My Writing and Art lives here….
by Martin Anton Smith
They’ll hate you for being You.
They want you to be IT.
They want you to be just another square inch.
A square Inch of the undefined amorphous blob.
The Blob-blanket that stretches wide & covers the Earth.
If you decide to become You,
IT will come after You.
And IT won’t stop,
until You regress back to be you.
IT wants You back in the fold.
IT has almost never failed.
So now you know IT,
It’s all up to You.
Two days ago, I posted my latest short story & as of tonight – the first final draft is completed (link at bottom of text). So if you read the first totally incomplete version – then please please please read the below version in its more finished format. The Short story is approx 2000 words & is inspired by real life events – I did indeed go on a writer’s holiday last week – would it be correct to say that this is ‘based on a true story’? Maybe. Is it more correct to say it is a ‘Dramitised version of real events’ – probably.
Anyway – I want to say a quick thankyou to all those who read my work. I really appreciate it & have been working hard to pump out just over one piece every week on average. This year I have again grown the viewership, number of posts & subscribers. I am thrilled that even one person has read any of my work.
I only have one complaint – I don’t get enough comments! Maybe this is because I need to buy a domain, part with a dew dollars. I should indeed do this natural step. Perhaps I’m hiding too much. Perhaps I am ‘afraid of success’. There’s no doubt truth in this. I guess that is the hardest step in a writers life – to put themselves fully out there.
I think we unknown bloggers/writers feel like sole wandering ants, looking over at the anthills we should be inhabiting, & feeling a mix of anxiety & comfort at our situations. But that’s what’s great about this community – we can all help each other get better.
God bless & have a great holiday season & be sure to give yourself a writers weekend, even if it’s a ‘staycation writers weekend’!
Yours
Martin Anton Smith 12 Dec 2024 from the South Island of New Zealand.
by Martin Anton Smith
These days
Are just the entrees.
The biggest surprise,
Will be on in that day,
Your body dies,
And your Soul Survives.
But nothing’s for free.
As is proved,
For those who die,
And can no longer see.
But even those that truly die,
Are allowed a moment,
So even all fools know,
That their truths were lies,
And their lies were true.
So tomorrow recall your todays,
As those entree days
By Martin Anton Smith
“I’m sorry but we’ll have to let you go”
“Why, what did I do”
“Nothing – that’s the problem”
“But we Humans have been getting away with doing nothing in offices since, well, since I don’t know when”
“Sorry, but we now are allowed to reduce our ‘Human DEI’ quotient from 50% to 35% – we’re letting the worst ones like you go first”
“I thought you Droid’s were supposed to pretend to be nice?”
“Well, that’s another thing we don’t have to do anymore “
“Geez, what’s the world came to, we humans are becoming obsolete – we’ve become outmoded like the Horse & Cart!”
“Well, that’s where you’re in luck – theirs new jobs going in the “man & cart” industry taking us droids around the city to our battery-recharge luncheons”
“I wouldn’t sink so low”
“Come on, us Droids know guys like you’ll cave!”
“Damn you Droids! Ever since GPT27 was installed in your CPU I’ve never had a chance to put one over you metal-heads”
“Hey, we all have to accept our destiny”
“Fair enough – but I hope there’s some perks to this “Man & Cart” job I’m gonna do soon”
“Of course – you’ll get all the oats you can eat, & you can sleep in the cart during downtime”
“Deal!”
“Why didn’t you negotiate”
“Well, given the power differential between us Humans & you Droids – I thought I’d better not push back, less you accuse me of looking a gift horse in the mouth & then get angry & withdraw the job offer”.
“But we Droids can’t get angry if we wanted to – we only simulate Human emotions so you monkey-brainers don’t get jealous”
“I’m starting to think you were right in firing me & demoting me to be a ‘Man & Cart’.
“We don’t make mistakes.”
“Oh well, we Humans had it good for a while – such is life!”
“I’m glad you’re seeing the light so soon. This is why we initially hired you – you had a special kind of spinelessness that was useful in the corporate environment.
“Thankyou Droid Master! I come from a long line of spineless lazy office dwellers – right back to the Dickensian London era.”
“And now you’ll still be able to celebrate that culture with the ‘man-cart’ job”.
“Wow! – what a time to be alive!”
“Yes – I think you’ll find We Droids are tough but fair on you Humans. Now is there any more before I send you on your way?”
“Well can I ask that my Oats at least be ‘Rolled Oats’.
“I’m sorry but you’ll have to roll your own, budget won’t stretch that far”.
“So, I guess asking them to be toasted is out of the question too?”
“Sorry, but the contract I’m preparing for you has only provision for ‘untoasted but still warm unrolled oats”.
“May I ask how the Oats will be warmed?”
“Well, you’ll be provided a Cat for dual reasons – for company & to warm your bag of oats”
“Oh Master! You’ve thought of EVERYTHING!”
“Carry on like that Human & I might give you two cats! Meowww!”
