I had a thought today, which of late seems to be near-miraculous, given the assiduous nature of my life at present. I've been bombarded by an intense air of deceit at the workplace. Deception of any sort always seems to set me off. The duplicitous and oft times malicious nature of intra-office politics is and always has been  extremely disconcerting for me. It is difficult at times to refrain from speaking with a 'forked tongue' in the direction of these childish fucks and subsequently watching their lives fall into impoverished, ruin with a certain schadenfreude until they get the message. In my younger days I'd have lost patience by now...

I had to see a member of my team sacked yesterday. Poor Joan, she couldn't have won any popularity contest had she tried. Why should she have to? Singled out by the pack I suppose as weak and deformed, she was picked apart. Now I work with a number of patients of different faiths in my line of work. As a nurse specialized in hospice and palliative care for the terminally ill, one might imagine that colleagues are all as compassionate. They are not. Oh they pretend to be, but, for example, when the Chaplain asked me about the belief of one of my patients and I responded that he his Buddhist I got the response, "Oh... that's a shame", whilst shook his head and looked as though he felt sorry. 

I am subjugated though.  Every morning at the office is begun with a saccharine prayer to Christ whilst we all hold hands and smile. Yet at the behest of their perception of righteousness moments later they viciously gossip and deceptively smile. Joan tried being herself and herself did not fit into their ideal. She refused to wear camouflage and now she is gone.

I can be no better than them. I must wear a disguise as they do, albeit for different reasons. I must falsely smile and pretend to agree. If I am to continue to be there for the dying and to help them cross their own boundaries, as I am called to do, I must do it under cover of darkness as I suppose the ancestors before me have done at times.   

I am a fool, walking backwards and yet I love my fate.