"Excelsior!" continued
Previous pageAnd me. Two hours melted away as we chatted and nodded over our drinks. It is amazing how much a man and a woman can talk away time without ever accomplishing anything. Over that time we touched on the high and the low. She was sure that Marx in Das Kapital had first exposed the abuse of labor by the Haves, I countered with Hobbes’ Leviathan. She stood defiant in her error. But sometimes you win when you lose. I thought I’d try to explain the reality of rating a worker. The point is that if you are a squeaky wheel, you are demanding some grease. You are alerting us that there is something different, if not something completely WRONG, about you. Your squeak = labor + the cost of the grease..., I tried. She let it fly by. She chose instead to go back to Reed. “Darling…you never answered my question." Didn’t I? What, about Reed? Well…I was just refreshing my memory. “Memory? Memory of what?” Of the Russian Revolution. “Why on earth that? God how droll,” she said, sneer-smirking with that loose lock of hair teasing an eyebrow. Kitty, Kitty! “All power to the Soviets!” Have you forgotten? That Democratic Socialists of America platform? I mean, their plan is RIGHT out of Bolshevik Russia 1917! She stood up abruptly, and said slyly, “no”, held her hands lightly to her ears to call an end to the talk. While I tried to figure out to what she had said “no”, she fished for my fingers with hers. When she had two, she wrapped them up in a soft fist, and pulled me forward. I had been transformed into the hunted from the ‘maybe-hunter’ role by her absolute and unquestionably powerful feminine guile. I followed her into her bedroom, not condemned, not a supplicant, but somewhere in between; not running, but holding back just a tad–for sport. She looked languidly backward, closed the door to her cream and gold appointed room with its brocaded maroon curtains. A piquant hint of patchouli hung aloft. A queen bed lolled before us unimpressed. She let go of my hand, took something purple and sheer out of the room’s closet, and waved backwards at me as she entered the bathroom. “Stay put, now, Zeke! (I was fine with Zeke. It’s short for Ezekiel). She wasn’t gone long; the version that returned wore the sleek royal purple negligee with leopard-like lines rippling with every move. There are times when I take orders well.Next page
Previous pageAnd me. Two hours melted away as we chatted and nodded over our drinks. It is amazing how much a man and a woman can talk away time without ever accomplishing anything. Over that time we touched on the high and the low. She was sure that Marx in Das Kapital had first exposed the abuse of labor by the Haves, I countered with Hobbes’ Leviathan. She stood defiant in her error. But sometimes you win when you lose. I thought I’d try to explain the reality of rating a worker. The point is that if you are a squeaky wheel, you are demanding some grease. You are alerting us that there is something different, if not something completely WRONG, about you. Your squeak = labor + the cost of the grease..., I tried. She let it fly by. She chose instead to go back to Reed. “Darling…you never answered my question." Didn’t I? What, about Reed? Well…I was just refreshing my memory. “Memory? Memory of what?” Of the Russian Revolution. “Why on earth that? God how droll,” she said, sneer-smirking with that loose lock of hair teasing an eyebrow. Kitty, Kitty! “All power to the Soviets!” Have you forgotten? That Democratic Socialists of America platform? I mean, their plan is RIGHT out of Bolshevik Russia 1917! She stood up abruptly, and said slyly, “no”, held her hands lightly to her ears to call an end to the talk. While I tried to figure out to what she had said “no”, she fished for my fingers with hers. When she had two, she wrapped them up in a soft fist, and pulled me forward. I had been transformed into the hunted from the ‘maybe-hunter’ role by her absolute and unquestionably powerful feminine guile. I followed her into her bedroom, not condemned, not a supplicant, but somewhere in between; not running, but holding back just a tad–for sport. She looked languidly backward, closed the door to her cream and gold appointed room with its brocaded maroon curtains. A piquant hint of patchouli hung aloft. A queen bed lolled before us unimpressed. She let go of my hand, took something purple and sheer out of the room’s closet, and waved backwards at me as she entered the bathroom. “Stay put, now, Zeke! (I was fine with Zeke. It’s short for Ezekiel). She wasn’t gone long; the version that returned wore the sleek royal purple negligee with leopard-like lines rippling with every move. There are times when I take orders well.Next page
"Stay, Zeke!"
6.