Shoot the Round Dial

“Shoot the Round Dial” … as in the one on the wall with 12 numbers and 2 hands.

I was just walking back from an office going-away party and promotion party, combined. A peer opined as she headed into her cube, “2 o’clock, not time to go home yet.” I could tell from the tone of her voice that she didn’t return to her cube to answer the barrage of duties on a warm sunny Friday afternoon. She went back to her cube because the clock said to go back to her cube.

And the realization settled in my consciousness, “What a stupid work cadence we have in civilized, socialized, city living!”

In comparison, what’s a farmer do? Or a hunter? Or a fisherman? They work when there’s work to do. All night, if need be. Farmers even buy high power lights for their tractors. It’s not as if the work is particularly fun. Can you imagine tugging dirt back and forth a huge field well past midnight? Instead, they do it when they do it because it needs to be done then. But when the work is finished, then what? They quit working. (Well, actually they fix all the machinery first, and then the work is done.) If there’s no work to do, go home!

Why does most America work when there’s no work to do? And why do they abandon work just because the little round dial says, “go home”?

Dodging this inane behavior is part of what makes me enjoy private contract work. I am hired to do work because there is work to do. No doubt about it. I like a project mentality. I like finishing the project. And I like finishing something more than another week.