Rich Man's Purgatory

So I’m driving like a maniac down the highway yesterday morning, fighting against all the other rats on the treadmill to punch a clock by the appointed time decreed by my masters. Yes, I’m in my forties, have a wife and two young children, have a home and $400,000 worth of debt, and now my number one goal in life is to stay off the Tardy Report. Normally I’m punctual as can be, but this week I have to drop my children off at day care, way out of my way, and one of those childrens is not digging the whole day care thing too much.

After I rush like crazy to sit dead still on line for an off-ramp, I reflect upon the dualities of modern American economic life. Now, I’m not one for all that class warfare stuff. I think that angle is just a smokescreen for other agendas. But there is undoubtedly a chasm in our society. Whether it’s widening or not, I don’t know. I’m just very aware of it, I guess, because now, at this stage of my life, I seem to be right in the thick of it.

There are rich people out there. No doubt about it. I see a couple every day of my working life. I’ve dealt with them on a daily basis. They drive nice cars and wear nice clothes and live in nice houses and generally have a nice outlook on life, as long as their economic foundation is not threatened in any way.

They do not worry about Tardy Reports. They are the ones who look at Tardy Reports.

Then there are people like me. I work a very difficult job as best I can for a meager wage, simply to pay the bills. And pay the bills my income does, barely. Just barely. It almost doesn’t pay to work, but it does, however slight, so work I do. If I work long enough and hard enough, eventually things will pay off, but I can’t seem to muster such long-term vision at the moment.

Taking a somewhat biblical outlook, I imagine how it might be divine justice if a rich man could walk in my shoes for a month or two. Just to know how we “little people” think and feel about life and work. I wonder that Purgatory for a rich man might just be living like me, check to check, month to month, bill to bill, nervous all the time that the ever-growing expenses might one day soon overtake the never-growing income.

Then, with horror, I realize ...

What if I’m a rich man doing time in Purgatory ? ? ?