My first professional gig in New York, my first actual job there, was as a light and sound engineer at a cabaret theater called The Ballroom.
Jimmy, ostensibly, was the floor manager of the bar and restaurant part ... no doubt having taken the job proudly; won the position from numerous other qualified applicants and fulfilled his duties with zest and purpose ... once.
By the time I knew Jimmy, he'd become installed: a figurehead, fixture at the end of the bar, where he'd plant each day and into the night, quaffing cup after cup of port and vino ... Occasionally yelling out, "86!" - whether the kitchen was actually out of a menu item or not.
It didn't matter to Jimmy, who scarcely realized where he was by the middle of each nightly shift ... let alone who he had bartending or waiting tables for him (who he was "managing", in other words) ... who might have been playing in the cabaret ... or whether blurting out "86!" in a crowded restaurant, for no good reason, was a good idea.
In work, as in life, there are comforts, nostalgia, stagnation, complacency, habits (for we are creatures of all!) ... which creep in and combine with routine, daily boredoms, lethargy, apathy, to freeze one in place ... annihilating zest and purpose, rendering one meaningless.
I wonder what happened to Jimmy, sometimes ... and sense, in the end, we are all of us, Jimmy.