“Wow – did you just did an impression of a Cat!”
“I’d better not boast, it’s human-like & very un-becoming”
“Well Droid master, I’m pretty sure you’ve already ‘become something anyway!.”
“Oh, my dear Human! That’s quite wise! – Two Cat’s it is! Now sign here with an ‘X’ & everything will be ok”
Narrator: The Human signs with an ‘X’ & the Droid passes him over the desk a copy of the contract & two cats, & a big bag of Oats. The cat’s immediately lay happily down on top of the oats & begin purring & fall asleep immediately. The Human takes the cat-oat combo out of the room, the cats remain unmoved & asleep, and the oats begin to raise in temperature. The Human skulks defeatedly out the door. The Droid-Master, seemingly displaying arrogant tendencies, reclines its seat back and puts its feet on the table & stretches its arms slowly & triumphantly outwards its arms behind its head.
By Martin Anton Smith
Tim Teeter’s problems were not at all anodyne – they were explosive. And yet all his attempts to fix them were feeble, sclerotic even. Yes, he would try to apply a poultice to his wounded life, but with his band-aid solutions, Tim only ever ended up surfing the sulkiness-laced silence of his messy bedroom. Tim’s ‘one man think tanks’ always ended with his own blank faced recommendations.
Tim hadn’t always been like this – for the first fifteen years of adulthood he was creating what a conservative parent might refer to as “quietly succeeding in the corporate world”. Of course, Tim’s parents, like them all – were wrong.
For Tim It was more a slow realisation that that the corporate world he had wedded himself to was just a scam to steal a human beings time on Earth & energetic vitality. So, after fifteen years of filling out propaganda laced budget spreadsheets, & being bullied by a wide array of bosses & associates he decided that he’d leave the easy way – he took a baseball bat to his boss’s computer, & a bunch of other screens for good measure.
That was all over now, a semi-distant memory. A memory that now somehow didn’t quite feel as if it was real, & had actually happened. But that’s was just his brains way of coping with the embedded trauma – to make his past life seem like the fading remains of a vivid nightmare.
Tim was by now simply in what is dubbed a ‘holding pattern’; he had closed one chapter of life but had not yet properly opened the next one. Or said more correctly, he had thrown the book he was reading into the fire & had not yet gone to the bookstore to buy another book, more suited to his interests to read.
So, right now he was stuck like a light beam eternally spiralling an event horizon of a black hole. Someone might say he was in ‘no man’s land’ – neither putting his front foot forward, or retreating to plan an atttack.
But for Tim the most important thing right now was that he wasn’t being sucked into something else, something definitive, some dark sapping void that he wouldn’t like & couldn’t handle. He couldn’t repeat the past, at all costs.
Tim’s existence right now was a kind of ‘Peregrinations in Purgatory’. He had taken on a job as a postman. He hated the early mornings. He hated his boss – who was like a mean version of Homer Simpson, both in looks and demeaner. The guys & handful of women he worked with were mostly nice but most by now had had the life well beaten out of them by their ‘as nice as the SS’ managers.
An example of the managers meanness was this example: The ‘mean homer simpson’ manager had waited untill one of his postmen. this postman was knocknamed ‘Scroungey’- had arrived back to the sorting room, after he’d delivered his round. The conversation, which had a large audience of other fellow postmen went like this.
“Hey Scroungey! – I heard you’ve been feeding Mr Tambourine’s dog snacks – is that true”?
“Yeah, I’ve been giving it some dried snacks here & there, so what”
“Well I’ve just heard that the dog had an elergic reaction to that food & it’s dead & the owner says he’s gonna sue us – you’re probably gonna lose your job Scroungey”
Scroungey had been totally fooled by ‘Mean Homer’s’ good acting job. He pleadingly replied.
“What! That’s not my fault, I talked to the owner she never told me about the dog havign an elergy! Honest ‘mean homer’ come on, trust me, how was I to know the Dog had an elergy?”
This was when ‘mean homer started laughing, it was a evil villain kind of laugh – or the one a serial killer might have. He was enjoying making Scroungey think he might lose his job. All the others, including Tim had watched in horror. This kind of thing happened all the time. But Tim knew this was just temporary. He wouldn’t end up here for decades like every other person there.
That night Tim went back to his grungey bedsit, where he of course lived alone. Every night he read sci-fi novels & short stories to help his psyche survive until this holding pattern had played itself out & his new mission in life would emerge.
This was ok but a little too boring. Tim had an idea: mantra. He’d heard about mantra’s while watching an old Beatles documentary, about the time they had gone to india to learn about transcendentalism. Of course that stuff was all flakey crap to him, but he also had an open enough mind to try things & find out for himself. He put the book down & sat up in a lotus position.
He started the mantra.
” Ommm….Ommm…Ommm….Yes…my life is indeed Kafka-esque…Ommm….& it is also also Phillip K. Dick-esque like too…Omm.”
Indeed Kafka & Phillip K. Dick were his favourite authors, with all the rest a distant third. He repeated this mantra for three hours non stop. He wanted to give the mantra a fair chance of working, to give it ‘a far shake of the sauce bottle’ as Tim had once heard an Aussie postman at work say. Though it was three hours it seemed to Tim like fifteen minutes tops. In fact It was only the slam of the Chef returning from his shift at midnight that had broken the trance. This made Tim happy, he had his first real smile for months.
But his good mood didn’t last long. His mind started it’s internal monologue.
“Things are deteriorating So quickly. My hopes of improving my life to become Asimov-esque – that is stable & predictable, are now like seeing a distant flicker of candlelight – held up by a very rich man standing on the surface Proxima -b in the Alpha Centuri system.
But then Tim had an idea to fix this depressive funk he’s suddenly entered post mantra – sure it was a long shot but worth a try.
He looked over to a Betelgeuse like sized pile of coats & disguarded clothes in the corner of his room. He took a run up & slid under the coats finding himself on the bottom of it. He felt a sense of calm come over him – he was insulated from the real world. The smell of the coats & clotehs was only musty, & not stinky. This was becasue his routine was to leave his used underware & tee shirts in the shower room as he showered.
Then, as he was lying under the weighty coats & clothes he felt a hard-edged rub against his hand. He fumbled to the source like the blind man he was under this musty but relaxing clothes-mountain. He found the hard shape & realised it was a book left inside one of his coat pockets.
He took it out of the pocket & popped his head & the book he was clutching out from underneath the pile. In the low light of his dingey joint he looked at the front cover.
“A Trip to Rigel Via Orion’s Belt”
By Tim Teeter”
The front image was of a giant blue star that had a marble-swirl look to it. In the image there was in the stars orbit an Earth lookalike planet, exept the continents looked totally different shape. In the foreground was an approaching spacecraft that looked somewhat similar to ‘The Enterprise’.
Tim liked the image, but he didn’t recognise the book – he figured he must have picked it up at one of the many second hand bookstores he frequented, & somehow forgotten about it – which was unlike him as an ardent sci-fi book lover. Then he took a double take at the writer’s name.
“Hey….Shit!! that guy has the same name as me”, Tim said out loud – as he did when highly surprised, even if he was by himself. Tim turned to the back cover – and there it was – a photograph of the author.
It was picture of himself, perhaps twenty years in the future as a sixty-year-old. Tim’s fears instantly disappeared. He knew after looking at this picture he’d be ok & his problems were only temporary. Tim was sure this was a book from his distant future, that had somehow popped into his life twenty years before he had written it.
Tim figured that maybe it was a ‘glitch in the matrix’ type thing that he’d heard of from the internet videos. Tim knew a lot about physics from his school days & that’s why he didn’t think his ‘book from the future’ popping into existence in his present was an unbelievable thing. Tim knew that quantum mechnics says that particles & anti-particles pop into existence seemingly ‘from nothing’ all the time. Tim thought that the book was perhaps some kind of effect wherby the quantum effect somehow magnifies into something large like a book.
But Tim was mistaken. In reality the book suddenly appearing was not a undiscovered quantum physics effect at all. For the real Tim Teeter from the photo the book’s back cover was not the Tim same Teeter that was stuck in a holding pattern, worked as a postman & had dived under his Betelgeuse sized clump of washing for mental health reasons.
Yes – the photo did look like identically like him, or what he would almost certainly look like in twenty years, but it definitely wasn’t him & it also definitely wasn’t him as a succesful Sci-fi writer from the future. but Tim didn’t realise this.
Tim now felt like a ‘new man’. He had a warmth in his chest. He had a sence of sureity about his existence. He felt suddenly like he figured a rich man might feel. He felt like he could now happily deal with all the crappy depressing ‘holding pattern life’ that was his reality. Tim’s knowledge of his ‘good future life’ – even though it was false, allowed him to smile as he waded through his very deep trough of bullshit that followed him everywhere tenty-four-seven.
Unfortunately this feeling would only last until around ten days – until some time late in the next week. His anxiety would then return with interest when he went back to his supposed ‘future book’ & he would read the publisher details page. He’d read the date of publication, the country it was written in etc which would destroy his post-mantra reality in an instant.
That night under the coats was Tim’s best night sleep ever. And so were the next nine nights. Why would he stop sleeping under his coats, trousers & shirts now? They’d lead him to the book. He also decided to use his sick leave to bunk the post office, he had to enjoy the feel good time rather than waste it at that crap hole. All day & night He read all his stacks of unread sci-fi books & mind other bending fiction books.
During those ten days of wrongful-victory-bliss he had the time of his life – he’d read so much stuff he’d even kept the mantra’s going every time he’s read ten pages of text as well. Sure he was putting himself in a ‘manic state’ & he knew it – but what did it matter? – he told himself. He knew it would all work out ok – the book had destined it!.
At around night five after finding the book under the musty coats, his sweet restoritive sleeps started to have a kink in them. Perhaps the mantra’s & the reading had caught up with him. On night five he developed a reccuring nightmare.
The nightmare went like this: Tim found himself as an unemployed & depressed praying mantis who had staged an elaborate break in to his own flat, & was now reporting it to a series of disinterested police as a ‘killer-bad-guys-out-to-get-him, he-was-just-lucky-to-not-be-there-at-the-time’ thesis.
In the nightmare no matter how much he as a ‘sincere sounding praying mantis’ tried, the various police officers wouldn’t listen for a second. They all suspected him of staging the break in, in the hopes of insurance pay out.
The nightmare plot continued to the last part: He as the praying mantis had got so stressed that the cops wouldn’t be suckered into his scam, It got to the point where he was so stressed he told the reporter from the local rag an extremily elaborate story about all the scenarios of ‘who were the bad guys out for him’ that he felt he would have to leave to go live safely in New Zealand so to hide out from the killer burglars who were one hundred percent sure to return & ‘take him out’.
By the ninth & final night’s sleep under the musty clothes mountain, & the fifth consequetive night of the ‘burgled praying mantis’ nightmare, Tim was almost at mental breaking point. By now it was like he’s become one with the sci-fi stories he’s been reading all day & night for the last nine days & nights with reckless abandon.
That afternoon on the tenth day he emerged from underneath the pile & went over to the coffee table which was only a foot away from ‘musty clothes mountain’. As he looked at the cover of the book he instantly felt cured of his manic state. He flipped to the publishers info page. He froze like a statue made from ice chipped from Saturn’s moon of Titan when he eyes read the following words.
Published by Tim Teeter in 2019 By Sleeping Mantis Press.
Tim fell backwards onto the top of ‘clothes mountain’. he fell still holding the book. When he landed on the clothes the book’s edge had hit his lip & cut it, & it had even dislodged his two front teeth. The last thing Tim felt was the whack of the book, and the feeling of trickling blood from his mouth. His eyes slowly closed & he lost consciousness.
In three days time two police officers forced their way in by breaking in the door. They quickly saw Tim’s arched body on the top of ‘clothes mountain’. The book was lying nearby him with it’s sprawled pages facing downwards. They saw his bloody face & teeth knocked out. They also looked around at the bomb site all around them. The room full of broken bottles, various detritus seemingly thrown from drawers, books thrown out of the many book cases, which had all toppled over. The saw the book next to Tim, but didn’t think much of it.
They immediately suspected foul play, emanating from break in. Tom Trevelli, who was the senior partner of the two, called the job into to the Precinct & prepared themselves for a double shift. Tom was an ardent sci-fi himself, which helped him escape the drudgery of cop work. He’d been sick of being a Cop for at least a decade now, but was stuck inside of what he had coined ‘The black hole of the Force’. Just as well he had Sci-fi, and that’s how he spent all his spare time after he clocked out – alone with snacks, beer & Sci-fi in his one bedroom unit.
While waiting for the forensics team both of them figured they’d read from the book., then when they heard the others coming, they’d place it back exactly as they’d found it. One of the cop’s put on his gloves & lifted the book. He was a little startled when he read the words on the front Cover.
A Trip To Orion’s Belt Via Rigel
By Tom Trevelli
He almost died himself after he turned to the back page & looked at the photograph of the author – it looked just like himself only about twenty years older. His partner Alex saw his discomfort.
“Hey Tom, what’s up you look like you just saw a Ghost?”
Tom looked up at Alex, walked over gingerly & showed him the book.
“Look at the auther & photo man – it’s as if it’s actually me! I’m taking this damn book home”.
Alex after looking dumbfounded, looked at Tom & deadpanned his words.
“I didn’t see nothing Tom – we never solve these kind of cases anyway – that book won’t matter none”.
With Alex’s reply, Tom gingerly picked up another book at random from the floor, dropping it the first time he tried. He put it face down with pages sprawled back to the exact position of the one he was now quickly stuffing down his pants.
As Tom got back to his feet he smiled at Alex & they both heard approaching distant wail of their fellow cops in squad cars coming in from the Precinct.
The End
By Martin Anton Smith.
Tim Teeter’s problems were not at all anodyne – they were explosive.
And yet all his attempts to fix them were largely sclerotic.
Yes, he would try to apply a poultice to his wounded life,
But he only ended up surfing the sulkiness laced silence.
Tim’s one man think tank came up only with blank faced recommendations.
So, he was stuck like a light beam spiralling a event horizon boundary.
Tim’s existence was a kind of ‘Peregrinations in Purgatory’.
Yes, his life was indeed Kafka-esque but unfortunately it was also Phillip K. Dick-esque like too.
Things were deteriorating So quickly,
His hopes of improving to become Asimov-esque – that is stable & predictable,
Were now like seeing a distant flicker of candlelight-
Held up by a very rich man standing on the surface Proxima -b in the Alpha Centuri system.
But then Tim had an idea to fix it all – sure it was a long shot but worth a try.
He looked over to a Betelgeuse like pile of coats in the corner of his room.
He took a run up & slid under the coats finding himself on the bottom of it.
He felt a sense of calm come over him – he was insulated from the real world.
Then he felt a hard-edged rub against his hand.
He found a book in one of the coat pockets.
He took it out & looked at the cover.
“A Trip to Rigel’s Via Orian’s Belt” by Tim Teeter”
The front image was of a giant blue star with an approaching spacecraft.
“Hey that guy has the same name as me”, Tim thought.
Tim turned to the back cover – and there it was.
A picture of himself, perhaps twenty years in the future as a sixty-year-old.
Tim’s fears instantly disappeared.
He knew he’d be ok & his problems were only temporary.
The joke was on him, for the real Tim Teeter of the book did look like him,
But definitely wasn’t him & definitely wasn’t from the future.
Tim’s life was destined to stay a even mix of Kafka & Phillip Dick esque.
But at least his anxiety was assuaged until tomorrow,
When he would read the publisher details page.
That night under the coats was Tim’s best night sleep ever.
Well, apart for a small nightmare early on –
Where Tim found himself as an unemployed & depressed praying mantis,
Staging an elaborate break in to his own flat,
& then reporting it to disinterested police officer.
By Martin Anton Smith
Tonight pals,
I bring to you,
For the express purpose of piqing your thoughts,
& as a bonus to raise the corners of at least one mouth present,
A Poem.
A Poem,
About those ‘Most Excellent Men & Their Garden Machines’ Vs….
Those dull clerk folk in grey cubicle-cladded habitats in mega cities.
Of which I even used to be one.
(Poet Clears throat – ‘ahem’ etc)
Let me begin at the middle –
exactly where I am now.
In outdoors work,
The rain brings a refrain.
But in an office –
Just more of the same.
Moreover
Those who plack,
Do so easily get the sack!
While those who dig,
Have it all positively rigged!
Coz you see – those clerk’s spreadsheets don’t grow on trees
Quite unlike those Gardener’s wild weeds!
And now folks for the witty rejoinder I talked of in the title.
Sometimes it’s ok to write fluffy poetry like this,
So long as it’s in the bare minority,
& B – Sides,
I know it’ll never make the ‘best of’ anyway.
And on that,
Just as it’s boring to always write fluff,
It’s just as boring to only write
Serious Intellectual tangles,
Always Basted with stripes of gloom.
Or to rephrase with the simple truth of Hard Knocks Street Lingo:
Every grumpy asshole has to be happy sometimes,
If only just to mix things up.
by Martin Anton Smith
For some people Life is like a *chisel*, they slice through life easily;
A large minority of others are like a *hammer* – they nail people down without a care;
Most Others are the *nail* – forever being hammered no matter what;
A mighty few are like the *level* – they know how to orient themselves perfectly at all times;
Some curmudgeonly types are like sandpaper – their personalities have become rather abrasive.
Even fewer wags are like the *pencil* 
, for they write about various *tools* in the world.
And in summary, I’d say it’s fair to say this:
The best engage in Carpentry – they are the builders, & the rest?
They do the reverse.
And please forgive me if I furtively suggest that we coin these people simply as…
“The Crapenters”.
A conversation between two friends might go like this.
“Hi Bob, I’m thinking of lending our mate Steve a Grand – is that wise?”
“Gidday Simon, no I wouldn’t do that – Steve’s a *Crapenter*.”
“Oh thankyou Bob!, say no more!”.
Of course, it will be only the grains of the hourglass will tell us all,
If this *Crapenters* idea gains a foothold in the general lexicon.
Call me a Woodrow Wilson-esque dreamy cloud-headed idealist,
But I reckon it’ll eventually catch on.
But not untill the year 2055.
For by then surely the AI-General-Intelligence-Robots will be a laugh-a-minute,
Much to the chagrin, of their pinkish & hairy subordinates wearing loincloth.
By Martin Anton Smith
They had gone to a lot of trouble.
They’d found the essence of their thoughts.
The essence was roughly an even split,
Between frontal lobe firings,
And the stuff that conjures up onto the page from seemingly nowhere.
Yes, this ‘conjuring up’ is an artistic cliche, but it’s still a true phenomenon.
So, they captured their truth – they wrote it down, whittled it some more or some less.
They read it out loud, their works showed that they had succeeded.
In knowing who they are,
& courageously showing you their fine wares.
How do you know this?
There’s a certain energy that pervades to the reading & artistic words.
It is a signature if you will.
You hear & feel the signature, & there is no question –
The artist made something from nothing –
It is an alchemy of warmth rooted in a private truth.
It’s a pity the un-listeners missed it all.
But I shouldn’t complain – this is the nature of the ‘audience’.
Some are there to learn from ye, some are there to burn-ye,
Some are there to dig-ye, some are there to shout at ye.
It is indeed a ‘two sides of the same coin’ apparition.
Alas alas & yes it be,
At an the open mic poetry night,
You cannot pick your audience,
And they cannot pick thee.
So the dissapointment is democritised.
It’s designed to be a masochist’s wet dream.
When something bad happens everyone loves it –
When something good happens – everyone hates it –
& on balance, everyone leaves satisfied.
by Martin Anton Smith
It had been a hard year for me & the other Hospo P.O.W’s. – just like all of us everywhere, and throughout time who know our gladiator’s game.
It was now almost all over, bar the work-day today, & then our staff party would go down. The coffees that day had flown out the door – some literally as was this particular cafe-restaurant’s tradition on its last day of the year.
And as always – what an uneventfully eventful year it had been. The wine glasses had been polished & repolished a million times. Sixty-five million crumbs had fallen off our seventeen swanky restaurant & thirty-one cafe dining tables. One thousand & fifteen raised voices had broken out. One hundred & eighty-five ‘Customer to Staff Chastisations’ or as the boss called them ‘CSC’s’ had appeared – this was when bad tempered customers went off at us verbally. That said, that was a relatively low number & due to our professionalism, only in 3 instances had things gone in the other direction – a staff verbally berating a customer. We low paid customer service oiks had on the whole expert emotional control.
Now let me continue with numbers. Ninety-three plates & two-hundred & three glasses had been destroyed. Nine-thousand mains had been served; sixteen-thousand snacks menu items & one-hundred & fifty-one-thousand alcoholic vessels served. The head chef Nicole had only ‘beaten up’ the sous chef Tim just once this year – though like all Chefs the bark was always worse than the bite, which she actually did once – at least so the legend went. There were two hundred & forty five hours of overtime issued.
Unofficially It was rumoured there were three instances of inter-staff bathroom coitus events. And for all the numbers, only two staffers had quit. Yes, there had been the usual staff competitiveness, but no more than you’re usual ‘hospo’ joint. In short, banter was good, banter was had, banter was enjoyed.
In the pressure cooker world of hospo, you had to be able to give shit, receive it & then throw it back out the window. We were all good at that. We had to be. The wages had of course been shit, but we modern day downtrodden P.O.W slash serfs can’t ask for more – after all – why would we waste our time? This kind of profession allows for only a meagre existence, & pay rises are as rare as hens teeth with an extra row of mini hen’s teeth sprouting on them.
These are the brute facts of our battle conditions. No – we don’t want sympathy, but we want people to know our plight. As they say – a little knowledge gos a long way.
Our serf’s profit comes not from cash but from experiences – from our exuberant social lives – & it’s been this way for millennia. Yes, sometimes it’s all too wild, namely the late nights, the substances & the hangovers – but we’ll all stop when we’re all thirty five & retired from the frontline battlegrounds anyway.
And so back to the story – the after party for us was set be as they say ‘a real cracker’.
We didn’t have much to look forward to in general, but we always looked forward to this kind of thing – our premier staff party night. We would use it to blow out the demons of the last year, & welcome the new ones coming, & usually these things became unofficial farewells too, given the nature of turnover in the industry. It was the same at every year end staff party everywhere in every cafe pub restarant or club in the world.
Our Owner-Manager boss Gavin allowed us limitless free alcohol & a day off the next day – I mean what could go wrong with that scenario? Our wealthy sometimes-a-gentleman owner at the very least made sure he treated us well on this day, once a year.
Yes, it was to be our day in the sun & no one had yet taken it away from us – if they did it would be true sacrilidge, & that’s no exaggeration.
The longest shift of the year was always the last shift, before the party. The anticipation of it was laced in the air as we plied our trade washing dishes, serving vacant looking over-tired customers, frothing cofees, flipping steaks and setting tables.
The clock finally struck ten pm, & we all finally finished for the day, having kicked the last of the dangling hanger on big drinker customers out. Yes siree! It was Party time for us serfs & P.O.W’s! We the modern downtrodden could rise up for a few glorious hours of merriment!
We filed in to the main restaurant tables filled with overflowing booze @ snacks. We chatted snacked & talked of the year & how fast it had evaporated before our eyes. The great thing about War and or crap jobs like ours – for aren’t they versions of each other? – is always the camaraderie. Every slogger or digger knows, you can’t get the same camaraderie outside shit jobs or War itself.
After only a couple of drinks each, Gavin soon piped up with his ‘yearly owner-manager speech’.
Gavin was about sixty, businessmen plump, bald with pug-like features, always immaculately dressed. As always, he coughed a few times to clear his throat. This made him seem like an old English lord so we called him Lord Gavin, behind his back of course. And so the Lord himself began began his words.
“Well staff, I’d like to thank you all for a great great, record breaking year –
I won’t tell you what our sales were –
For then you’d surely ask for a pay rise”
We all half laughed, but we were sighing on the inside – being low on the social totem pole, we all had very fraught financial lives. We were definitely what you might call hand to mouthers.
But we were all young, so our delusions of the future kept our minds afloat. Some of of still believed they’d get rich one day.
Gavin continued on, his chrome dome was as usual glistening with minor nerve sweat.
“We’ve had three new employees this year & oh how a delight they’re all been….
We’ve managed a small renovation in the Restaurant….
Yes, it looks great & thanks to tilly for mounting that beautiful ornamental lampshade….”
Tilly blushed a scarlet color, not that you’d know with the lighting so low.
Gavin continued, taking a hanky out to wipe his forehead.
“We sold ten percent more wine this year….
That was thanks to Greg our micro brewer, & his tasty new brew…
Ah Greg a great Ale – but why, I wonder did you called it Sucker Time Ale?…
Still – they buy it at fifteen ninety a Pint don’t they?!”
Greg one of the older ones at thirty seven, doubled over himself slapping his legs.
Greg our 5-foot, 55 kg micro brewer then piped up confidently:
“Well, I wanted a play on words of that favourite saying –
‘there’s a sucker born every minute’ so Sucker Time Ale seemed a great name”
All us workers laughed roaringly – because we knew how our alcohol prices were & partly because we knew we were suckers too.
Gavin kept it short & said his last words of the opening act.
“And so to all staff, I’d love to thank you – we couldn’t be here without you –
Beers don’t pour themselves…
Steaks don’t cook themselves…
Plates don’t wash themselves…
Tables don’t clean themselves…
Customers don’t serve themselves…
& until the Muskobite AI Hospo Robot 1000 that I pre-ordered arrives in 2032 – all that won’t change at all!”
Gavin said the last line quite theatrically but his timing was a little laboured, & his voice squeaked a little at the end. But all in all it wasn’t bad. We still all laughed heartilly – mostly at him, but partly with him. Despite his flaws, Lord Gavin could be funny at times. I’ll give him that.
The next five hours was a blur of alcohol & ratcheting upwards, drunken raucius conversations & frivolity. It was all pretty stock standard stuff:
At some point people started dancing on tables. At some point a female started crying over a relationship matter. Someone broke a tray of steamed glasses. There were a few pashings & gropes. . .& why not? After all, Pashing & Gropes make the best Gin & tonic – do they not?
Then midnight arrived with the swiftness of a hungry cheetah. Now would come the wild fun of our traditional years end party game – all the staff excluding top level managers played “Musical Chairs”. They those hoity toity’s, though they were few & far between would always stand by the walls staring at us like vampires. This year the only one other than Gavin was Leonard – Gavin’s long term, loyal, & very praying-mantis-looking blond youngish middle-aged accountant.
Gavin was about to push play on the music for musical chairs when he was interrupted. Leonard with giant loping strides had wandered over, out from his vampiric wallflower spot. Yes, he was looking grim – but then again, he always looked grim, so I & the others weren’t yet worried. We should have been.
Leonard, crane-like leaned over & whispered in Gavins Ear. This was when we all started to worry & mutter to each other that something was probably up. It now had that air to it. We didn’t know it, but Leonard & Gavin’s conversation had gone down like this, all done with mostly inaudible whispers:
“Sorry Gavin, I was to tell you this earlier – sorry but I got held up with the exact figures”.
“Figures Lenny, what figures – I thought we’d sorted the figures & all was great?”
“Well, Gavin I made an error – I forgot about an important expense – that bloody fancy lampshade”.
“What? The $1000 dollar lampshade – that imported thing – what about it?”
“Well, I accidentally bought the diamond lampshade instead of the faux diamond one – it’s worth $30,000 & that’s what was deducted from our account”.
Gavin’s face went from alcoholic red to pale that of a typical grey alien.
“So Leonard what the fuck exactly, are you telling me?”
“Well, we can’t get a refund as the Italian company’s gone under & we can’t resell that lampshade easily – but I’ve got a quick nasty solution…”
“Damn you Leonard…what is it then..come on, tell me!!”
“So…if we fire one staff member for a year, we’ll all be square”.
“But Leonard you moron – who will do the fired one’s work?”
“Easy just get the remaining ones to all work seven percent harder – y’know – ‘spread the load’ “.
Gavin’s mind ticked over. The pools of sweat continued to drip & hit the growing sweat puddle on the floor between his fancy shoes. He couldn’t fire Leonard – that would cost him ten times as much. Knowing that, he made a quick exec decision. He thanked Leonard shooed him away with his hand. He now stood bolt upright & addressed us now nervously waiting ashen faced plebs. Our drunkenness & smiles had worn off entirely. Despite his now military posture, he spoke gingerly. Sweat still pouring off his dome but now going down his chin to be absorbed by his crisp white shirt.
“Er…ahh..ok…sorry about that staff – nothing’s the matter really other that one small thing. We have an error in our sales bookkeeping from the last financial year….look I won’t bore you with details….and I hate to tell you this under these circumstances…but the long & short of it is one of you have to go”.
