#63 - Petula Clark Was Right

Petula Clark Was Right

7/13/05 (#63)

I have a corporate day job. If my life was cinema, viewers would sense a glaring similarity to Office Space; If it were a cartoon, my 9 to 5 would be slammed as a rip-off of Dilbert. But it's not a movie (most of the dialogue I hear each day would never make it past the editing room), and it's not a cartoon (cartoons are funny)...it's just my job.

I work in telecommunications, and I'm while an argument could be made for the important role we play in keeping the world connected, in making sure that news of the baby's birth or of Mom's promotion is shared with those who need to know, I would believe those arguments if, behind the scenes, I heard anyone worrying about making sure that news of the baby's birth got to grandma. What I hear is a lot of chatter about maximizing traffic, raising percentages, and increasing port capacity: in other words, making a buck. More specifically, a few million of them.

Wanting to make money isn't a sin---when I do freelance ad copy, it's not an altruistic gesture, it's to make sure Sage has shoes for more than one type of weather. But the bold-faced pursuit of the almighty dollar---abbreviated to "greed"---makes me uncomfortable. To do something that I do not care about, merely for the money, is a compromise I am willing to make. But I'd prefer to feel that I'm selling my services, not selling my soul.

As jobs go, mine isn't terrible---I don't have to evict people who can't pay the rent, I don't have to deny insurance claims, and there are scores of other occupations that I could name in rapid-fire succession that would be much worse than what I do. (I know from experience----I have done several of those jobs previously.) But there is no satisfaction in what I do, other than a dim pride that comes from doing a job well---and since my job, quite literally, falls under the category of "Revenue Assurance", a group whose stated objective is "protecting the revenue stream" (In other words, to make sure the profits remain as profits), it's a dim pride indeed.

All of this information is to help explain why my heart is broken today.

Our offices are currently in downtown Portland---and not in some distant cul de sac that is termed "downtown" only in the eyes of real estate agents eager to find a selling point for their not-really-in-downtown locations. I am two blocks from Pioneer Square, four blocks from Powell's, two blocks from nine different coffee shops. (There are more at the three block radius, but nine is plenty, even for a junkie like me.) I am two blocks from the buses, two blocks from the Max rail, and three blocks from the nirvana-esque experience of a Loco Locos breakfast burrito.

And tomorrow, each of those "I am"s become "I was." My company is relocating to the suburbs of Beaverton. I WAS two blocks from nine coffee shops, now I'm a mile from anything, and that anything is a Starbucks. (Consistent, but they pay more attention to the sweet concoctions than to the quality of the shots.) I WAS 4 blocks from Powell's---now I can throw a rock and hit the Beaverton Powell's, yet by virtue of train tracks and chain link fences, it's over a mile to walk or drive to there.

I'm not slagging Beaver-tron. (Okay, obviously I am, but that's not the point of this column.) Beaverton offers a "lifestyle" (a word I loathe) that has no appeal to me----I do not view the Washington Square Mall as a Mecca, I do not care for chain restaurants, and starting tomorrow, I cannot ride mass transit to work unless I want to commute for over 90 minutes each way, and walk the last half mile. Of course, I will survive, even thrive, because as I told a friend today, if the greatest trial I have to endure is carpooling with good company to a job that pays well but simply isn't emotionally satisfying, then I have it good. Better than many. I am honestly not complaining---I'm just sad, because I love downtown Portland, and it was a big part of what made this ritual of employment tolerable . And while the new commute is long enough to provide time for serious revision of my resume (and rest assured, I'll be doing that), I have a few things to write before I start scribbling that document:

To the gorgeous, gothic Central Library where my daughter and her friends were able to learn that books are more than toys---but are also great toys; To Peet's Coffee, whose baristas never failed to deliver on the promise of a latte that tasted, on first sip, like melted ice cream; To Rebecca and everyone at Coffee People who kept my occasionally empty pockets from being an obstacle to coffee and a bagel; To Bad Kitty Coffee, and now The Coffee Plant, for bringing gourmet pastries to within 50 feet of our office door; To Pazzo (the little one), whose lemon marscapone scone should be illegal, but I'm glad it's not; To Powell's, a place I visit every week, even several times per week, and it is every bit as exciting now as it was when I first visited; To Finnegan's, seriously mislabeled as a "children's" store and the ideal meeting place for lunch dates with Steph and Sage; To Jackpot records, who stocked Hamell on Trial when other record stores said, "Hammeron who?"; To Loco Locos, the burrito cart that somehow takes the same ingredients as every other burrito cart and makes gourmet deliciousness; To the Portland street car, the transit that allowed easy access to other neighborhoods of lunch cuisine; To Aroy, whose chicken basil is so good that I became genuinely sad when I came to the end of the meal....Sad like I am today....to all of these things and more: I will miss you.

I am not resisting change, and I will embrace the new routines and try to find new places that I will one day lament leaving. But for today, I want to mourn, to wax nostalgic for my home away from home for the last five years, the vibrant, vivacious 10 square blocks that fed and amused me through my best years of Portland employment. Today, I am saying goodbye.

Tomorrow, I'll work on my resume.

©2005 wpreagan