Blog #8

Bartleby, the Scrivener

For this week I would like to explore Herman Melville's story of Bartleby, the Scrivener. The first thing that came to my mind when reading this story was all the weird people I have worked with over the years. I think it's some kind of rule that no matter what kind of work you do or what kind of organization you work for, you will always have to deal with strange co-workers. By the way, for personal reasons, mainly because I'm afraid some of these cats might read this and come hunt me down, I won't divulge any names of people I mention or the name of the organizations I worked for. One of my favorite examples of a really weird person I worked with, was at my last job where this one guy would sit in the back of the lunch room everyday and talk to himself about vampires and werewolf's. Ya, I'm not making this up folks, and this is years before Twilight, so he wasn't just a hardcore Edward or Jacob fan! There are people at my current job who are definitely out there as well. One person that comes to mind is always reminding everyone to cut the RFID tags off your clothes so the government would be able to track your moves. What is it with these people??? I'm sure many of you have a number of similar examples about people you work with that are strange, but unlike Bartleby, the ones I have mentioned have not ended up in prison and starved themselves to death, yet. It is my opinion though, that Bartleby's issues were driven by the sometimes overwhelming pressures and burdens that work can put on us. There have definitely been times in my life when I have felt like just giving up on my career and walking out the door due to stress or major demands on performance. However, it has never escalated to the point where I gave up on life, just as Bartleby did. One the other hand, it may have something to do with undesirable work such as working in the Dead Letters Office, as Bartleby did. Social workers and heath care workers are said to have high rates of depression. Could this be due to dealing with death and painful situations on a daily basis? I think the answer is obvious. One thing that I have had to learn the hard way, is that you cannot take your work home with you. If you do, you may soon find yourself in Bartleby's shoes.