Signs of Life

So.

I have been getting up at 3am and heading to the office as early as possible.

Some (most) people can work late, others (me) prefer to work early. If I get to the office at 4:30am, I know that I can't leave until 5pm so I might as well get down to business and keep plugging away. I don't have the option to leave.

But come 5pm, the doors of the cell swing wide and I can leave any time I want. I am sorry, but give me the chance to bolt from the house of pain and I am taking it. I don't understand these people who stay at their desks into the evening knowing that home and hearth await them and the only thing standing between them and family is a desire to work late. No thanks.

I have been putting in the long hours for a number of reasons.

1) I no longer have an assistant and I am trying to provide flawless service to my clients as we are in an extraordinarily competitive market.

B) I need extra time during the day to pow-wow with sales reps, target potential clients and coordinate marketing strategies.

3) It doesn't hurt to get to the office before your boss and leave after him.

What a job. What a world. What a!

I don't want my job to be my life. I don't need to be wealthy (by my standards). I just want to make $X. Make the car payments, pay the mortgage, spruce up the homestead every few months or so and maybe take a vacation once every couple of years.

The trouble is, with the Real Estate market as it is, I am making $H and there is half an alphabet between $H and $X.

Money isn't health, money isn't happiness, money isn't life. But as the wealthy father of one of my high-school sweethearts said (as were were driving the convertible Mercedes to the lake-side cabin in Big Bear):

"People who say money can't buy happiness are shopping in the wrong place. I have been poor and I have been rich - I prefer to be rich."

Of course, he was working 15-hour days and sleeping with his secretary . . . .

Yeah, just enough to pay the bills and take a cheap vacation every couple of years - see the future birthplace of James T. Kirk, the ball of string, Mt. Rushmore. . . . The American dream, I suppose.

I really should get dressed and go to work . . . .