The Morgue
It looked like a sci-fi movie as we moved through the labyrinth of corridors, the kind that nightmares are made from, biohazard, morgue to creepy lights.
The federal government is the countries largest employer.
It was a final day of work at the Veterans Administration.
After 11 years it was time to pull out before all the mundane rules, regulations and bureaucracy crushed any life that was left.
It began with HR they are responsible for managing the human capital.
HR printed out a checklist of all the people and departments that needed to sign off before we got the all clear to leave.
The VA in Salt Lake is massive, hundreds of paper pushers who sit behind cubicles and do their little part in an antiquated system that needs to be scrapped.
This whole bureaucracy was founded on war and the little men who think up reasons to send our men and women into senseless war and the causalities created when fear is pushed to the brink.
Give guns and explosives to those involved and causalities happen.
It is always the little people who suffer the most, those little men who make war and push our young men and women into fighting a war based on profit and greed remain unscathed in their air-conditioned offices and hilltop vacation homes.
These same little men often fund both sides of a war to profit on death.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to place the top leaders of each waring county together in a ring and let them fight each other.
Wounded young men and women often return to a country that does little to heal the internal and external scars caused by war.
As I passed door after door I read the little signs that said hearing, trauma, prosthesis, healthcare, dentistry and a hundred other designations.
With hundreds of employees I estimated that this facility operates with a billion dollar plus budget.
I saw men who walking feebly with canes and walkers, wounded soldiers and mental patients all carrying scars of a senseless cause.
Surprisingly I saw a similar look in many of the professional people who walked those same halls. People with college degrees and certificates who did not want to interact with anyone in those corridors. Eyes held to the ground, body movements indicating they did not want to be bothered by anyone.
There is an all too common story of betrayal by coworkers and management who are caught up in the drama of corporate government. Many are paralyzed and unable to function in their own arena of cubicles and are often let down by the same institution that signs their checks.
What is it that traps good men and women in a toxic corporate government job?
What is it that causes a person to sell their soul to the company store?
There were approximately 15 or so signatures that were required before signing out. Some of those signatures were by the same persons but couldn’t be done at the same time until someone else in another building or office signed first.
It required nearly 4 hours of literally running around before all the dots and t’s were in order.
As we walked out of the last office for the second time and headed out the corridor I wondered how can these people survive such a depressing work place.
Tomorrow I leave for the mountains and desert where I can clear my head and breathe the clean air. It saddens me that so many are so unhappy when there is a light at the end of the corridor.
That light is always on.
It is always ready to guide.
It is up to us whether we choose to leave the nightmarish corridors and walk out into the light.
I made a promise to move a mountain and today we did just that. It took a bit linger than anticipated but the end result is well worth the effort.
