Friday, March 23, 2007

The face of change

Philip grabbed his chipped Caribou mug from his night stand and jabbed it under Mr. Coffee’s nasal drip without bothering to wash out yesterday’s black ring. The mindless drip grew into a weak stream that felt like a mocking indictment, as if it were his life’s blood leaking through the beans - being strained of any value. Phil was not a fan on Mondays.

He didn’t hold it against the Mondays, it wasn’t their fault that they were followed by four other mind numbing week days, just like it wasn’t his fault that he was always followed around by four mind numbing nitwits who called themselves CPAs, but probably couldn’t spell it. King Philip the 1st, emperor of a raindrop called the auditing department of Logicons R&D division.

Oooh-rah.

Mr. Coffee gave a last wet gasp and Phil pulled out his cup wondering if its stimulating effect might be heightened by skipping the part where he dumped it down his throat and simply poured it down his pants. Could he get disability for that and stay home? Phil knew he needed a change.

Attempting to button up his white collar with one hand, Phil wondered if change was possible; real change, not just changing from Dentine to Juicy Fruit, but genuine, paradigm shifting, earth shattering change. Hand slipping, Phil sloshed a wave of coffee onto his clean-ish white shirt.

At least I get to change my shirt; he thought bitterly and began the process of one hand unbuttoning. The coffee stayed in the hand, it was a rule.

Phil was about half way to work before he realized that his neighbor Ron had clearly possessed two heads. Not like, a mannequin head under one arm or some kind of two faced makeup, but genuinely had two heads, each just off center of the top of his torso, each with its own neck, each with its own goatee.

It was not until Phil raced into his office to share this startling observation with his newly two-headed coworkers that Phil felt deep down in his soul that change, real change, was possible. Holy crap.

-Brihack

1 comment:

Bryan Mahoney said...

Wow. Dude. Wow. You somehow made hte mundane beautiful. That was, bar none, some of the best writing we've seen. Just the right amount of personification; not too much where it's him vs. the world. He's very much a part of it, but just different enough. Then the ending! Wow.