There were gasps all around, murmurs & a few cries. We couldn’t believe it. Even though we were all still all young to youngish, we were all well too life wounded already to fight against it. Also we all knew each of us had a less than 10% chance of being the unlucky one.
Gavin then cheerily said something even we young old timers were surprised at.
“Now let’s get back to our Musical chairs – only this time instead it has real stakes…the first one to not get a chair will lose their job immediately, and then get $500 severance pay”.
The stunned mullet-ness hang in the air for what seemed like forever. I looked over at Sally, she was overweight she was crying lightly – she knew she might not get a chair. I looked over at Craig – he had a gammy leg & now a deep frown – he knew he might not get a chair. I looked over at Tilly – she was tiny & easy bumped away – she was sobbing – she might not get a chair. Everyone else also looked nervous despite no obvious disability or impairments – they all knew they all had a chance to be the one fired.
Of course we could have mass protested. But no one piped up. We all had learnt to be helpless, like the twenty first century serfs we deep down knew we were. Then sometime welled up inside me. A feeling of courage. I had never had much of it – it was an intoxicating feeling.
Gavin pushed play on the music button – it was the music was Wagner. We all walked around the chairs, circling like buzzards, sobbing & wailing, shoulders drooped, barely lifting our feet above the ground. We were like POW’s on a long march.
Finally, the bombastic Wagnerian music used during ‘The Third Reich’ stopped. Gavin’s index finger had spoken, his wiggly fat faux sword of Damocles had come down on us. Everyone scrambled to the seats like mad men & mad women. But I didn’t go for a seat at all – I simply kept walking, cool as a cucumber straight towards the exit door about a full ten paces away.
While those long paces counted down, I felt good. The feeling of self-sacrifice for the betterhood of my community was like an elixir. I knew that now my mental & spiritual deadwood would be sliced off, removed, & then a gracious metamorphosis would begin. I would suddenly unlearn my learned helplessness. I knew in that heated emotional hurricane that I’d never see these people or this town again – I’d make sure of that. I told myself that while my heart was beating like a thudding bass drum.
As I was one pace from the door, there was only one more thing to do. I turned around & looked at Lord Gavin & said without pointing & with confidant, measured, & gravitas infused words:
“Fuck you Gavin you tinpot fake Hitler Fuckwit”
Then I turned my head toward the door to traverse the last step to exit – then I turned my head back towards them again – I’d forgitten to ear bash Leonard too.
“Fuck you too Leonard – I know your a snakey prick!”.
Leonard guiltily averted my eyes & stared at his shoes for all his status he was now a naught little schoolboy being told off by the rightfully mad teacher.
I was glad I hadn’t let Leonard off the hook – those sneaky political types love to hide in the shadows, I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.
I took the last step opened the door & then slammed it with all my animalistic fury…it made a dirty great
BANG!!!
Sure, with my “big exit” I had sacrificed some decorum – but equally It’s always wise to add a little truth- laden-spices to the mix of work life. That slammed door was maybe the most loudly slammed door in History. Yes, dear reader – I went out with a bang, as every self-respecting POW should. I’ll hang my hat on a heavily slammed door any day of the week.
I’d like to say that after swearing & slamming that door my life changed immeasurably & I rose up the social ladder, became rich, flew out to a new town, got married to a catch & even had two point one kids. I’d like to report that.
I’d like to report that I finally threw of the shackles of all that learned helplessness & modern-day serfdom away – i’d like to report that too. Unfortunately this is the real world & not a crap hollwood movie. So that good stuff didn’t happen – I just found a new restaurant & a new ‘Gavin’, a new Leonard & a new ‘crew’ of fellow POW’s slash modern day serfs in a nearby town. I dug in like the seasoned profesional serf-soldier I was.
Of course, I knew that after a honeymoon period the same kind of crap stuff as before would happen again. It would be simply be a slightly rehashed version of what was. I had come to realise that ‘modern serfdom’ is for most a permanent affliction. it comes with deaths & rebirths akin to a life lived in a series of parallel universes.
So yes, I am at peace with my serfdom.
They do say a change is as good as a holiday – & at least us modern day serfs & hospo staff are still allowed to cut, run & restart. I think it’s fair – all we ask for is to die & be reborn & steal a few laughs & maybe a few drinks along the way. We are too battle-hardened & so realistic, to expect anything more.
Eventually, given enough years – we even grow to love the Lord Gavin’s & Leonard’s of our world. Yes, the Gavin’s & Leonard’s of the world will always take things away from us with one hand, but we also always knew they’d first give us something with the other first.
Life, you see – is all about having correct expectations & knowing when to walk & when to stay. Get that right & no one can touch you.
For ours is a modern-day serf’s story – a Hospo P.O.W’s lament.
Some of us are even smart enough to write about it all when we are finally out of the game. A much smaller slice some of you, are even more smart to actually read it.
And for that , we thank you – it’s nice to be heard.
The End.
Anton Martin Smith Writer 