-time. I don't thrive in an environment where there are loose deadlines. I am also not comfortable with working in situations where people think they won't be hurt by bending rules.
I have participated in the downfall of people who thought they would never be caught and others who were roasted as scape goats for institutional folly. I like what one multibillionaire said to his share holders, the company had to behave with integrity they would like to see reported on by a knowledgeable but unfriendly reporter.
The reason I bring this up is because I have been reading "The 48 Laws of Power" by Robert Greene. It talks about the multitude of ways people can assume power using one or a combination of tactics. It makes me cringe just reading it. The thing I keep telling myself is that people actually think this way. The scheme and farce and con their way into serving themselves. The way Greene writes makes it seem as if the game is the most important thing, the fact that overzealously playing the game could lead to a beheading is merely an inconvenience.
I will use a journalism condition here. It is a lot like the lookie-loos at a traffic accident I don't know why I keep looking at it but damned if I didn't just slow down to look closer. Although, it is a helpful reference as I am watching politics leading to the election. I have a play book to watch the game with and it satisfies my journalistic instincts to determine which part will be played by whom.
Let the games begin.
