The grasshopper and the ant October 1, 1985

 

Ill again, not terribly, not yet.

The strain of too much work tells on me, exhaustion working through my whole body.

Fortunately, I’m not under a lot of pressure. I’ve managed to adapt to the crazy pattern. Still, I’m on the edge of a real breakdown if I don’t get a break. Any minor thing might push me over.

I sort of understand how people wrapped up in money-making feel, burdening themselves with some notion of future financial success. They think they can take it easy after they get rich.

Phil, my boss is a perfect example. He owns three Dunkin Donuts and is pushing himself to purchase a fourth. No matter how much money he has, however, he’ll never be satisfied.

Then, there is the average worker, who labors his whole life with the idea of reaching retirement age, collecting a pension or social security, living in some retirement village playing cards with the neighbors, only to realize the ugly truth when they get there, when they don’t have enough money to do what they want and have to scrimp and save to get by, especially when the medical bills start piling up.

Fat John, the weekend night guard, retired two years ago, but has to work side jobs like this one in the mall to make ends meet. I often find him in the hall with pencil and paper, calculating his expenses.

You can win at this game; but you have to be ruthless, cunning and clever.

Those who get rich don’t often talk about how they got that way, or by the fact that they are trapped in a never-ending cycle of greed. Most look over their shoulders to make sure they’re well ahead of the pack, and ahead of those who they’ve cheated.

If you don’t lust for money, you rarely get it. Those who don’t generally get trampled in the stampede.

We keep getting sold myths about hard work, the turtle and the hair, when in truth, it’s more like the ant and the grasshopper. The boring old ant toils the whole summer away while the grasshopper plays. We’re supposed to side with the industrious ant, when I side with the grasshopper every time.

What is the point of living if you have to toil all the time? Does Phil have any fun? Or does his spend all of his time in his office calculating his wealth the way Fat John calculates his poverty?

There has to be a middle ground.

For artists its worse, since most of us aren’t very practical, and spend our lives focused on creativity while we starve, hoping to hit it rich like old prospectors used to when searching for gold – only we don’t quite labor as hard as the prospectors would.

I don’t want to grow old counting money I would not have time to spend or worried over the bills I would not have resources to pay. I don’t want to retire like the industrious ant only to find what I stored away over the summer is not enough and I still have to work two nights a week in a mall to make ends meet.

 

  1985 Menu 


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