Well, thank God that’s over. I wonder how the Dems will fuck it up this time? They have a knack for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Perhaps Mr. Obama will lose his mind and select Dennis Rodman or The Reverend Wright as his running mate. I hope not, although it would make for some entertaining debates.

* * *

Today is the 51st Annual Puerto Rican Day Parade in Manhattan.

RUN!!!!

I went to Brooklyn for dinner this evening. I visited my old friend Oswaldo in my old neighborhood, Fort Greene. This will come as a shock everyone who thinks I’m just a lily white pretender from an Ohio suburb, but I actually have some street cred. I moved to Fort Greene in 1989. At that time I was the only white person in my building and, in fact, one of a small handful of Caucasians in the neighborhood. The neighborhood was pretty raw—I was mugged twice—but I chose to live there because I could afford an apartment on my own.

The neighborhood has been gentrified since then. There are glass and steel high rise apartment buildings that look idiotic and out of place amongst the beautiful, well kept, brownstones that were built in the 1800s. There is now a balance of moneyed whites and the original black residents with a smattering of Latinos. We had dinner at The Smoke Joint. I had a half rack of spare ribs and some collard greens. They were really nice.

All throughout dinner Oswaldo lamented the change in the neighborhood. He has been in his apartment —a small studio in a brownstone—for 30 years. He’s seen it all. He said that the new white professionals who have been buying up brownstone for $1M+ and pushing expensive strollers up and down South Portland Avenue are an unfriendly bunch. He said they don’t talk to you and will look at you in a way that makes you feel like you don’t belong in the neighborhood. Unfortunately, I don’t think he’s exaggerating. He said, “And what is it with white people and dogs? Can you explain to me why they all have to have dogs in the city?” I said, “I don’t understand it, either. I’ve never been much of a dog person.” He said, “That’s because you’re not white.” which I took to be a compliment.

There are a few different subway lines that will take you to downtown Brooklyn but I waited for a B train specifically because instead of passing under the East River, it goes over the Manhattan Bridge and affords you some pretty nice views of the harbor. I saw the Statue of Liberty floating around out there. As soon as we came out of the subway tunnel into the open air, a few passengers fired up their cell phones to make quick calls before ducking back underground. It spoiled the atmosphere. Fortunately, cell phone service on the train suddenly and inexplicably went out. I took the same line back but had to change cars because the one I initially boarded smelled like urine.

This morning I came up from the Penn Station spider hole and merged into the head-down crush of humanity flowing across 34th St. We were all chasing paychecks; running to our unimportant, necessary jobs. When I got to Herald Square I stopped for a moment to look up and admire the way the sun hit the Empire State Building. I turned up 6th Avenue, walked through Bryant Park, fought my way across 42nd St. and up 5th Avenue. My iPod shuffle first selected Keep Yourself Alive by Queen, then Bummed Out City by Joe Strummer and The Mescaleros and then Walk on the Wild Side by Lou Reed. It, literally, gave me a chill. How did this stupid little hunk of metal and plastic know that these songs would be so perfect?

All you people
Keep yourself alive

A hustle here and a hustle there
New York City is the place where

That thing is intuitive to the point of being creepy.

* * *

Paranoia is rampant at Benevolent Dictators, Inc. Everyone has whipped puppy syndrome. People huddle together in small groups of two and three and hold whispered conversations. There are lots of sideways glances. When someone talks on the phone, they cup the mouthpiece in their hand so that no one can hear what they’re saying. When someone’s cell phone rings, they look to see who it is and quickly get up from their desk and move to a secluded spot. I just taught a Vice President how to use a jump drive and download her Outlook contacts.

* * *

My headhunter phoned this afternoon. “Are you sure you don’t want to take this position? You might be able to grow it into something different.”

I’m sure.

* * *

When I was a teenager, while scrutinizing my face in the mirror, I mistook my tear duct for a blackhead and squeezed it. Now THERE’S a mistake I haven’t made twice.

Last week there was a massacre at Benevolent Dictator, Inc. It was the third slaughter in the past nine months. They try to give it pretty names. Headcount decrease. Attrition. Reduction in force. Redundancy. They all mean the same thing. You’re fired. Get out. They don’t dare call it a layoff. Calling it a layoff implies that they might have you back one day. None of these people will be back. They weren’t kidding around this time. They got rid of Executive Directors, Managing Directors and the groundlings who were unfortunate enough to work under them. You rarely see senior people go in such great numbers. In one instance, an entire investment vehicle was unplugged and the whole team was wiped out.

Back when I worked at Brand This!, these things were handled with a lot more aplomb than they are at Benevolent Dictators, Inc. At Brand This!, I was deemed redundant, but they gave me a five month notice, a fat severance check, access to outsourcing services and more recommendations that I knew what to do with. They gave me everything except a foot massage and an apology. Not so at Benevolent Dictators, Inc. It’s like an episode of The Sopranos. In the middle of a workday, someone will suddenly vanish. That’s it. No warning. No goodbye. Nothing. Nobody knows where they went and you never hear from them again. There’s still stuff on their desk, but when you come in the next day, the desk has been wiped clean. It’s like working in a morgue.

I feel fortunate that I survived the latest wave of firings. Despite the aforementioned tale of woe, I like the work very much and would prefer to stay but I have to be pragmatic, so I decided to carpet bomb Manhattan with my resume. I got a response almost immediately, interviewed last week and yesterday my headhunter called with a generous offer. I declined. It looked to be an insufferably boring job. It would have been the safe, dull choice. All I’ve ever made are safe, dull choices. I’m sick of it. I’m through with safe and dull, even if it means ruination.

Enlightenment—that magnificent escape from anguish and ignorance—never happens by accident. It results from the brave and sometimes lonely battle of one person against his own weaknesses.

Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano