Work Shmerk

Here's the primary difference between Baby Boomers and everyone else born since their Reign of Terror began:

The rest of us don't define ourselves by our jobs. They do. It's as simple as that. To them, flipping burgers at McDonald's would be a "Career". To us, it's a paycheque till we can find something better.

WE are totally not cool with the whole "sacrifice our lives in favour of the 60-70 hour workweek" thing. Neither are we cool with the idea of doing just that for what, 30 years (longer for us, thanks to your absorption of any government pension funds and health care we might have enjoyed had you lot not come along...thanks to the Boomers, we have to work longer just to make sure we can survive the retirement we will probably never get. Bitter? Oh...a TAD!) or so, only to wake up one day in our declining years wondering why our kids and spouses don't want anything to do with us. Wow. Can't imagine why, huh?

The conundrum is how it happened to you in the first place what with all your protests in the '60s about free love, freedom of this, freedom of that. Freedom isn't free, my friends. Turns out, you CAN'T have it all. For what you want most, there must be sacrifices made. In the case of many Baby Boomers, they've sacrificed entirely the wrong things.

Regardless, my point is this: while we may never successfully achieve the balance between work and life, we strive to find it. We don't perceive our jobs as the definition of who we are as people. You think St. Peter - or whomever is waiting for you on the other side of this life - really gives a fig how much money you made for your nameless, faceless corporation? At the end of that you get what, a gold watch, maybe a pat on the back, an empty house and loveless marriage. Awesome.

The way you gotta look at it is this: if you're doing it for money, then you're just whoring yourself out anyway. May as well spend the time and energy on what you REALLY love, and do only your mediocre best at work. You know. Just enough to say that you did something, but not enough where you're so tapped that you have nothing left for the really important things in your life. And while you're at it, try and get as much money as you can, i.e. match the dough with the ho.