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Once upon a time, in the Land of Opportunity, there lived Arthur Artisan, a post-global-apocalypse-era job hunter, consumed by both anxiousness and exhilaration. While, for him, such seemingly at-odds emotional ingredients did feel downright counterproductive (and rather unnerving, too), his conflicted state of mind could hardly be deemed unique.
Would that not be experienced by most anyone, who’s about to reenter and retest the reawakening work-a-day-world waters? Who’s simultaneously able to entertain a keen awareness of having found one’s true vocation?
Fortunately, for chef-wannabe Arthur, he’d been able to table such fruitless drama. Long parable sort, he had no sooner begun circulating copies of his cleverly crafted résumé, completing job applications and interviews, than, tout de suite, came the big pay off! The personnel manager singing out those magical lyrics, “You’ve got the job!”, had, most assuredly, been music to this new-hire’s ears!
And, this was no ordinary entry level job, either. Quite unexpectedly, his yet-to-be, real-world-tested, culinary training had already earned him the prestigious title of Head Chef, no less!
A mere 24 hours later, he found himself donning his tall white toque; toiling within the three specialized kitchens of a swanky, five-star eatery. And, in short order, via his superbly created/plated delectable dishes, and courtesy of word of mouth props from his 600, newfound, loyal patrons, almost overnight, he’d become renown, far and wide.
The massive influx of hourly phoned reservations both delighted the maitre d’ and worked him to a frazzle. During each hectic day, of these 600, approximately 200 ravenous diners (typically 40 parties of 5) would show up.
But, alas, that success, in itself, had become the fly in the ointment. And, ahem, Arthur did sigh his relief that this was only metaphorically speaking; not some actual, drowning in the soup, disgusting, winged, buzzing bug.
Yet, in less time than it had taken to set his sighs aside, the real bugaboo had managed to float to the top.
And that took on the form of Arthur’s big boss, Tasman Taskmaster, whose utterly unwise business strategy was to severely curtail food prep time; thereby permitting Arthur only 5 scant minutes per hungry patron. Talk about Fast Food! YIKES!!! That Mr. Taskmaster hadn’t hired another chef or two could be attributed to his also being an overhead obsessing tightwad (the details of which are best left bused to another parable, another day).
Anyhoo, tout de suite, Arthur’s “OH NO” moment of truth had arrived. Nary one doubt, he was working for the proverbial sweatshop whip cracker from Hell.
Sadly, it had been the sheer elementary school mathematics, which powered the driving force behind this 5-Minute Rule; that is, what was driving Big Boss to slave drive his Head Chef. To crunch that bean counter’s numbers.
200 diners X 5 mins prep time per diner = 1,000 mins burned up daily (16 hrs 40 mins to be exact).
So much for the 8 hr workday, huh? So much for the recommend 8 hr sleep cycle, too!
There simply was no time for Arthur to lead an active, healthy social life outside of his workplace; hell schlep thru any existence at all! No time to complete household chores, tend to property upkeep, to even do his own laundry and grocery shopping. Hell, he’d have probably starved to death were it not for his sampling the food he was preparing and his scarfing down the shift’s end leftovers, which were (unforgivably) destined for the dumpsters.
Seeing too, how his own career was dumpster bound, Arthur Artisan took a hike and took his talents elsewhere.
The End?
Our Parable’s Primary Moral:
Life is too damned short for anyone to waste away within any toxic environment
Our Parable’s Secondary Moral:
Everything will begin to coalesce upon our comparing Arthur’s unenviable vocational woes and far from ideal workplace conditions / expectations to society’s typical Social Network Platforms; indeed, the very one you and I stand atop as I type, you read.
Localizing that more to my own blogging avocation, it’s been my regularly posted content, which has attracted nearly 600 followers. The bugaboo, here, is how my staying meaningfully connected to even one third (200) of them would inflict fictional Arthur’s identical time constraints on real Tom’s real world life. In other words, I don’t have 16 hrs 40 mins each day to fully savor every mega-talented blogger’s content; to post meaningful props in their comment sections re their oft entertaining narratives, spectacular poetry and overall, sheer artistry.
And, I’d be remiss not to mention how my doing so would leave me no time to compose/post my own content.
Beyond that, just how, pray hell, do bloggers who boast 10K, 100K and even 1 Million followers, ever manage to stay connected? I’d challenge each of them to, without peeking, name them all by screen name!
Beyond beyond that, I curse that math that hath morphed me into an unresponsive, almost non-member of the WordPress Community.
My sincere apologies to all, who I had never ever intended to snub, yet, nonetheless, still did.
Alas… long sigh… today’s headline doth sum up, succinctly, the paradoxical, anti-social nature of so-called social network life:
It’s ALL UnSustainable!
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Stay Publicly / Properly Masked!
Stay Safe at Home!
Stay Healthy!
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