I often describe myself as a recovering bureaucrat. What I mean by that is that I'm tired of "working for the man" and am moving on to more fulfilling things. One could argue (if one used male God language) that I'm switching gears to "working for THE Man."
But what a day like today tells me is that I'm REALLY GOOD at being a bureaucrat. I may not enjoy it, but if I'm honest a part of me does. After all, little Susan Rose used to beg her mom to take her into work with her so she could pretend at being a government worker. Sad but true.
I have perfected the art of the really friendly yet stern letter (you failed to do x, y, z - but it's ok, this nice bureaucrat lady will help you get into compliance). I am my own good and bad cop. I am extremely talented at taking amorphous policy goals and translating them into nuts and bolts rules and procedures. I can create, interpret and enforce red tape. Heck, I've even had people apologize when they've sued me (not really sued me, sued the government agency I work for but I've been the named defendant twice, and both times got the "we're sorry" line).
So it's interesting. I will miss this place on some level.
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